McKenna Pre-Toddler Summary: 15 Months Old

A full summary of life for this 15 month old. Find out what daily life was like and find a 15 month old sample schedule to follow.

Things have been good for McKenna the last couple of weeks. They have been kind of crazy with summer activities, but so far we have managed to pretty much keep her so she gets the sleep she needs for the most part. That won’t be the case all summer, but I am glad it has been thus far.

EATING

She is still eating a whole lot of food. I am really not exaggerating. People comment on it all the time. She loves to eat and eats a lot.

She had a couple of days where she slowed down, but then she jumped right back up again.

Someone pointed out that she never holds still, and that is true. For a girl, she is quite a mover. Even in my womb I knew she would be that way. She was a mover.

With Kaitlyn, I would reach the end of the day and realize I hadn’t felt her kick that day, so I would lay down and do the kick counts. I figured that was pregnancy with a toddler to chase.

Well, McKenna never left me wondering. She was sure to kick and kick hard. She is kind of a paradox. She will sit happily in your lap, but at the same time, she usually is at least waving a leg around in the air. She is constantly moving something around.

People around me who have seen the massive amounts of food she eats have been asking lately what her pooping is like. Ahh parents. Aren’t we funny?

So I thought maybe some of you are wondering. If not, then you aren’t fully grasping how much food she eats. Her poop amounts aren’t over the top. She poops three times a day and they aren’t huge. She just must have a fast metabolism and she is always moving something. My husband has a very fast metabolism, so I am guessing she got it too. Lucky girl. I wish I could eat like she does 🙂

Purees

McKenna has pretty much banned purees from her diet. Every so often you can get them in her, which I still attempt because she doesn’t like to eat whole green veggies. But most days, she just eats extra carrots, sweet potatoes (yams), or squash.

PLAYING

Things have been busy. There have even been most days she doesn’t have a chance for independent play. When I do it, she is still fine. I am hoping this week I can be sure to get it in there every day because it is something I do not like missing.

We have had morning swimming lessons, so that has taken from our independent play time. Then we have been busy during afternoon waketime and of course evening is family time….so this week our afternoons should be calm and we should work this in.

SLEEPING

No issues sleeping. At all. She is amazing.

So I shared about how we went camping and she slept until we woke her at 8:30 AM despite her noisy siblings by her. Amazing.

We went camping again this last weekend, and she again slept until 8:30, although this time she woke up on her own at 8:30. She is such a deep sleeper.

I started tracking her naps with the spreadsheet I made that I talked about last time. I am not tracking anymore because it was of no interest. Every day was “went down quickly. Slept until I woke her.” for both naps. She obviously is not at a point of needing to tweak naps at all right now.

COMMUNICATION

This last weekend, McKenna said her first sentence. “Hi Daddy.” She also said, “I did it!” but I am not so sure I would really count that as a sentence. I think in her mind, it is more of a single word. I am pretty shocked. I was telling a friend Friday she would be a later sentence speaker, and this is early. We will see what happens.

She doesn’t say a high number of words–she is pretty average. But she is progressing. And she is very good at communicating what she wants, with or without words.

She does mix up her sign language quite often. She is getting better with doing “all done” correctly, but if she is being impatient, “more” is pretty much signed to mean whatever she is thinking at the moment. You basically can tell with her eyes, but she is so good at non-verbals that even Brayden can tell you what her “more” means…more, all done, yeah…..

MINI-FITS

We still haven’t escalated to full fits yet. She pretty much growls when she is upset. She is pretty chill and willing to go with the flow.

If you tell her no, most of the time she is content to do something else instead. Yes, she is tenacious, but typically as she is trying over and over, she is laughing about it. She isn’t frustrated or upset. Then she moves on to something new. But at this point, she usually moves on to something new right away without a fight.

15 month old pretoddler schedule

SCHEDULE

Our schedule is different than usual right now:

8:30 AM–wake, get dressed, eat (fruit mixed with yogurt, oatmeal, milk). Go to swimming lessons.
10:20 AM–get home.
10:30 AM–nap.
12:30 PM–wake, lunch, sibling playtime. Independent playtime for one hour if we are home.
2:30 PM–nap
4:30-5:00 PM–wake, play until dinner time.
5:30ish PM–dinner with family. Finger foods and what we are having. She also has milk. Then time with family.
7:30 PM–Bath, PJs, story, prayers, bed.

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10 thoughts on “McKenna Pre-Toddler Summary: 15 Months Old”

  1. I'm curious about how much milk is McKenna drinking per day? My daughter is about a month younger and still has about 32 oz per day which seems like a lot to me. I'm wondering if I should try to push more food than milk? She still eats well I think.Thanks!

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  2. Is McKenna doing 1 hour IP in a pack n play/play pen? It seems like a long time in such a small space…but I don't know what to expect, so I was just wondering. My 12 month old does 35 minutes in a pack n play in her room. I guess I'm still working on increasing the time.

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  3. Hi there! From your schedule it looks like McKenna is getting 16-17 hours of sleep a day. Is that correct? My son is 14 months and he gets around 13-14 hours of sleep a day—is he getting too little sleep? He sleeps 11-12 hours at night (mostly 11) and takes 2 naps that range from 1 – 1 1/2 hours each. Do I need to make some changes?

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  4. I am just curious, I thought I read that you started to use white noise for McKenna, like a humidifier or something like that? Did I mix that up? So when you travel do you take a white noise machine or does she sleep deeply? I'm really surprised about how deeply she sleeps even traveling……I thought I heard that later kids tend to not sleep (at least nap) as well because there is more activity from the multiple other LO's to distract/interest them. So she almost seems like your best sleeper yet which is saying something as Kaitlyn is awesome! Wow! Watch out for #4, lol.

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  5. Kristen – my DD was drinking 28 oz of milk at 13-16 months of age. Over the last month, she began to refuse to eat her meals and became very picky. I decreased the milk to 20 oz for the last few weeks (she is now 17 months) and her eating has definitely picked up. She is less picky and will eat 3 decent meals a day. Indeed, my DD was drinking too much milk. You have to just see what is the "right" amount for you LO, but you don't want it to interfere with meals.

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  6. Kristin,She only drinks about 8 ounces a day. I also give her 3 ounces in her oatmeal. Then she gets about 4 ounces of dairy worth of yogurt and some cheese each day. The most basic average for milk consumption at this age is about 16-24 ounces. With Brayden and Kaitlyn, I did 24 ounces of milk, then they also ate further dairy beyond that. But McKenna just doesn't like to drink that much.I think most pedi's would say 32 ounces is too much per day, but I think it is a question you should ask your pedi. He/she can see your daughter and make an evaluation better that way.

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  7. Katy, yes, she is in the pack and play.At this age, both Kaitlyn and Brayden were in roomtime, but Kaitlyn's floor space in her room was really not much larger than a pack and play, so it wasn't that big of a difference. McKenna is still happy in the pack and play, so I will keep her there. There is a post called "independent playtime lengths" that tells you how long it should be based on age and physical ability.

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  8. Kristen, it looks like he is about on. His night sleep is right on. For naps, that is about right for that age, too. Sleep lengths vary. I suggest you see the post "dropping the morning nap: transition time." What I would shoot for right now based on what you have listed is about a 1 hour nap in the morning and a two hour nap in the afternoon.

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  9. YS, I do use a humidifier, but I don't take anything with me when I travel. She sleeps really deeply when she is sleeping for sure. I think many younger children don't sleep as well due to noise going on, but those who love to sleep seem to learn to just block it out. McKenna really loves to sleep. If Brayden had been #3, I would need some major white noise because he hates to miss a party 🙂

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