Things she says

tememos
This one is a good 6 weeks old. She was so proud of herself, using it CONSTANTLY. I'd walk in the door in the evening and she'd look all around for something. "Mami! Tememos... *grabs first toy she sees*... jirafa!"

Yo te cargo!
Of course, we ask her this *all the time*. So, when she wants Up, this is what she says. It's especially sweet when she's in tears, standing there with her arms up, offering to carry us.

Me ayudas!
If she wants help with something, she simply groans, "Ayuuuuuuda!!" (I don't know why the groaning. But it's always groaning.) But if she wants to participate in something (unloading of the dishwasher, for example), she comes running over, saying, "Help me!" as her offer to provide assistance.

No quieres.
In the same vein as above. When she's done with her plate, or decided she doesn't like whatever's on it, she picks it up with two hands and thrusts it in your direction, telling you about how you don't want it. She uses it to talk about her needs and wants other times too. She'll point to her chest and say, "*Her name* no quieres" if she's telling you about something she doesn't want, or something that she didn't want earlier that day. Interestingly, she rarely uses 3rd person with this one. For instance, she'll tell you about what her Cat in the Hat does or doesn't want, but she'll say "El gato no quieres..." She rarely makes that error with other verbs, but nearly always does with querer.

The Guajolotita makes 4 word sentences (and longer) as a matter of course now, almost always in the 3rd person. "El camion pasa por la calle," for instance (I'm counting that as a 3 or 4 word sentence - she uses the correct articles but I'm not gonna count them as separate words for this purpose.) There are also plenty of times that she sort of strings some nouns together and adds a verb, sometimes conjugated, sometimes not, to get her point across. She uses 1st person conjugations appropriately on a daily basis, but not *reliably*. That is, she might say "Quiero comer!" at one point during the day, but she will more frequently just holler, "Comer camote!" or "Comer avena con pasas!"

She seems to be starting to make the conjugations herself. As shown above, most of the time it's rote memorization, simply repeating back the phrase in its entirety however she hears it, which generally means incorrect conjugation. (She's not actually planning on carrying me.) But every day she tries it out on some of her most-used verbs (as you can guess, "comer" is one of those!). Juego, como, quiero... can't think of others just now.

Stupid Christmas ads

Things I do not want in our house:
- barbie anything
- disney anything
- any clothes with any licensed characters on them
- tutus
- princess anything
- baby dolls
- those hallmark book & toy sets I keep getting advertised on Hulu
- jewelry, purses, makeup, nailpolish for little girls
- any electronic toys
- those recordable books, except we will get one or two for family in Mexico to record stories on. Otherwise I think they are lazy - reading should be a bonding experience where the parent/grandparent is reading TO the child. Physically present.

The princess/baby doll stuff I know will happen in a couple of years, but right now she is thrilled with what she has - Pat the Bunny and the bear-like creature from Hop on Pop are her favorite stuffed animals. No need to coach her in the ways of girly crap - other little girls will unfortunately do that to her soon enough.

Sickness: pregnancy

Being deathly freakin ill for 7 weeks while caring for a sick toddler in the nights.

She spent her first fall sick the whole time too - 24 hrs of totally healthy before the next wave of boogers/flu/whatever hit. This is a fully vaccinated kid who plays outside EVERY day and eats all her veggies voluntarily. Fall is just her season to get sick I guess.

Her sleeping patterns had improved greatly - even occasionally slept through the night. But the stuffiness and attendant coughing and inadvertent waking up means *I never sleep either* so I haven't recovered at all.

It doesn't help that while pregnant there's not too much you can take for just plain ol sickness. Vit C drops and a humidifier. One of those nose strips and a box of kleenex to go to bed with. One day I stayed home even though the sitter came and just slept whenever she took the kid out of the house.

By the end of this illness I started to cry in the daytime just out of sheer exhaustion. No one at work ever caught me though, thank goodness.

Baby talk already being left behind

The Guajolotita #1 has said "co-co" for "conejo" (rabbit) since July. In the last week or two she's increasingly switched over to "conejo". New rabbits seem to be "conejo" but old rabbits, which were already "co-co" - like in Pat the Bunny - are usually still "co-co".

She calls the baby bunny in Goodnight Moon "co-co" but the nanny bunny "conejo".

More sentences and toddler logic

Sep 27th:

She says "edificios" like this:

"Vicios"

which is hilarious.

Oct 1st:

She's in the bath and I've just turned off the shower head after rinsing her hair. She reaches up and says,

"Ahi viene la lluvia!"

A favorite catch-all term of hers now is, "Pone!" to put together a lego car, to put a sticker on her belly, to wrap her up in a towel or blanket, to assemble a puzzle. Sometimes it's "Pone this!" or "Pone... this one!"

Oct 3rd:

"No tienes zapatos."

She got real shy right after she said it, she knew she was trying something new I guess? Totally impressed by appropriate use of "you" instead of 3rd person. Usually she says "No tiene zapatos" as in, "Mama no tiene zapatos" but today she branched out.

She used "yo" correctly once last week too, I forget the sentence though.

Despite those grammatical leaps of progress, she still calls me "tu mama". Since about 2 weeks ago, she learned from everyone else to say "tu mama" instead of "mama". I presume between my suegra, the babysitter, and THCSITU telling her "Tu mama esta trabajando" or "Daselo a tu mama" or what have you, she rechristened me "tu mama". When she pulls out my license, which she loves to do, she points at my picture and tells me proudly, "tu mama!"

The talking never stops!

We noticed some new things in the Guajolotita's speech: She is making short sentences. Two of today's sentences were:

Vamos a la calle!
*Aunt's name* toma agua!

Last week, she started to say "a la calle" as separate words (probably in her mental grammar it's all one thing, but she pronounces them with the appropriate separation). And then today she put the verb and the rest of the predicate together: Vamos a la calle!

Tonight, at dinner at "Gappa"'s house, there were 9 of us including her. There was a pause in the conversation, and she called out across the table to my sister. Then she continued her order: "*Aunt's name* toma agua!" This time as well, she put the appropriate amount of pause between the words. She was instructing her to do it, and watched until she did. None of us had offered her water in the last couple of minutes, or been talking about water before hand. I guess she just decided that her aunt needed a drink?

Then tonight, this one I especially loved. She asked to read "Tu Mama" which stands for "Éres tu mi mamá?" which is the Spanish version of Are you my mother? a very nice P.D. Eastman book which has been a favorite for months. I took the opportunity to read to her sitting on the toilet, so she could get that done before her bath, and I'd be able to strip her from the waist down, making the bathtime transition easier.

We were reading, and she was skipping around in the book. She grabbed all the pages and started letting them slowly flip by with her thumb, as she usually does when she's looking for something specific ("El gato!" "La lancha!" etc.). She was letting them go pretty quickly, so I laughed and just stated,

"You have to be a speedy reader, 'cause there's so, so much to read!"

She stopped flipping the pages and looked at me. She was thinking about something and looking at me intently. Then it came to her: "Eyes Shut!!" I was absolutely tickled that she recognized the line and said yes, of course, she could certainly have another book given the fact that she'd called it, so to speak.

