a whole week again??

How does time get away from me so quickly? I really was going to blog more than once this week...but it didn't happen. So here's a summary.

Judith has at least one more new tooth. I keep expecting to see another molar coming through on the bottom right side (to match the one that's in on the bottom left), but the newest one I see is a molar on the top left - to oppose the bottom one, I guess.

Fun new words include: grass, sky, moon, blue (yes she recognizes the color), swing, and elephant.

We've been playing outside a lot this week, because (starting Thursday) we finally had some sunny weather. Unfortunately, I've been working in the yard, so I didn't take my camera out, and there are no pictures (yet) of Judith enjoying the grass...or rather, the mud. She's been exploring in the yard, rediscovering acorn "hats" for her fingers, climbing (or trying to) on the terrace bricks, and sliding in the muddy grass. Today I cautioned her to "be careful" near the edge of a short grass step. She stood on the edge saying "ej" "carpees" (edge, careful) and then slid down it on her bottom.

We also went to the park with Vika and Julia on Thursday. Vika and Judith had great fun swinging and playing on the slide. Vika tried to teach Judith how to climb up the slide, but since the most she (Vika) could do was climb onto the end of it, I don't think any lasting damage was done :-). By the end of our time at the park, however, Judith was climbing up the play structure stairs, walking across the (bouncy) bridge, and going down the slide all by herself! (Actually, that was pretty scary for me, so I don't know how often she'll get away with it.)

Here are some pictures from this week:

Peanut butter face!
She was actually wiping the peanut butter off the toast with her finger, licking her finger, and then eating the toast.

Dance!
I was working in the kitchen and had the stereo on. Suddenly I heard wild giggling from the living room, and when I looked in, saw Judith dancing up a storm - giggling wildly as she did so.

Movie?
I asked Judith one morning if she wanted to watch a movie (yes, I finally given in and let her watch some DVDs - one of two hand-me-down Baby Einsteins or a Veggie Tales.) I put in a VT movie, and within five minutes she had taken Baby Beethoven off the shelf and brought it to me, saying "moopees" (movie) over and over - obviously she wasn't happy with my selection! The part that she's watching in this picture is one that she always anticipates. That little toy begins to spin with the music after sitting still for about 1 second - Judith always says "pin" (spin) as soon as she sees the toy.

Tonight I tried giving Judith macaroni and cheese (again). In the past she hasn't really eaten it, just played a little bit with one or two noodles, but tonight she actually ate quite a bit of it, and was able to chew it just fine (thanks, I'm sure to those new teeth!). We did ask her not to eat it with her hands, and you can see how successful that request was. It was pretty humorous to watch her hesitate over putting her hand in the bowl, and then slowly give in to the temptation.

And one last picture of Judith playing with Daddy and NayNay. They were rolling her pink soccer ball around, and Daddy stuck it under her stress. She thought that was pretty hilarious!

A night away, a party, and coloring!

No pictures from this last Friday night-Saturday, but it was a very momentous occasion. I attended the River Rock Women's Retreat, and it was my first night away from Judith! I wrote out very detailed instructions for Lance - just in case there was any part of her routine that he didn't know, and I left at about 2:00 p.m. on Friday. And (of course) they were both just fine. Apparently Judith asked for me a couple times ("mama?") and even went and patted the garage door once, in case I was out there. But otherwise she was just content with Lance. She slept fine on Friday night, ate well, and went down for her afternoon nap. And I had a great time at the retreat.

Saturday's picture is from Grandpa Tim's 70th birthday party. Here's Judith helping to unwrap the afghan that I made. She was fascinated by all the animals on the paper, but she obeyed "do not open" instructions. She also had a great time playing with all the cousins and aunts and uncles. (She didn't say "Happy Birthday" though.)

Sunday's picture turned out too blurry, but the anecdote that goes along with it is worth telling anyway. There is a small spot of chocolate on the wall near our dining room table that got there sometime during my Holiday candy frenzy, and has yet to be washed off. On Sunday night Judith noticed it (again), and also found one of my Pampered Chef nylon scrapers. I guess she's seen me use the scraper to clean off a cupboard door or to scrape tempered chocolate off the table, because she kept saying "caca" (chocolate) and rubbing at the spot with the scraper! Apparently my cleaning isn't quite up to her standards. (yes, I cleaned the spot off this morning.)

On Sunday night she also said what we have decided is her first complete sentence. She sat down on one of her stools (there are two next to each other), patted the other, and said "Nay Nay, Sit!" She's patted the stool before and said "sit" but never put it together with someone's name. And this morning she was going around the table where we sat for Life Group last night and patting each chair to tell me where Amanda (Dama), Nate (Nay Nay) and Daddy were sitting.

This morning I was working on stuff in the kitchen and searching for something to entertain Judith. I got out one of the pieces of butcher paper that came as packaging in a box, and put it on the top of one my big rubbermaid containers. Then I got out one crayon, and demonstrated. Judith liked the idea very much, except she was constantly wanting a different color. So I eventually gave her the box, which she found much more intriguing than the actual coloring process. She spent a good hour, at least, first coloring and then taking crayons in and out of the box. I also drew her some flowers and stars, which was perhaps a mistake because she no longer wanted to color on her own, but only wanted me to draw more "fowrs" and "tars".

