Elizabeth Ann Hart

The Nursery

Elizabeth is almost 18 months old now. A lot has happened over the past nine months. She now has a mouth full of teeth and she wants to walk everywhere. She had suffered more than her share of illness over the past month, but she is very healthy now. Among her favorite things to do are to go to the dump in Dad's truck on Saturday morning and to play peek-a-boo at the corner of the house.

Her favorite foods now include mostly fruits and vegetables - grapes, apples, pears, tomato, and cucumber - and spaghetti, but she also enjoys pancakes and sausages, too.

In April, Wendy hosted a delegation of visitors from Beijing, China at work. We invited them to our house for dinner one evening, and they made the dinner! There is a picture of Abigail helping make dumplings on her page. Elizabeth ate some of the rice and she enjoyed playing with Yan Wei.

We'd mentioned illness earlier. That happened shortly after the Chinese visitors were here. Dad was in New Orleans for work. He returned home about 1 AM Saturday morning after a late flight into Manchester to find no one at home except for a dog who was very glad to see him (and who badly wanted to be let out). The only hint as to where everyone was was a note stuck to the microwave door giving a hospital room number. After a paniced phone call, he learned that Elizabeth had gotten a stomach flu. She had not been able to keep anything down for a day and half and she had lost between 10 and 20 percent of her total body weight to dehydration. An IV and a night at the hospital was all she needed. She was able to return home Saturday afternoon. Wendy stayed at the hospital with Elizabeth and Abigail stayed with a friend.

Lissy walks - and climbs - everywhere, including places where she really should not be. She especially loves to climb. While preparing dinner a while ago, she was told that dinner would be ready soon. A minute or two later, she had climbed into a chair, and from there onto the table. She crossed the table and was reaching for the high-chair tray when she was rescued. She was hungary and she wanted to be in her high-chair ready for dinner!

With a big sister who loves to talk, it is no surprise that Elizabeth is talking a lot, too. A web site we found says that at 18 months, a child should have a vocabulary of about 20 words. Perhaps they are being conservative. A couple of weeks ago, Wendy gave up keeping the list of Lissy's vocabulary words that she had recently started. At that point the list contained about 200 words. Now Elizabeth is working on sentences. Favorite are "Abby (or Daddy) move" and "go out." She also knows her numbers. She counts to at least 6 and she knows the difference between 1, 2, and 3. If she asks for 2 or 3 crackers, and she gets the wrong number of them, she will be sure to let you know it.

Here is Elizabeth with Jenn, who takes care of her four days a week. Elizabeth enjoys her time with Jenn, who has been teaching her to count, among other things. Lissy also loves to use the phone. She now talks to people on the phone when she recognizes their voice. I think she is talking to her lawyer here. (;-)

Elizabeth is now 31 1/2" tall and nearly 23 lbs. at 17 months of age. There is still little change in the status of her kidney. The kidneys continue to function without a problem, but the doctor wants to continue watching them closely.

Here are earlier editions all the way back to her birth, if you haven't seen them yet.

The Front Door

Last Updated: 9/1/98

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