So I went and got I Can Read With My Eyes Shut, as she sat there on the toilet with her bath waiting, and she turned each page and waited for it to be completely read (instead of skipping ahead) up until we got to the page with the line I'd quoted earlier. She looked up at me when I read that one, and smiled sort of perhaps to say, "See, there it is!"

My toddler is so big!

Darn canines are making sleep difficult. She's up for the second time tonight. I tried waiting her out but she got up and left her room - guess she WAS really awake!

She asked for agua, so I gave her a bottle. Also I turned on her humidifier, this dry fall air is making THCSITU snore more and kiddo seems a bit stuffed up too. And I think she was chilly, so I put her plush blanket on her mattress to be more snuggly, since she won't keep any blankets on.

Now we are snuggled in the rocker, under a blanket her Abuela knit her. She's clutching her bottle in one arm, but her face while sweet and sleepy is not that of a baby. She's so big and smart and in charge of herself, even when she wakes up crying at 4:30 am. She wants Agua and she wants Up and she will direct you to one room or another with words and pointing.

D'oh she just stiffened up in her sleep with a sharp inhale. Darn canines!

Telling everybody

As I mentioned, we did end up printing announcement cards this time too. And I ordered this shirt for the kiddo:

The announcement cards came Saturday, so I stamped and addressed them. Since the tshirt shipped the same day, I mailed the cards Monday morning, figuring I'd get the tshirt later that day & we could tell both my suegra and my dad that night.

However, the dang shirt didn't arrive until Wednesday! I was so nervous that the nearest snail-mail receipients of the cards, my grandparents, would call my dad and tell him before we had.

So we got home Wednesday night and both kids, the Guajolotita #1 and her 3-yr-old cousin, were running around like lunatics. So we went outside in the dark to play with flashlights, which they loved. I called my dad and asked him to come over because the kids were being nuts (just an excuse, in this case). Then I popped the shirt on the kiddo.

When he got there, I handed the announcement card to the Guajolotita #1 and told her to bring it to Grandpa:

Which she did, and he recognized it right away. Then I told him to check out her shirt, and apologized for not telling him sooner... that dang shirt took forever to arrive!

Next up, is telling my suegra. We were supposed to meet at lunch time today, so I'm armed with a picture of the kid in the shirt, plus one of the announcement cards. The back has this text:

"The invasion continues... Alien #2 expected to land in early April, 2013."

Then a picture of Guajolotita #1 holding the ultrasound picture, with the caption:

"First Wave approval still pending."

Anyhow, she can't make it so I'll text her the picture of the kid, then email the link to this video. I got a heartbeat check this morning at the midwife since the midwife-in-training couldn't find the heartbeat last week. Before my suegra starts telling every animate and inanimate object she encounters, I wanted to be sure there really was still something to say. Sounds good to me:

I just have to get her to keep her trap shut so we can call THCSITU's family in Mexico and tell them ourselves. They're getting the cards in the mail but probably they'd prefer the call anyhow.

More language

The Guajolotita #1 is adding new words and phrases about every 10 minutes. It's totally crazy. When something falls - like her bochito falling onto her face as she drives it up the bathroom walls during her bath - OR she deliberately dumps something out, like THCSITU's soda that he left on a side table last night - she throws her hands out and exclaims, "Se cayó!"

Tonight after THCSITU got home, he saw her playing by herself with a ping-pong ball. After a while, she disappeared behind her play kitchen, then came running towards him. "Se fue! Se fue!" she told him.

So he went hunting for it, and she'd dropped it between her play kitchen and the wall. So he got it out for her... and she promptly threw it into the bin with her stuffed animals. "Se fue! Se fue!" she told him again. I think he told her to go get it herself, so she did, and she played like that for some time, "losing" it and then retrieving it herself.

Other favorite phrases, though not new ones, are "Donde esta?" "Busca tus zapatos para salir" (look for your shoes to go outside) and she'll wander around, hands upturned, repeating "Donde esta?" until she finds them. "Ahi esta!" once she locates something or also when she comes out of "hiding" during hide and go seek.

The other adorable thing is the counting. She's had this one in hand for a while now, but it's evolving. Now, she counts like this:

• 1 uno
• 2 dos
• 4 quatro (cat-o)
• 5 cinco
• 7 siete

And she does it again, and again. She'll count to "siete" 4 times going down our six front steps. Or she'll turn the pages of this wonderful book a friend gifted her, and "read" it to herself, counting to "siete" again and again.

And then, going along with the other post from this evening, there's singing the alphabet. We sing it to her (per her constant demand) in English (ABC!) and in Spanish (el abecedario), though tellingly when we sing it in Spanish she *usually* interrupts demanding "abc, abc!" (Because, in her opinion, we are doing it wrong, I think.) She does a great job of singing along. Below are the letters in red that she supplies as we sing:

ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXY (and) Z 

Now I know my ABCs, next time won't you sing with me.

Sometimes she sings them in the pause and I can continue the song with her filling in her "part", but othertimes she doesn't provide them unless I keep going, and she sings along with.

Musica!

I rejoined the orchestra at my university. The director called, as he does every semester, and asked if I'd be interested. 2 years ago I was pregnant for the first time, and renovating a house. Either one of those things can be overwhelming, but both at once? I just couldn't take on another commitment.

Last year I had a 5 month old and had just really been hit with the reality of full-time work. Although I went back to work when the Guajolotita #1 was 12 weeks, it was summer at a university. Two weeks before classes began, sh*t got real. 10-12 hr days, 5 days a week. Emailing evenings and weekends too. Unless the kid was REALLY sick, doctor-sick, I couldn't just stay home to spend time with her. If a sitter couldn't make it, I had to find another childcare solution. It was already too much time away from my sweet baby. (Things calm down about a month in, which I knew after many years at the same institution, but nonetheless I couldn't opt for MORE time away!)

So this year he called. I'm pregnant again, and overwhelmed with the thought of 2 kids. Childcare for 2. Family vacations for 4? 2 snakes kids on a plane?? Nooooooo! I can't pass the audition, I told him straight out. I'm a great sight reader, and a competent orchestral player, but I have 0 experience with any solo music (besides the Bach Unaccompanied, I can scrape out some movements of some of those because that's like the definition of playing viola). He just needed more bodies to round out the section, he said. So I said yes, half-intending to back out.

The next morning on my commute, still not having told my husband, I read this by Katie Allison Granju. (I also commented via my phone, but it appears not to have stuck. I thanked her for her post, it was a very heartfelt response, but alas, the moment is gone.) I cried. (Pregnancy hormones? perhaps...) I thought about Korinthia Klein, whose musical/luthier career (and overall excellent parenting/personhood) I find very inspiring. I resolved to ask my husband what he thought - and pick up the music that day as I'd arranged.

Since orchestra means coming home a bit later than usual, it means he must commit to being home "on time" so the babysitter can leave. Over the weekend I pulled out the sheet music and showed it to him. He was surprisingly supportive. He took the kiddo outside for at least an hour each day so that I could practice.

