developmental milestones

Belle can officially walk!  I'm not saying she's self motivated about it.  It takes cajoling and bribing, but she can do it.  At least until she gets so excited she flings herself backwards.  Or bored of it and drops down to her knees.  But still, an important skill to master.  Crawling fifteen-year-olds are a little sad. 

And D (who is not a big drawer/scribbler/writer) drew his first picture of a person!  It's his daddy and I think the resemblance is uncanny.

Big Girl

My baby turned one on Tuesday.  I don't mean to sound old, but where does the time go?  I really do swear she was just born a couple months ago. 


She's quite taken with her new maturity.  Starting on Tuesday she decided that she could stand.  Well, she's been able to stand for ages, she just doesn't.  Set her up on her own two feet and she smirks at you and either flings herself backwards in her favorite game of Trust Fall or just jellifies her legs and melts into the floor.  But not Tuesday.  No, on that momentous day she was hanging out by my legs, examining a toy when, voila, she pushed off me and stood on her own for half a minute.  Like it was nothing. 

Then on Wednesday she took two steps for Med Man.  Then five tonight!  Very exciting.  She also is suddenly very interested in my wallet and talking on the play cell phone.  I'm already praying for myself 15 years from now...

Happy Birthday, Belle.  I love you so much.  I think you are the funniest, quirkiest baby I've ever met and I can not wait to see you grow up and get to know you more.  I love that you snuggle with me and duck your face in such a cute way when you are feeling shy.  I love your silly laugh and your huge smile.  Happy birthday, baby.

Hello again

So, I recognize that it's been AGES since my last post.   Sorry.  It's either feast or famine with my blogging.  I either have a hundred things in one day I want to blog about or nothing for weeks. 

But we have had a nice time lately.  We took a weekend trip to St Louis where we went to the zoo and the Magic House.  The zoo was, as expected, full of animals.  Some interesting, like the tigers, some boring, like frankly most of the bird exhibits.  There were a couple weird birds, but mostly they were, well birds. 

Yup, see the fake smile? Here's D with some sort of Hornbill (well camouflaged off to his right.)  There were lots of different kinds of Hornbills.  Probably because most of them had such an odd beak that they couldn't survive in the wild. 
 

There was also the occasional exhibit of animals that you had never heard of.  Like this one of a yamahoo or an zandagur or something like that.

How do you think that poor fellow got up there?  And isn't it amazing how even with very few facial muscles he can still look puzzled about how he is supposed to get down?  My theory?  The zoo keeper knew that this animal wasn't interesting, and seeing how he was set between the giraffes and the camels (two zoo celebrities) he knew they needed some pizazz in the exhibit.  So before the zoo opened, he used a crane to lift that unfortunate creature up there.  It's really quite easy to see why people are against zoos.  That is some serious cruelty.

We also went to the Magic House, which is a Children's Museum and  super cool one.  D had quite a good time there.  There are swirly pipes on a wall filled with air that let you put fuzzy balls into and the air zooms them through the pipes and shoots them out at some unsuspecting sap's head. There are water tables and sand tables and detective rooms and long swirly slides and train rooms and fishing holes.  Fun, fun.

D got to sit in the Oval Office and use the big red phone.  He said he was calling his mom and dad. I can already see a congressional inquiry into the use of government property for personal use. 

Even Belle got to play in the baby section. Yes, she still has the mohawk.  I'm wondering if it's ever going to collapse.  D's did at around 6 months, but since most of her little head is just covered in fuzz, I guess the long stuff feels the need to express itself.