Feeds:
Posts
Comments

The Magic Word

Baby sign language is useful for those tricky pre-verbal months when the kid knows what he wants but can’t use words to tell you. Baboo has known the sign for “more” for a few months, but I only recently began teaching him “please.”

I assumed food would be the thing that got him to use “please” independently since that’s what got him going on “more.” So I’d sign “more please” before I put more grapes on his tray or broke off another bit of animal cracker for him. But he kept doing “more” without “please,” not even taking a stab at it. I’d move his hand to his chest and say “please,” say, “good baby!” and then put the food in front of him.

Sometimes, he gave me the stink-face when I did the sign for him. I began to harbor a theory that he just wasn’t interested in being polite, much as he has no interest in pasta.

This morning, he did “more please” on his own. For this:

20130427-112548.jpg

Now, he smacked his chest with both hands — a far cry from the actual sign, which is making a circle with one hand in the middle of the chest — but I’ll still mark this as the day my kid first said, “please.”

20130423-091622.jpg

You are 14 months old.

You have eight teeth. One of them is a molar, and we did not enjoy nursing you through its eruption, which took for freakin’ ever. Naturally, its mate is now coming up on the other side of your lower jaw.

You are still uninterested in walking, though you often stand like a rock and will take a few steps now and then.

You like to look at books after your morning bottle. Your current favorites are “Runaway Bunny” and “Dear Zoo.” “Goodnight Moon” continues to hold your interest too — you’ve recently begun pointing at the little house and the young mouse.

You don’t know that you can get up from being flat on your back; you’ll just hold your arms out to be helped up and kick your legs, like a beetle that’s been flipped over. This is fine, because we still change your diaper on a changing table that’s four feet off the ground.

You have begun to say “ma,” meaning “more.” “No” still comes out as “nah” or “neh” or “nnnnneeeehhhhhhh.” Your other new words are “uh” and “moo,” a/k/a “up” and “moon.”

You hug other babies, your baby dolls, your Grammie, and your stuffed animals with joyful abandon. You hug us, too, mostly at the end of the day when you’re very tired.

You try to put Cheerios in your nose and eyes when you’re tired. You do this while smiling at us.

You make a kissing noise in imitation of Mama and Daddy, but you don’t try to kiss us yet.

You enjoy bath time thoroughly, though you increasingly try to stand up in the tub despite Mama explaining this is not a good idea and gently sitting your butt back down over and over.

You recently blew your Daddy’s mind when he asked where the red dragon was, and you promptly crossed the room to fetch it.

You can turn light switches on and off, and lunge for them whenever you see one. You cackle every time you flip the switch regardless of whether you can see the lights it controls.

You like to share Mama’s apples with her, and will wipe her face as you pass the apple back and forth.

You go after forbidden things with astonishing focus when you are tired.

You are becoming a much more adept imitator of gesture and speech.

You are now over 30 inches tall, but it’s hard to tell exactly how tall you are because you wiggle so much.

You can locate your eyes, ears, nose, mouth, fingers, toes and diaper. Sometimes you get a little confused when we ask where your mouth is.

You adore playing peek-a-boo with towels, large bowl lids, and whatever else is handy.

You are 14 months old, and you dazzle us every day.

20130410-094112.jpg

Every so often one of us will say we need to get this or that cute thing on video, but there are a lot of non-videoable things I want to remember. And no, I don’t care if non-videoable isn’t a word.

Here’s the list so far:

– The baby’s foot working against my leg as he takes his bottle.

– Milk breath.

– The sparky light in his eyes when he hears a new or interesting noise.

– The weight of his body against me when he’s completely relaxed — I don’t know how, but it weighs more than he weighs.

– The dainty ballet of his hand when he carefully picks something up or takes something from me.

– The smell of his neck.

– The thrilled, thrilling energy that pours out of him when he’s really excited.

– The rainbows that shoot out his butt during every diaper change.

Okay, kidding about that last one. But it still amazes me to see how perfect and beautiful his little body is.

Observations

20130406-094415.jpg
Shortly after the baby took his first steps, I was asked if I’d gotten it on video. I hadn’t.

I still haven’t, partly because he’s not doing a lot of repeat performances, and partly because I don’t want to miss it. Also, he often takes a few steps as he hurls himself towards me. Kind of hard to film that without assistance.

I’ve often heard it said that the act of observing an event changes it. The video corollary is that by recording something, you’re removing yourself from it, even if only by a degree. And right now, I want to be as close as possible to big moments. There’s plenty of time to get his early stumble-steps recorded.

And besides, I’m not sure the video camera is charged.

The Week in Review

20130402-101906.jpg

Oh, my people. There has been a LOT going on at our house lately. Hence the lack of posting… And hence the list format of this post.

So. Since I last posted, the following things have happened:

– Baboo took a few steps on Good Friday. We happened to be on Skype with my mother-in-law at the time, which made it even cooler. I totally burst into tears. He has not yet repeated this new trick — par for the course when he picks up a new skill.

– The baby learned how to climb onto his toy bin. He also learned how to fall off it.

– I’ve spent some time re-watching the previous season of Mad Men and getting stoked for this Sunday’s premiere. Yes, I’m one of those.

– We gave the baby the small Easter basket you see up there. He loves that talking orange egg. It says things like, “Yoo hoo, I’m hiding!” until you open it to reveal the blue bunny inside. Then it says, “Surprise, it’s me, Jojo!” whereupon he makes a very excited face. He had a good time taking the purple paper grass out of the basket, but seemed perturbed once it was spread around him. Could be he’s taking after his Virgo mama…

– I’m finally below my pre-pregnancy weight. Only by a pound, and only if I weigh myself in the morning, but it still counts, dammit!