And I went. I've been to two rehearsals, sat in the back both times. I have no doubt most of the players ahead of me are more skilled than I am, and certainly most are in better practice. However, they're also undergrads. A lack of focus/commitment is a hallmark of the undergraduate (I don't think violas 3-5 ahead of me are string performance majors - maybe the first stand could be). As the conductor asks us to start again at bar 275 or G or whatever, one of the girls doesn't even pick up her instrument until the rest of us are a bar and a half along. Yesterday he told me to move up a chair, which I'm mostly glad about because I want to mark up my music as we go.

I really like the conductor, I'd say it's the second best conductor experience in my life. And the one time that was better was a week with a guest conductor that was just transformative - really an exceptional conductor and an experience I'll never forget. Anyway he's great, and I'm really enjoying this.

But the real point here is the Guajolotita #1 and her experience. Right now, this is our 7am anthem (also bathtime, parents-come-home-from-work time, and all-hours-of-the-weekend time):

Her favorite tunes now, besides the above, are Itsy Bitsy Spider and Happy Birthday. Johnny Be Good would take some work, and my viola-work right now is going towards Night on Bald Mountain (glad I've played that in the past! I think I'd be really intimidated otherwise!), but Happy Birthday I can do. :-P

When she comes inside and I am practicing, she gets fairly jealous. She wants to "help": she wants Up! Up! She shoves trucks on my lap, she tries to pull the music down, whatever she can do to disrupt the non-child focus.

So I knelt on the floor and had her grab the wood of the bow. Together we sawed it back and forth as I fingered the notes for Happy Birthday. It was so fun to do that together!! Now whenever she sees my case out, she starts asking, "Hab B-D-D?" In the last two days, she says "Musica!" and "Tocar!" as well, which is AMAZING.

Then, THCSITU found this video. He was working at the computer and she was using similar tactics as she does with me to make me stop practicing. So he thought this video would entertain her. We've never played a video for her before - we always just grab music and turn off the screen to listen.

Anyway, she was enthralled for a few minutes, then she disappeared. I heard her in our room - she was trying to drag my viola case out! She wanted to play too. So of course, I got it out and we played "Hab B-D-D" a few times together.

I'm so excited that she's interested. I have learned the melodies to some of her favorite Mexican children's tunes, so I can play along to her recordings. Whatever she might like, it's my side project (to this general viola side project) to learn. Whether she sings or dances or plays the ukelele, I hope she will always love music!

Again with the braiiiiiins

Well, the Guajolotita #1 was overtired and semi-hysterical by bedtime tonight. I think she needs 2 naps per day right now again. Perhaps she's growing a lot right now? She had 2 naps per day all weekend and tonight was really hard for her.

Anyhow I passed out after she was finally asleep at 10pm, and woke up when THCSITU was getting ready for bed at 12:30. I was SO HUNGRY and tried to sleep, nothing sounded good, blah. Then I remembered I have a ton of waffles from the last two weekends!

So I got up and have eaten a 4 quarters of waffle, had two cups of milk, written a couple of posts, read some articles... and kid will be up in 2.5 hrs so I better go back to bed!

Guajolote #2 purchases!

Well, I did order a few announcements to mail out to close family after all. They are the same alien/UFO-themed ones as last time, but I added a little alien to represent the Guajolotita #1, and of course the Guajolote #2's ultrasound image.

However I only ordered 15. Last time I think I ordered 30 or more??

Also, I ordered a shirt that says Only Child Big Sister. I'm figuring we'll put that on the kiddo when we tell my dad and my suegra, and thereafter she can just wear it as one of her everyday shirts.

Also, I bought some Old Navy end-of-season sale maternity stuff, and that came today too. I was pregnant at the same time -2 weeks last time, so I have pretty much everything I need for my size x the seasons here, except we will be going to visit family in warm weather when I am about 6 months pregnant. I don't have anything sleeveless, or a bathing suit, etc. for a body that size and shape! So for $35 I got a 2 piece bathing suit, 2 sleeveless shirts, a sleeveless long tunic, and one more long sleeve maternity nursing shirt.

I figure I can wear the tunic over long sleeve stuff once we are home from our trip too - last time an inch or so of my belly would peek out underneath as I guess I got too big for my maternity/nursing long sleeve shirts so that tunic might be my every day coverup. The Guajolotita #1 came at 38 weeks, 4 days. But since we won't (shouldn't) be moving when I will be 37 weeks and 6 days pregnant this time, it's possible this Guajolote #2 could stay inside longer. More days of even bigger belly to attempt to cover! :)

Dorking out about language acquisition

My boss pointed out that Guajolotita #1 generalized a rule when I recounted to her the evolution of "avion" I talked about in this post. However, today she expanded it to include a new word:

For weeks she had "avión" firmly in control. For weeks or even months before that, she used "ca" for "camión" (and "carro" and any other "ca" word). But, once she could finally say "camión", in the next day or so "avión" became "amión". That's about two weeks ago now.

She's said "arena" for a few weeks now as well. I don't think she says any "r"s at this point, so she says it: "aena". Today, I made steel cut oats for breakfast for the first time in a few months. She asked for "huevos" and I told her we were having "avena" (con pasas). After a few go rounds, she tried it herself - and it came out "amena" and stayed that way for today at least.


On a different track, the Guajolotita #1 initially did say "huevo" correctly. But she changed at some point to "huevi" and stayed that way for a month or two. Now, she says "huevos" and "huevo" but the singular has this funny non-native pronunciation: "wayy-voe".


Both of these changes happened around when she turned 17 months.

English

Her English phrases aren't nearly as many as her Spanish ones. And she doesn't have many translation pairs:

• "up" and "arriba" (and she uses "up" for "pick me up" - "arriba" (a-iba) only refers to the upstairs neighbors or perhaps the location of an avion)
• "outside" and "afuera" (afuela, she doesn't say any "r"s so far). These are used with the same meaning. I think she only says "outside" if she's heard someone use it (if she's been cued to that word in English). I suspect she never uses it with her Abuela, for instance. But if I holler at THCSITU "I'm goin outside to..." she'll start pointing and dancing, "Outside! Outside!"

But the English ones are key. Besides the ones she adopted early on as chronicled in this post, she also uses:

• "want that" (this is not clearly pronounced AT ALL, but it's consistent and a phrase constantly used by her cousin, her main source of English)
• hilariously, she used to say "ten" for "give me that", and then changed to "pa' ti" (short for "para ti") because those were the phrases we used when giving her something. So she'd be pointing and shrieking, "Pa' ti! Pa' ti!" when she wanted you to hand her something.
• "sit"
• "that one" also combined with "want that" to form "want that one" As you can guess, this is usually in a very insistent tone or a whine. 3 yr old cousin is a heckuva whiner.

Brought to you by....

Very good friends gave us a Melissa&Doug talking alphabet puzzle for the Guajolotita#1's birthday. We didn't open it for her at the time, as she still put EVERYTHING in her mouth. Recently the babysitter must have, because it came crashing down on my head in pieces when I was trying to reach something else in her closet.