"spatula"

One of our favorite new Judith-words is spatula. She learned this word when she got the play kitchen and tools, and she likes to say it over and over - it's such a fun word to say after all! Here's a little video (my first video post!!!) of her saying it.

sick

Judith has a cold :-(. She woke up Wednesday morning with an extremely runny nose. And since she doesn't quite understand blowing, we've been following her with a kleenex for the last three days. It is starting to dry up a little, and she's getting really stuffy as a result. We've been giving her C-Plus cold tablets, and putting liquid garlic in her ears to help prevent an ear infection. She thinks the liquid garlic process is pretty fun, actually (much better than having her scream the whole time!), and as soon as we finish, she wants to do it herself. Here's a picture from yesterday morning of her showing that she knows exactly what to do :-).

This morning Judith re-discovered her moose slippers (given by our good friend Char at a baby shower). They're still a little big, but she wanted to wear them, so I put them both on her feet. And she had a great time running around in them...for about 5 minutes. Then she brought me her shoes to put on instead.

A Whole Week?

Oops! I didn't mean to go quite so long between blogs, but I'm not going to publish 7 pictures here . We've been just fine, although Judith would really like to be able to play outside - our yard is currently flooded. I think she's been getting a little stir-crazy. We've been able to take advantage of a few breaks in the rain to talk short walks along the sidewalk, but it's not the same as being able to really run. Unfortunately, it'll probably be several months before she can do that in our backyard.


On a positive note, Judith's been sleeping much better - and we didn't have to take naptime away (yay!). She's adjusted to taking her afternoon nap around 12:30, and she's slept 10 hours straight for the last two nights (I'm hoping that's a trend, and not just a coincidence, we'll have to wait and see). Here's a beautiful picture that Lance took of her sleeping:


I took this picture to show how proficient she's becoming at feeding herself with a spoon. Yes, she gets oatmeal all over the place, but it can all go back in the bowl, and eventually gets into her mouth. Incidentally, she loves oatmeal ("ohbeal"), and eats about a cup of it every morning.

Here's a picture of her playing with the alphabet magnets that Grandma Judi made for her - on this day she was transferring them one-by-one from the back of the front door (it's metal) to the wall (magnetic painted).


And here's today's picture. Lance and I had finished our dinner, and we were all just hanging out in the kitchen. She's become quite excited by the camera - wanting to see the "baby" every time a picture is taken. So I told her to go and sit by the wall and I would take one. Lance got her to give this beautiful smile.

And so it begins??

Picture No. 1 - Judith on the potty!

Obviously, she's not "going" on the potty, since she's sitting on it fully clothed. Yesterday I got it out of the garage, washed it off, and brought it in. She was quite interested in it, and wanted to sit on it (with her book!) but wasn't nearly as happy when I tried it without her pants on. I think part of the problem she has with it is that it's just slightly too high for her to get on for herself. And she likes to be able to sit down herself.

I got it out in the first place because of my new dilemma about diapers. Judith is still, for the most part, in cloth diapers, but she wets through them all the time, and as a result she's getting a nasty rash around her leg where the wet diaper cover rubs against her. I have stuff to put on the rash, and I check her constantly, so that she isn't wet for very long, but the rash doesn't really seem to be getting much better. The only time it improves noticeably is when she wears disposables for a day or so. But disposables are so expensive! (Although, given how much more frequently I have to do the laundry both for the diapers and the covers, it might be closer to equaling out cost-wise.) So I thought "what about potty training?" And I took the first step by getting the potty chair out of the garage (incidentally, we have a second potty chair as well - both hand-me-downs) that might be a better height, I'll have to get it out and check. I did check into some websites with potty-training hints, and I'm not entirely sure that Judith's really ready to be trained yet. The biggest "miss" on the list of "signs of readiness" is a "dislike of being wet or dirty". Pretty much she'd much rather not have her diaper changed ever, so I figure she's not feeling and dislike of the dirtiness. We'll see. For now she can sit on it when she likes, and occasionally I'll put her on it with no pants, and see what happens. (There's really no rush, except for my diaper-dilemma.)

The second picture is of Judith enjoying a new toy - she got this stroller today from Julia, who we walk with. When we got home from our walk, I opened it for her, and she spent the next half hour (at least) pushing Donald around. She did occasionally alternate with her car, but she kept returning to the stroller. Even the offer of lunch didn't distract her! Apparently it's a big hit.

talking, sleeping, playing

The biggest news to report: Judith started saying "Gamma" (finally) yesterday morning. I was sitting at the computer, and she came up, as she often does, asking to see pictures on the screen. Most often, she asks to see "nay nay" (our friend Nathan), but this time she was clearly asking to see Grandma. So I found pictures of all three grandmas, and she had fun pointing them out and saying "Gamma."

The sleep thing is still pretty up in the air. Our one trial day with no nap went fine during the day, and she went to sleep almost immediately an hour before her normal bedtime - but she was up two hours earlier than normal the next day, and was super crabby all morning until naptime. So I don't think we'll be trying that again. I've pretty much just decided that I'll put her down around noon, and wake her up if she doesn't fall asleep in time to wake up naturally before carpool time.

Here are the two recent pictures: she spent some time with Lance yesterday while he was playing games on the computer - I like how it looks like she's telling him where to go/what to do (too bad you can't see what's on the screen).
And here's a picture of her playing with some items from her tea set this morning. She often asks to sit in a specific chair, and since I was working in the computer room, she chose to sit in Lance's computer chair. She balanced the little cup on the arm of the chair kind of by accident, and I congratulated her on doing it. Then she spent the next 10 minutes or so trying to balance the tea pot as well.