– Baboo liked his first taste of chocolate but didn’t want much of it because of the hard shell around said chocolate. So I helped him out with the Cadbury mini eggs he rejected. Such a hardship, this motherhood thing.

– The baby now uses the sign for “more” for abstract things (not just Cheerios). This morning, he used it to say he wanted his Daddy to hold him again. Now I have to teach him more noun signs so he can say what he wants more of — because sometimes, we can’t figure it out.

20130326-094853.jpg
In a recent post I mentioned that Baboo had enjoyed playing with a baby doll at a neighbor’s house. A few days ago, I made good on my promise to let him pick out a doll for himself.

Here I will pause to link to a song I hope is no longer revolutionary: William Wants a Doll, from Marlo Thomas’ excellent TV special and children’s album, Free to be You and Me.

As it happens, there weren’t a ton of choices at Target. No boy dolls, for starters, and only a few options that looked like actual babies instead of Disney characters or anime princesses in physical form. There were, however, tons of “companion dolls,” whatever the hell that means, and accessories, because God forbid your dolly go out without her cell phone and matching purse.

Anyway. He seemed to gravitate toward a standard sort of doll, reaching out for her and smiling at her and so on. I stuck her in the front of the cart with him, and he continued to touch her face and babble at her as we finished shopping.

Once we got home, I took her out of her box and handed her to Baboo. He smiled at her, and then gave her to me. Over and over. And gave me her bottle, because true to her newborn form, she is always hungry.

A friend who is wise to the ways of babies and a doula said he’s doing this because he knows I’ll take care of her. Aw. How sweet. But how am I supposed to get anything done? I can get him to wave the bottle near her face occasionally, but he really, really wants me to hold her. Usually when I’m trying to get a round of bottles washed or do some food prep.

I’m hoping he’ll relax about her care needs now that she’s made at least one friend among the toys:

20130326-100112.jpg

I could talk about inner and outer journeys and kick-ass writing and laughing and crying, but here’s all you really need to know about this book:

Wild by Cheryl Strayed is so good that I finished it instead of napping on a day when the baby was teething and I had cramps.

20130321-115154.jpg
If you want to read a real review, this one is darn good.

Mama Time Management

20130321-091145.jpg
Recently a friend who was helping care for her toddler niece and colicky baby nephew asked me via text how moms have time to brush their hair or get a cup of coffee. I laughed and wrote back that those things happen when nice Aunties come to visit, but it did get me thinking about how my personal time management has changed since the baby.

Probably the most significant difference is how I use baby-free time. Specifically, there have been occasions when the following things were more important to me than showering:

– sleep

– food

– coffee

– writing

– a chat with an old friend

– cleaning (I’m a Virgo, remember?)

– a quick escape, i.e., a visit to my favorite websites

– quality time with my husband

– quality time with a heating pad

And yes, I do occasionally put the kiddo in the pack-n-play for five minutes while I shower. I know he’s safe in there, and I leave the door open so I can hear him and talk to him. But that also means I rush through the process, which takes a lot of the pleasure out of it. And yeah, I know, that sounds weird, but when you haven’t showered for a few days and you know the kid is going to be asleep for at least 45 minutes, there is a whole lot of joy to be found under a stream of hot water.

20130318-080344.jpg
As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, the baby has gotten very interested in putting things away and taking things out of bins. He’s also gotten very picky about what he will eat. So when he expressed interest in the grapes I was washing this morning, I sliced a few up for him and put them on his tray.

He picked up a piece and held it out to the side, as if to throw it on the floor. I asked him if he wanted to put it back on the cutting board, and held it out to him.

He put pieces of grape on the cutting board and took them off the cutting board for the next five minutes. He was very deliberate about which pieces he wanted to pick up and put somewhere else, as well as exactly where he wanted to put them. I was unable to discern any outward logic, but to him it was very serious business.

He did not eat any of the fruit, but it sure was fun to watch him wrangle those grape bits with the gravitas of Bobby Fischer.

20130317-074728.jpg
You are 13 months old.

You think the best feature of a sippy cup is the noise it makes when it hits the floor. But watching what the liquid inside does when you shake it is cool, too.

You did not recognize fruit leather as food when a friend’s mama offered it to you.

You loved that friend’s baby dolls, though, going to them and hugging them over and over. So very soon, you will get to pick out a doll of your own.

You will shred paper towels, newspaper, or circulars for a good long time, shaking the little bits off your hands and then tearing another piece in two.

You still have only six teeth, but every day, two more get closer and closer to the surface.

You are still not walking, but you’re doing more independent standing.

You think all the kitchen cabinets belong to you. Which they more or less do. Your favorite kitchen toys are the metal strainers.

You recently figured out how to take socks off your hands very quickly. So now we clean your hands after every diaper change.

You know where your nose is. You’re a little hazy on the location of your other features.

You have figured out that if you stand on tiptoe, you can reach the countertops. And the tabletop.

You watch the garbage truck in still, silent rapture.

You will put things into your toy box and take them out and put them in and take them out for a good 10 minutes. You are very serious about this.

You hand everything to us: food; toys; tiny pieces of stuff from the floor.

You are 13 months old, active and happy and funny and healthy, and delighted by the world.

I'm over 50. I'm raising a fifth grader. Sometimes he posts too.

thepeacefulparsnip

My journey to becoming a dietitian and other cool stuff

Bideshi Biya

Living The Road Less Travelled