So I am hauling everything out of the closet to try and find the letters, while the kiddo is putting the "puzzle" together. It's just one of those where each letter has its slot, they don't actually interlock or anything like an actual puzzle. And it doesn't talk yet as it has no batteries.

Anyway, of course I can't find them all. But l made good progress. I called out to THCSITU, "We're just missing N!"

He says, "I know where it is. Check the TV."

I said, "No, I found G above the TV, there aren't any more."

He says, "I mean on Sesame Street. I'm pretty sure I've seen it there."

Har har!!

(Which, also, he actually hasn't because we've never turned on Sesame Street or any other kids programming.)

Guajolotita #1 general update at 17 months

Weaning

The Guajolotita#1 still cries for "pecho" every morning when she wakes up. Sometimes other times too. I have become more hard-core about denying her the boob. Per a friend's excellent suggestion, we offer her a bottle of water for middle of the night or otherwise early wakeups. Right now, she's downing 20 oz of water overnight. The idea was that water would not be enough to wake up for, so she'd start to sleep through instead. Hasn't quite worked out that way.

Abuela took away her bottles cold turkey two weeks ago. That was a really rough 5 days or so. That first night, THCSITU and I were arguing about it as he had the bottle in his hand in front of her while holding her - then set it on the counter and handed her to me. Oh, the outrage! That was the last night she got the boob, I think. Now, she drinks milk out of a straw cup with no problem (or objection - there was some objecting for a bit over a week). She drinks water from any sort of vessel, straw cup, steel bottle, open cup, cups with handles, whatever. She'd drink milk from other cups too, but there is usually a bit of spillage and that gets sticky with milk. And, of course, her overnight water bottles. We wanted to wean her from the bottle, and otherwise she is, but as a kid very prone to constipation, being well-hydrated is important. So I won't fight about that one anymore right now.

Speaking

The number of new words, in English and Spanish, each day is amazing. I can't count them. Today one was "panqueque". Two weeks ago she finally learned to say "camión" which made her SO happy. She LOVES buses, I mean loves them, so she pretty much repeated "camión" from waking up till going to sleep for a few days. Interestingly, she's stopped saying "avión" correctly and has generalized to "amión". She also stopped saying "pan" and changed it to "pam".

THCSITU noticed that she's more conversational. Since she has 2 and 3 words sentences now and enough vocabulary, you can talk about things with her. It's noun-verb, with the inclusion of one or more of these to make a 3-word phrase: "no", "aqui", "más".

Also in the last two weeks, she's started saying "Sh!" to situations she deems need quiet. "Papi's sleeping," I tell her when she tries to go into our room after she wakes up. "Sh!" she says, with her finger to her lips. The babysitter said that she woke up during her nap this week, and she asked her if she needed to potty before going back to sleep. The Guajolotita looked up, said, "Sh!" with her finger to her lips, and then conked out in her arms again.

Another cute recent gesture is the finger wag for things that are "no". Especially in the book mentioned below, Joshua initially has an accident. There's poop and pee on the floor. She looks at you very seriously and wags her finger back and for at Joshua. "Eso no se hace" is the phrase we use to describe such things, which now elicits a the little finger motion - and just today she says it, as well: "no se hace."

Potty training

Last week was nearly accident-free. I know she had four consecutive days without accidents. In the last week or two, her Abuela has gotten her to love "Juja" (Joshua) in Once Upon a Potty. I got it, along with the much more entertaining Everyone Poops, to help her cousin potty train. This morning, however, she was demanding I read "Juja" to her while also demanding one of her tunes. As I looked up the song to play while we would then read, she peed all over the floor. We have had more accidents than successes this morning, I think in part because of the 20oz of water she drank between 3-7am. She's got the urge more frequently than she or I can predict. It seems that, while she rarely warns that she needs to potty, her interest in Juja may correlate. For now, we've got a bit of a rule that we read "Joshua" only while she's on the toilet. At least that gets her sitting there pretty darn frequently.

Pooping in the toilet is now finally an every day occurrence. This is in part because we did change from whole milk to 2%, I think. And Joshua sure helps.

Sleeping

We're at the same place sleepwise as we have been since she moved to a floor bed in mid-July. She goes down easier and easier - THCSITU puts her to sleep, to avoid the crying for the boob, and sleeps till 4:30-6 or so, about 4 nights a week. Then she gets her bottle of water, some time on the boob maybe, and usually sleeps again for an hour or so. The other 3 nights a week she wakes up twice, sometime between 1am-2:30. Recently THCSITU started going to her at that time, which is a huge relief for me.

Cravings

I want something salty! Like Ramen. Or Lays. Or seasoned croutons right out of a package. Pretzels aren't good enough, but maybe the vending machine has something else appealing.

UPDATE: Lays were so good! I had one bag before lunch and spent another dollar on a second near the end of the day. I was thinking I should get a stash for cheaper, but I'd consume so many more chips if they were just sitting in my office. I have to go 2 buildings and 2 flights of stairs and spend a dollar to eat them, so at least there's some disincentive.

Pregnancy Symptoms, at last

Yesterday I had a few small symptoms, and it took me a bit to piece them together that that's what they were.

The first that I realized what it was was visual effect? distortion? Sort of like when you see those shiny circles in a photo that's looking into the sun? I was having a conversation with someone and just couldn't see half their face because this shiny/glittery thing was making me blink. I couldn't figure out why it was hard to see when I figured out there was this distortion. I remember having something similar during the first time around.

The other was headache.

And the last was faintness/dizziness. I felt weak, and then that flushed pre-fainting feeling as I was hurrying home (late) from work last night. I wanted to see my kiddo and was late and rushing and then after a couple of blocks realized that I had better slow to a walk if I wanted to make it home without assistance (since I nearly passed out and had to sit down early in pregnancy the first time).

None of those were any fun, but they made me feel a bit better that the embryo is continuing to grow and suck my resources. :)

Articles

The Guajolotita #1 started using definite articles with her nouns this week. The English definite article is "the" ("a" and "an" are indefinite articles).

Spanish, like most languages, has gendered nouns and the definite articles reflect that: el and la.

She says "el leon" (and provides a tiny roar if asked, "Como hace el leon?"). Her bed sheets have elephants, turtles, lions, and giraffes. She counts the animals and says their names. So far of the sheet-animals, only the lion merits his article. I've gotten reports from THCSITU that she used the (correct!) article with several other nouns yesterday.

This is one she's going to start correcting me on soon - I imagine from her various sources of input she'll learn the correct gender of nouns and correct me when I get them wrong!

Betas are in

13 DPO, beta is 175
15 DPO, beta is 401

I'm sending just those two lines of text to my sister in med school, see if she gets it! The tests were pulled almost exactly 48 hrs apart.

My calculations of dpo are based upon my own very sketchy chart from this cycle. The midwives want me to get a "dating ultrasound" sometime next week.

Bruja Suegra

After getting a call from the midwife today that the blood test confirms pregnancy, I let another dear close friend know. She was very congratulatory, of course. We did some shopping for an upcoming party - and between lifting and walking and driving, I was having noticible cramping.

