Retracing the Steps: The Mini's Latest Doings

Oh man, I'm so behind on this! Let's see if I can do a quick blog post to get myself a tad bit caught up on all this Tiny One has been up to...

Crawling

She started crawling in May, and now will scootch herself along at tremendous speeds. I am forever telling her 'no-no' and picking her up to move her back. She especially likes the recycling bin and the cat food area (even though we've removed both food and water to another location at this point). She especially DOES NOT like being put in the exersaucer or bouncer...She will stiff-arm and stiff-leg me and cry until my heart bleeds sometimes to keep from being put in either of those, unless I bribe her with a few cheerios in the tray. ;) Fortunately, she doesn't seem to mind the baby fence as much, and will play happily inside the little pen I make for most of my meal-prep time. She can get up on her knees and she'll rock back and forth or pick up a hand or knee or even stand up on her feet while she's on her hands, putting her little butt high in the air like a Downward Dog pose, but she won't actually CRAWL on her hands and knees. Any time she wants to move, she drops back down to her belly...just like her sister. Looks like I have yet another Swiffer...

Sitting up

She first held herself in a sitting position at the beginning of April, but it took her a couple months at least to really figure out how to keep from wobbling. Just within the last couple of weeks, she's started figuring out how to push herself up to sitting by herself, and now she's starting to try to pull herself up on things...mostly on me. That coordination isn't quite there yet, though--she needs quite a bit of balancing to actually do it...but she does so love to be upright.

Teeth

She has 8 teeth. EIGHT. And she's had them since July. When the Munch turned 1, she still only had 7. And BOY does she know how to use them (though usually not on me!)! She is sooo good at chewing. Cheerios, cut up fruits or cooked veggies, pasta, rice...she can even take bites of animal crackers or apple slices if I hold them for her. Even though these teeth popped out so quickly, she did not teeth easily. I am strongly considering purchasing one of those amber necklaces for her, because any time she was actively teething, none of us got any sleep and all of us were miserable. Supposedly, the next set of teeth isn't due until at least 12 months...with my luck, she'll probably be working on them by 11 months... But on the plus side, her adorable smile is now even MORE adorable! :D

Talking

The Mini is our quiet one (relatively). For a while when she was 6 months or so old, she would babble away with Ma-ma-ma-ma-ma, or even cry 'Ma!' when she wanted something, which was awesome and thrilling because the Munch took FOR-E-VER to figure out how to make the 'M' sound (she was all about the Da-da-das). But then she just stopped. She barely said anything, except of course the sounds needed for crying. Just recently, she's started to make new sounds, and now she'll babble away (when the mood strikes her) with ah-wa-wa-ah-ba, etc. :) Not much 'ma' and no 'da' at all, but if you say 'ah' back to her, she'll get a HUGE grin on her face, and say 'ah' again, and you can have a darling little conversation with her for a minute or so.

Things She Loves

Water. Water. Water. She's a little fish. My nanny family has a neighboring family who set up a pretty deep pool every summer in their backyard, and it's the highlight of our days there (if the weather cooperates) to go over for a swim. We've purchased a baby float so the Mini can join us, and even though she doesn't like getting put into it, she starts waving her arms up and down excitedly the moment she IS in it, so that she can splash the water. She already knows how to kick her legs to make her float move. If I hold her by her tummy outside of the float, she pumps her legs and arms like she's swimming...and she's already figuring out how to climb OUT of the float...yes, I watch her like a hawk! Bath time is more of the same...I need a waterproof apron. I really do. I've learned to spread towels around the entire circumference of the sink, because she WILL splash, and those splashes will NOT be small, and WILL result in much water on the counters if I don't lay down towels. I feel like I'm bathing a dog sometimes, I get so wet!

The cats. No surprise there. She tries to follow them, just like the Munch did, and she loves to chew on their tails if they'll let her...and Stevie and Graham usually do. She's already gotten much more gentle with them, which is so cool to see, and there have been times when she's found one of them in an unexpected place and gotten really excited about it.

Other animals in general. Our nanny family found a black and white bunny roaming free in their neighborhood shortly after Easter (yep, my thoughts too), and rescued her. The Mini is FASCINATED by her, and is forever trying to go over to her little pen to get closer to her (yet another 'no-no' moment). The one time we let the bunny, Dash, out of her pen when the Mini was up, though, Dash bit the Mini's little finger (she hasn't done that to anyone else, and is a super-sweet rabbit...baby fingers must just smell really, really good...). So she is a no-touch animal that the Mini yearns greatly to touch. Other animals she's seen and also wanted to touch include dogs, birds, squirrels, basically anything that moves. Life is amazing to her, clearly. :)

Food. I haven't yet found a food I couldn't get her to like. Some of them took a few tries--fruits originally were not a favorite, although she scarfs them down now. She has quite the appetite, and is figuring out how to ask for things...no words, of course, but she'll grunt at me and LOOK at something, like her sippy, or the cup that holds the food I'll put on her tray, and there is great meaning in that grunt and look. I can tell now when she's thirsty during a meal, and she's almost got the sippy figured out at this point so I no longer have to hold it when I give it to her. I basically just keep putting food on her tray, offering the sippy now and again, and I can eat my own meal in relative peace and her stuff all disappears. I love that this happened so early on, for both my girls.

More Pictures

A few other sweet moments:

7 months old.