A girl through and through

So we've officially entered a new stage with Samantha. One that I had been warned about and am now seeing first hand what it is like.

A good friend, who has 4 year old twin girls (okay, it is Heather) used to tell me in great detail how her girls would change their clothes 2, 3, or even 4 times a day - just because. Ha! I couldn't even get Ian (who is 6 months older) to put on one outfit, let alone willingly want to change his clothes throughout the day. This was definitely not an area I could relate to...until now.

Several times during the past couple of weeks Samantha had been taking off her pants and diaper at the end of her afternoon nap. I was used to this from when Ian was doing it around the same age. Hence the reason we now find the video monitor to be the single most important baby gear ever invented. Once you see the stripping starting you can rush in and save yourself a huge mess to clean up; and I mean HUGE!

But yesterday Sam realized she could take her clothes removal skills to the next level and surprised me and Ian with a new look. During the late afternoon she went upstairs to her room on her own. After a few minutes she emerged with her brown pants completely off and a denim skirt now on. The skirt was on backwards, but that was a small technicality given that it was hard to tell which side was what. The inside of the skirt has built in shorts and she managed to expertly get her legs in the correct holes. I was very impressed at this level of coordination at only 20 months of age.

The cutest thing about this was what happened directly after when I discovered what she had done. She made motions for me to follow her and lifted the lid to her clothes hamper to show me that she put her brown pants in the dirty clothes pile. How adorable is that!?!?!?

Maybe because she is just starting this behavior, or maybe because she put the clothes she took off in the hamper, or maybe because I love her independence, or maybe because she is so darn cute, but I am not annoyed by this new stage at all. I know, give it time, right? But I'd like to think all of this practice will come in handy one day when she is famous, at the Academy Awards, and needs to put the outfit changing skills in action. :)