So when I got home I was sort of grumpy and just sat around. (THCSITU might ask here: "How is that different from any other night?")

And my Mother-In-Law sits nearby and tells me about this dream she had two nights ago, about me being pregnant and she thinks it should be a girl and by the way why do I not feel so good, am I pregnant?

Gah!!! What is with this woman? I already told THCSITU that we won't be able to keep it between us as long this time, because with my MIL in the house 2 days every week, she is going to notice something is up.

And, apparently, she is also a witch.

Maybe this is for real.

I've got something like sciatica again. It's too early for that, isn't it?

I am eating a McFlurry for the first time in my life, which THCSITU got for me, because I asked for it. And it's freaking awesome.

Trying to convince myself

I got the CVS brand tests for this week. I tried again Monday morning. If you drink too much water and wake up to pee after only 4 hours, is that still FMU? Ah well - it came out again a faint positive.

I was hoping for a firm bold positive, or even a negative. I feel in limbo.

So I went to the midwife and requested a blood test. I go back Wednesday for the second one.

If that comes out with good info, I'll publish to the blog all these I've been writing.

Here it goes again

Awake and hungry since 4:30 am. It's the second day in a row that I've been up for the day at 4:30.  At least yesterday it was the Guajolotita who woke me up, and I just couldn't fall back asleep.

Today I woke up hungry at 4:30, but I'll be dammed if I'm going to risk waking a child who slept through the night!

She woke up on her own around 5:45, but I got her back to sleep easily - so I have to keep waiting to eat.

I better get some granola bars for the bedroom or something!

Second Child Syndrome: in check so far

I wrote three, no this makes four, blog posts the day we got the positive test. Even though it was faint, and sort of declared a "Maybe positive" by consensus at the midwife that same day.

Also that same day, I made a Lilypie ticker, and kept the pregnancy test in just as safe a spot as the ones for Guajolote #1 (floating around the "random drawer" in THCSITU's dresser).

However I'm pretty sure we won't do printed pregnancy announcements this time. I will print out a couple of whatever digital one we create to go with kiddo's First Year book.

I wrote to two close friends to let them know, and will follow up with the other three close friends as soon as we get a "for real" positive, probably early next week.

All these posts are staying hidden until then, though.

Read about the dangers of Second Child Syndrome.

Midwife says Maybe?

I took the Guajolotita with to my PAP-turned-prenatal visit. Trying to pee in a cup in a tiny bathroom with a one year old is complicated.

The nurse took my vitals, then I left a sample. It came back negative. "Oh well," I shrugged. "The home test was expired after all." I offered again my FMU in the ziplock, which she took this time but also came back negative.

The midwife came in and did an annual physical, told me what tests to order from a primary care doctor if I wanted, etc. As we were finishing up, and the Guajolotita was completely losing it first for "leche" and then failing that for "pecho", there was a knock on the door.

The nurse stuck her head it. "It's a faint positive now, ten minutes later! Congratulations!"

The midwife says I can either get the 2 part blood test, to look for doubling of some number - or just pee on another stick next week. I'm pretty non-interventiony, and the kid was totally losing it. If I'm pregnant, I'll still be pregnant in a week (or not) - and either way today's result doesn't make a difference.

So... we're at Maybe till next week (or menstruation, whichever comes sooner).

Breaking: Blog Title Now Accurate?

Today I had my annual PAP exam scheduled. Since I couldn't totally rule out pregnancy, I took the one leftover pregnancy test from the pack of three we used 2 years and 8 days ago. Probably scraping your cervix is not advisable during pregnancy, so I figured I should check.

The test was expired since March 2012, around 4 months ago.
Well, you can see what I saw:

I kept the pee in a ziploc for the midwife to test. I showered, emailed, etc. waiting for everyone to wake up.

Just before 8, the Guajolotita opened her own door and came out of her room. No tears, no accident - just like a big kid, but with her sleepy toddler face and all her hair in her eyes. It was the cutest thing!

So we went to wake up The Hottest Computer Scientist in the Universe. He hugged her, and we all went to pee (potty training is a long process at this age!).

I brought him his glasses, and he says, "What."

I hand him the test. He looks and says, "You're pregnant?"

I sorta rock back on my heels, and nonchalantly say, "Yup."

His response: "What are you, Irish?"

** astute friend observed that Mexican-American people are a rather fast-growing segment of the population! Why'd this Mexican guy decide to lump me with a different bunch of Catholic breeders?

Thinking of a Guajolote #2

My period came back for the first time since the Guajolotita. That's 2 years and 5 days since LMP (first day of last menstrual period.

Naturally our conversations shifted to possible Guajolote #2: should we? are we ready? childcare expenses WHAT?

Actually, The Hottest Computer Scientist in the Universe said something to the effect of great, now we can have another one! Whereas I came back with a bunch of concerns (as listed above). But I agreed, sure, let's see what happens.

I did more or less night-wean the Guajolotita by around 14 months, in part for my sanity and in part to help my period return. However, day to day (night to night!) boob use is inconsistent. Sometimes I can keep her off with a bottle, sometimes she insists. Sometimes I'm too tired to remember to go get a bottle before going to her.

Anyhow, between the night wakings (and night comfortings, really) and random boob-fests, I feel like my cycle is all over the place. Pre-baby, in those 5 months off birth control pills, I had a 29 day cycle. To the day, every time. Today it's Day 32. I don't expect that I am pregnant, but rather that ovulation was delayed due to more-than-usual nursing.

Though last night, I had this freaky vivid, scary dream - something to do with the kiddo being hurt or in danger and I was with her but I hadn't been able to protect her somehow. She woke up A TON last night (yay sinus infection) and I was in a 15 to 40 minute window of sleep before she woke me from that dream. After which point I just slept on the floor next to her mattress.

THCSITU is pretty astute. When I told him about the dream, he asked, "So does that mean you're pregnant already after all?" I laughed and said I don't think so - but I do not usually have scary dreams, and the only time I really had freaky-vivid dreams was during pregnancy.

OTOH I was also overly sensitive/critical to more than one person on Facebook today too - either this is PMS or I am pregnant, cuz something is going down with my hormones.

Uno a Seis

This kid just tonight counted from one to six - handing me her "calzones para la noche" (pull-ups) as she counted.

You could have knocked me over with a feather.

Happy to share the link to the video, just ask in the comments & I'll email you the link.

Dancing queen

This talking thing is amazing. The number of words she says is not something I could even begin to count at this point.

The latest funny development is her starting to learn the lyrics to her favorite songs. I've got a great video of her dancing to one of her favorites (and a couple more) that I'm happy to share on an individual basis. Just ask in the comments and I'll email you the link.

We were on vacation this weekend to visit my cousins. She had a fantastic time, and I should really write about that separately.

But now that we are back, today we noticed her asking for her favorite songs. She usually comes to you and says, "Baila?" while beginning to dance - she's been doing that for a couple of weeks. Then she specifies what she wants to hear. For one song, she hollers, "Hey!" while doing some freestyle dancing, which is the cue for Fiesta de los Zapatos. Listen to it and you'll see why (free mp3 available to stream from that link).


For another favorite, she says "teté" and "metete" and "muchacha" to ask, and they are all words from this song: Metete Teté. When they come up during the song, she repeats "muchacha" especially (that's the newest one to enter her vocabulary of the three). This song has been her favorite for almost year, she would begin to smile and kick to the rhythm since she was at least 5 months old.


She spends part of each day with her Abuela dancing. They listen to cumbias and other dance music and dance around. The songs linked here are by a classic Mexican children's song composer/performer, Cri-Cri. Honestly though, this kid will dance to anything and everything.

Big Day!!

She woke up late. I was laying near her, reading email when she began to stir. She sleepily sat up, blinked, and in that just-woke-up croak (that even little kids have, who knew?) said, "Pee-pee?"

I grabbed her and we ran to the bathroom. It was tough to get her onesie open and diaper off since she was too sleepy still to stand up. Hopefully she didn't get too manhandled. I sat her on the toilet while we leaned forehead to forehead, all the while I had a pro-pee-pee patter going on.... and she did it!! First time ever!!

I knew it wasn't the whole contents of her bladder, but after several attempts to elicit more pee, I washed our hands and started to get her some breakfast. During which time, she went back to the bathroom and squatted next to the toilet and peed there. Ah well, she tried! It was my fault for not paying attention, really.


A couple hours later, we went to swimming lessons. Which is just dance-around-in-a-circle-and-hope-your-kid-doesn't-cry time. But this kid loves the water. Loves it. She spends the entire half hour floating on her belly, her legs floating straight out behind her, with my hand under her chest to keep her head out of the water. Her favorite thing is "jumping" into the water, which we do with a big "A la una, a las dos, a las tres!" and a huge splashy entrance. She will sometimes blow bubbles in the water (or drink it) but I haven't been able to get her to kick. Today she did this frantic bicycle pedal though!

Dinner

We had this for dinner tonight.
Quinoa Wilted Spinach Salad (with citrus)

Only two modifications: we didn't have any dried cranberries (and THCSITU doesn't like raisins, and wouldn't share his mango), and I added some lime to the dressing so it would be a bit more interesting.

I was surprised how well it came out. Not really a good dinner, but a great filling side. Baby Girl loved it, she helped mix the dressing & dump it on the spinach. To eat it, she mostly grabbed spinach leaves, sucked the dressing/quinoa off, chewed it up and spit it out, moved on to the next leaf. The spinach wasn't fully mature, but still pretty crunchy - to much to get down without molars, I think. She liked crunching the toasted sliced almonds between her front teeth.

Kitchen Helper!

When I agonized about going back to work, a coworker with the wisdom of 5 yrs' parenting told me something like, "You'll have the best dishwasher-unloading helper, grocery shopper, etc." (because being at work during the day means quality time and basic chores often overlap.) And it's true.

Loading and unloading the dishwasher always has the Guajolotita gleefully participating. At this point, her efforts are nearly always detrimental to the short-term goal of taking care of the dishes (pulling all the silverware out, on to the floor, is her main self-appointed task) but great for the long-term goal of spending time together, learning the names of different kitchen implements, and having her grow up to be expected to participate in such mundane activities. Or at least, that's the hope.

Also, she has become a not entirely unuseful cooking assistant. She always helps mix eggs for baking or scrambled eggs. She dumps the flour from a full measuring cup into a bowl, and helps mix the contents of the bowl together. She helps sift baking soda into a mixing bowl. She hands me the containers of vanilla and cinnamon when asked. (She doesn't know which is which, of course.)

This weekend, I made huevos con chorizo. Super fast and easy. I got the chorizo started, then sat on the floor with a mixing bowl, whisk, and the egg carton. We were going to use all of the eggs, so I just opened it up, and took one out and broke it into the bowl. Then I asked her (in Spanish) to hand me an egg. I think she knows the word for "egg" from "Are You My Mother," one of her recent favorite books. She handed them to me one at a time from the carton, and watched with great interest as I broke the egg, dumped it in the bowl, and stacked the two halves of the shell together back into the carton. For the mixing of the bowlful (for pancakes it's the bowl of flour, etc.), I asked her for the whisk. She grabbed it and stuck it the bowl and waited for me to grab her hand and help with the scrambling. Then I mixed in a bit of milk, more joint stirring. Then I picked her up so she could watch as I poured the eggs on top of the chorizo and she was so interested (as she always is) as I combined them in the pan and the eggs cooked.

Not to get to long and drawn out, but she also knows how to make coffee! OK, sort of, and with lots of help. First I put the water in the coffeemaker so it's ready to be started. I take out the coffee filters and hand her one, and she puts it in the filter basket. I take out a cinnamon stick and hand it to her, and she puts it in the filter basket too. I replace the filter basket in the coffee maker. Then I fill the grinder with the beans (under her supervision) and together on the count of  "Uno, Dos. TRES!!" we press the grinder. (It's high up on the counter, I have to lift her for this, don't want her messing with those blades herself.) Then we make an inspection and observe how the beans are now polvo, and dump the coffee into the basket (I do that part, under her supervision). Then she presses the button to start the coffee maker.

Since she was 12 months if you ask her anything about "cafe" she will go to the kitchen and point at the coffee maker because she helps me with this every morning. I'm hoping by 6 or so she can make (pre-ground) coffee for us all by herself. :)

Strawberries

The Guajolotita looooooves berries. Especially strawberries. Last year I got some strawberry plants and put them in pots amongst our thicket of mint. (That mint is going to become sentient in a year or two. It's insane.) In the postpartum, back-to-work, unpacking-from-having-just-moved-5-days-before-giving-birth disorganization I created/lived in I DID manage to keep them alive. However, lots of flowers shriveled from lack of watering on hot days and many berries rotted forgotten on the plant.

This year they came up in and all around their pots. After I noticed the plants flower ing from the living room window, I went out and watered them once or twice. Then a few weeks ago I saw the proto-strawberries!

Kiddo pulled the first ripe one off Friday night, and almost every day since. It's so fun to watch her jam the fruit into her mouth and start signing "more" before the juice has even begun to drip off her chin.

(Well, she always does that with berries, even sitting at the table - but it's especially sweet outdoors with home grown ones!)

Words and Phrases at 14 months

I found this draft, she's 16 months today so I'll back date this to 14 months per the title. I probably never published it because it didn't feel complete - which it can never be because every hour it's at least one new word!

She still says all of these at 16 months, though her pronunciation is more refined and "carro" "conejo" and "calle" are all different (of those three, only "calle" would be recognizable to a stranger).

English:
Up
Down
Hot
Ba-ba! (Bye-Bye!)

Spanish:
Mami
Papi
Che-Che (leche) (milk)
Gol! (pelota) (ball)
La-la (Abuela)
Ca: Caballo, Calle, Camara, Carro, Camion, etc...
Ahi esta! (There it is!)

Imitative sounds:
Guau-guau (Perro)
Mraow (Gato/cat)
Meeeeeh (Vaca, although this is the sound a sheep makes)
*tongue clicks* (horse)
Choo-Choo (for trains or cars or any vehicle)

Mami

The sweetest baby ever now says "Mami". Constantly, almost plaintively. And it breaks my heart.

She's NOT talking about me. She wanders around, reciting it to herself. She stares out the car window (while I am sitting next to her on the other side), repeating it over and over. There's barely a pause between iterations: "Mami. Mami. Mami."

Both my suegra and the nanny have coached her on this. During meals or diaper changes, they each recite with long, over-emphasized syllables: "Maaaammmmiii. Paaaapiiii." And since neither Mami nor Papi are around.... well, of course she learned no meaning to associate with the word.

I pointed out to each of them that it doesn't make sense to ask her to say "Mami" when Mami isn't there. But neither one understood what I meant. I should have insisted they stop. :-(

Both my suegra and the nanny are so proud that she says it. I am getting tired of smiling when they mention it.

Sleep training, night Q

I've got to insert another post about nights 14 and 16. But we're around night 29 tonight.

It's only like the 3rd or 5th time this kiddo has slept 6 consecutive hours. And the first opportunity I've had to also sleep those hours. All the other nights, her 6 hr stretches have been 9:30 - 3:30 and I haven't been in bed earlier than 11:30 - 1:30 on those nights.

This week she's been really wakeful again - maybe molars coming in, or maybe habits re-forming without having really been broken in the first place. So I asked The Hottest Computer Scientist in the Universe if he could get up with her tonight. He said sure - but also put her to bed.

Maybe you can see where this is going. She went to bed late because of our own familial disorganization (late dinner -> late bath -> late bedtime) . Once he was putting her down, I thought, "Oops. Never mind, I'll go in the first time she wakes up tonight instead, and he can get up with her after."

Well she's been asleep 5.5 hours. I am awake, with one engorged corn silo boob.

It's leaked long enough that the shape of my torso is soaked into the sheets. We've got quite a busy weekend so I have no idea how I'll be able to add another load to the list of "must accomplish!" laundry, but the mattress cover has to come off ASAP. The real problem here is of course that I WAS EXHAUSTED BUT AM NOT ASLEEP because boob pain woke me up.

There are additional minor annoyances including: why does she sleep on the night THCSITU agrees to get up with her? I am hungry because we had Thai delivery for dinner (and gave the kiddo half my food since THCSITU's order is too spicy). I am awake and so would love to do laundry or work on her baby book - but those things would wake one or both of these people up. Gah.

On another note, I need to take the time to plan and write a celebratory blog post. I don't want this to become a "list of grievances" type blog. Being this kiddo's mom has been more fun - and easier! - than I ever imagined. She's amazing and I am excited to see her sweet face when she wakes up.

Because my other boob just started leaking too. (Really.)

Baby no more

Finally have an official first word:
Agua

Contenders:
Gol
Not
Ah-choo
(She says all of those too, but not with regular context/meaning. Well, Ah-choo is FULL of meaning but not really a word.)

Though I LOVED having a tiny baby, I have noticed that this is physically easier. There are always a lot of things to accomplish, but just not so infinitely many loads of laundry, bottles to wash, minutes (hours) of nursing. Also kiddo can play on her own for ten minutes or more at a stretch. That's never when I desperately want her to so I can finish what I am trying to do, of course, but still a nice development.

On the other hand, the actual parenting is a lot more challenging. When to give in, when to hold firm, when is defiance a result of hunger/thirst/exhaustion and when is it plain old toddler contrariness? And we've only barely begun.

Sleep training, Night 3

SHE DID IT!!!

I will have to write about it tomorrow, because I have no idea if she woke up since I put her down (with 40 min of hysteria) again at 11:17. I think maybe once - vague recollection - but I doubt there was more hysteria.

I'm unfortunately awake anyway (at 5:17 am), with one engorged boob. But that's ok!!

Baby girl has an incredibly runny nose right now, so I thought about giving up and just starting sleep training over in a week when she's healthy. But The Hottest Computer Scientist in the Universe said we should persevere.

And she's still asleep!!!

ADDENDUM: she woke up at 5:55. I went in right away and nursed her, she drank a lot then went back in her crib without a fuss. I put her down & she rolled over and slept. When she woke again at 7:30 or 8, I brought her to our bed for nursing&sleeping. It's 9am and they are both asleep. I gotta finish these Cinnamon Rolls for Easter brunch.

Sleep training, night 1

We have 2 issues to address:
Sleeping in the crib instead of with us
Sleeping instead of eating all night

It's pretty clear that I am a human pacifier. Last few weeks, she's not eating that much but also WON'T LET ME GO. She's 12 months and almost 2 weeks old and eats like a champ during the daytime. She is physically capable of sleeping and not eating overnight. We just have to help her realize that.

So the plan was to have me nurse her before bed and put her down as always. But for all night wakings, The Hottest Computer Scientist in the Universe would go in and comfort her and put her back to sleep.

10 pm: asleep finally
10:30: awake. Kinda angry that THCSITU went in instead of me, but after a while she calms down for him and goes to sleep.
11:30: cries for under a minute before falling asleep in his arms. However, he has a really hard time lying her down. No clue how long that took - 45 min? Longer?
1:30: this time she is a bit madder but otherwise like previous? Not sure.
3:35: THCSITU tries to comfort the kiddo. 25 min of hysteria. Eventually they come find me in our room, Baby Girl leading her Papi by the hand. He is upset to see her so upset. Which I understand. It was no fun for me to listen to it either.

I don't want her to think she can scream till she gets her way - but since she has an on-the-boob night waking habit, she probably was honestly hungry by that point.

I put her on the boob as we talk about it. I was wrong to try and eliminate all the night wakings at once. She may not NEED to eat at night, but her body sure is accustomed to it. She settled down for THCSITU tonight with very little fuss, until this 4 am feeding. We talked about boob vs. bottle. I advocate that tomorrow we do the same thing, but at any 4am-or-after awakening I will go in instead of him. To feed her and put her to sleep - and leave her sleeping in her crib. We'll see if later in the week or next weekend we can start trying to push that feeding back, substitute a bottle of milk and then after switch to water, or just skip it entirely.

I took her back to her room where THCSITU had put her crib mattress on the floor and put some play mat next to it for him to sleep on. I nursed and rocked and sang to her - and noticed that she popped off before she fell asleep, and rolled back to sleep.

I set her on her mattress, which caused her to reach for the nipple again. But I just took it out of her mouth and she rolled to her side and fell asleep.

Here's hoping her next waking is at 7 - although this room doesn't have a curtain so I don't know if she will sleep once it's light out.

If only I could sleep... this mat is so uncomfortable!!

Vocabulary!

Ok, so, it's mostly receptive at this point.

The only thing Baby Girl says with consistency is "Allá!", which is more or less Spanish for  "Over there!" She'll point into the distance and insist, "Allá! Allà!" Or, drop something off the changing table and go leaning over the edge pointing at it: "Allá!" And if you ask her something like "Vamos por allà?" she goes towards the front door and points sort of generally "out".

She also is trying reeeeeeally hard to parrot back anything you say, though she doesn't understand it. She said "ocho" pretty well this weekend, but there was no context. THCSITU says he heard her say "gato" last month at my dad's house (he's got several cats). And, what with a preschool aged cousin and a bunch of insane aunts and uncles, we spend lots of time meowing over at Grandpa's too, and she meows along with everyone else, though not independently.

But she does understand these words:

Bye/Adios: Double handed, single-hand-clap/squeeze motion 

Hola/Hello:  Waving

Panza/pancita: Gripping/rubbing her belly with both hands

Luz: Points at a light fixture or a light that is on

Abaníco:  Sorta waves her arm in an attempt to show the fan spinning

Me lo das? Hands you whatever she's got

Eso no se come. Takes whatever she has out of her mouth. Or stops putting it in. Or does neither of those things, but looks at you mischievously to see what you are going to do about it.

No me muerdas/No me vayas a morder: She knows she's not supposed to be - sometimes saying that will stop her, sometimes it doesn't. Seems to depend on how much her teeth are bothering her. 

Bueno? (answering the phone greeting in Spanish) Puts whatever she's got up near her ear (more like curls her arm and wedges it in her neck).

Basura: Goes to garbage can and points. If you hold her up and open the garbage can she will wave whatever she has over it, sometimes letting go.

Vamos pa'fuera/Vamos a la calle: She will get her coat and bring it to you and stick her arm out to put it on.

Papi: She knows that Papi means THCSITU. She will go find him if he is home/go look for him. 

Allá/Allí/Acá: She will follow your eyes to figure out what you are talking about.  

rojo/azul: she knows that one specific piano key on one toy is red, and another specific piano key on another toy is blue. But (of course) does not know red/blue in general. (Example: both toys have a red and a blue key.)

Pajaros: This kid LOVES birds. She'll stop eating to point out the window at the birds. So she points at the window or goes to the window to point if you talk about pajaros.

She also has this RIDICULOUS trick that the babysitter taught her. She grabs a stuffed animal - she has a couple of favorites for this one - and puts it on her shoulder. She starts to rock back and forth (same as if she were listening to music) and she pats the toy. "Durmiendo al ______" whatever jugete she has. It is ridiculous and horribly genderized and SO freaking cute.
In other news, baby girl LOOOOOOoooooooooooooooOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOVES trains and buses. Shrieking, pointing, looking at you and back at the bus/train again and again to see if you understand OMG THERE IS A BUS RIGHT!! THERE!!! Her whole body practically convulses as she bounces with excitement..

We have a TODDLER

This week, Baby Girl finally made the switch from walking sometimes but crawling by default, to walking (or attempting to run) almost all of the time. This past weekend, 11 months and one week old, she started standing up from sitting on her own, without using anything (or anyone) to pull up. The classic butt-in-the-air push off the ground standing.

Now, as she careens around, she falls ALL the time, but she falls on her butt, and then pushes herself back up and continues to wherever she was going. No pause, hesitation, no looking for or waiting for help. Totally independent. She also has two walker toys (both presents). One, she drags laterally or walks backwards (?!) as often as she pushes it. The other, last night she was using to crash into the dining chairs on purpose! It has a pretty smooth wheel action, so she can go really fast. Run-run-run CRASH back up, back up, back up, run-run-run CRASH like that.I LOVE IT we are SO PROUD of her!!

Another big announcement: last night at dinner she drank water from a "glass" ALL BY HERSELF. She soaked herself in the process, but she picked up and put down the "cup" several times. The "cup" that worked is actually a Medela breast pump bottle. While she was getting a bath the week before, she grabbed one of the bottles that I was washing in the sink next to the counter her Papi was bathing her on. She sat down and did a good job of drinking... the bathwater. She already does a great job drinking from a water bottle, which also has a small mouth, smaller than this baby bottle. But we don't have any cups that have a comparably small mouth and are neither too heavy nor too light for her to use.

So at dinner last night, I put half an inch of water in the bottle and let her drink. That didn't work, because she needed to raise the angle of the bottle really high and tilt her head farther back than she is accustomed too. I don't know if her arms are even long enough to do that. She did try though, and sucked away at the air for a minute. So then next time I offered her a drink, I filled the bottle all the way up to below the screw-rim part. Big mess possible, I know. But she grabbed it with two hands and gulped away! She did sort of stick her mouth in the middle of the opening instead of drink from the edge, which caused her to get pretty entirely soaked, but it was before bathtime - and she's got to learn by experimentation anyway. We're on our way!

I am SO SO excited about these developments. The walking I knew would come soon, but the drinking out of a vessel on her own I wasn't sure how long that would take. AMAZING, my smart girl!!

Bottomless pit!

This kid could not. stop. eating. tonight!

She had:

• a bowl of soup. I don't mean like tomato soup or something light either, this had "fideos" (alphabet noodles), broccoli florets and chopped stems, onion and garlic, cabbage, and some other dark leafy green. This was an adult-sized bowl.
• 1 raspberry
• 4 large strawberries
• 20-30 blueberries
• a bite of bagel
• some swordfish (size maybe 1 or 2 tablespoons)
• an entire sweet potato
• two huge hunks that she bit off a whole russet potato!

Now, she almost didn't eat food all day, and she's been kinda constipated. But nonetheless, how on earth does she have space for so much at once!

Today she is 11 months old!

It had to happen sometime

Post-bath insane playtime ended in the first-ever split lip and tears.

Favorite books at 10 months old

Tied for #1:

Clip-Clop!

given to us by a librarian friend who clearly knows what is the good stuff!

Superman!

given to us by my cousin who I don't think knows anything at all about babies but he picked a total winner!




Tied for #2

The Very Hungry Caterpillar

A classic. The shortened pages, the holes for tiny fingers, what's not to love?

I love you Stinky Face

I had never heard of this one till a friend brought it for us (the same friend who gave us the Caterpillar above) but it's a great one.

Pat the Bunny

This is a classic too of course. The story is insipid but we've got two copies and they have already been quite abused.







These are the books that baby girl searches for. She dumps everything she can out of her bookshelf, and finds these. She will sit, turning pages alone. Sticking her finger in any holes, patting the bunny or Krypto, etc. If you come upon her and start reading while she turns, she is ecstatic. Stinky Face and Pat the Bunny are also especially tasty for reasons I don't know. I think a measurable percentage of the fiber in her diet comes from Pat the Bunny.

Baby girl Does It All

From (really) crawling (full time) the week after Thanksgiving to pulling up to stand that same week to starting to creep along the furniture before Christmas to rarely falling as she makes her way all around the room with one hand on the furniture and standing all by herself for short stretches. And growing 5 teeth. Months 8 and 9 were busy ones.

New foods, Mexico edition

Verdolagas, papaya, chirimoya, platano macho, cake (Abuelita got it to her mouth as I was saying "nooooo"), every flavor agua de sabor we've come across (Abuelito, thanks) and several different ice creams (nieve, helado, paleta) (also mostly Abuelito). Oh and several kinds of fish too. Not to mention all sorts of arroz, frijoles, and corn-based items (tamal, tostadas, and innumerable tortillas).

9.5 months old.