New Tricks

Holly has discovered the fun of shaking her head 'no'. Apparently if we make a funny noise, like if I 'buzz' or David does some tube & throat singing, it cues Holly to shake her head 'no'. So I don't think it actually means 'no' to her yet, it's just fun. She really likes it when she's in her highchair...whatever it takes to get her to eat, right? Holly also does it on her changing table and sitting on people's laps. Holly has also found that her velcro bibs are fabulous fun to drag around the house, connect & disconnect the velcro, and smack the kitty with. Who would have thought...bibs. Holly is also starting to see the difference in shapes, colors, and textures...so also the shape sorting toys she has have gotten that much cooler. She always played with them before but just liked clapping the shape blocks together or chewed on them. Now she tries to put the right shape in the right hole. Holiday has made some progress with standing/walking pursuits. Besides her having pulling up to standing completely down she's starting to be able to sit or pick something up off the floor without a total crash and burn. Of course the crash and burn still happens, but if she lands square on her butt she seems okay with that. So we have less panic attacks from being stuck standing up somewhere.

Holiday with the Easter Bunny

We saw the Easter Bunny while we were at the mall. The picture turned out cuter than the one with Santa Claus. Holly is trying to walk all the time now. She's highly frustrated that it's not working yet. The drool machine is back on and there's been a lot of crying while putting her hands down her mouth and the tugging of little ears. I put my finger in to check and she bit me...hard...it bled quite a bit. Holly has bitten her own hand too...hard...it's better now. So now I check for teeth with caution. My book says you could see upper molars as soon as 13 months so those are probably the ones that are warming up right now. She got her 8th tooth in January so there's been a teething hiatus.

Holiday is growing up fast

Holly has continued her major development streak. She's just past the 20 lb mark so now we can graduate to the next size car seat. I'm shifting her from 6-12 mo. to 12-18 mo. size clothes now. That probably means she'll grow out of her baby bath tub soon. We'll need to get some sort of non-slip surfacing for the main tub. Holly doesn't seem to like her stand-n-play saucer plaything anymore or playing in her playpen. It's just too much fun to roam around the living room and scootch under the table following the cat around. Holiday pulls herself up to standing all the time now. She still takes that step on her own but continues to crash and burn if we don't catch her. She's so quick at it that we don't always see it coming. At least the hard knocks haven't discouraged her because she keeps trying to walk by herself. Holly's had quick a few moments of standing completely unassisted for a whole minute. It works better if she has her attention on something else, like a kitty walking by. We go to playgrounds and playareas as much as possible for her now, she really enjoys being around other little kids.

Holiday's play times

Holly is all over the place now. We have a gate set up so she can't get into the kitchen or office (where the litter box is). Vader just meows at the gate when he wants in or out and we leave it open when Holly's napping or her bedtime. She's standing up against furniture all the time now and cruises around the coffee table by hanging on to it. We took Holiday to the Green Lake playground and the Southcenter Mall play area last weekend. She really likes to swing, she leans into it and everything. The play area is great because she can scootch around as much as she wants. It was PACKED with kids and chaos and Holly LOVED it. So when you watch the videos...yep, that's her screaming. It's that fun. That girl is fearless, she just goes for it.

http://www.youtube.com/user/MrTurtleback#p/a/u/1/baFiwLAzXUA
http://www.youtube.com/user/MrTurtleback#p/a/u/0/qO5B5yKgKUE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8sAlJFcE7Y8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=48Re57yETUI&feature=related

The toddling begins

Holiday is just growing up in leaps and bounds this week. She's trying to walk and stand up all by herself without anything to hang on to. She pushes my hands away even. Holly can't quite do it yet, but she really wants to. So we're trying to get her used to wearing shoes now.

Tears of joy

Holiday pulled herself up to standing last night on the entertainment center without any coaxing at all. So needless to say the babyproofing continues. She's so wicked fast at scootching that it's kind of spiderlike. We have also found that if something happens that she really likes she'll cry because she's so happy about, but then she calms herself down in a minute. Every once in a while I play Sesame Street for her and she bursts into tears and then she's so happy to see Elmo and friends. Such an emotional, passionate, sensitive little girl (just like her parents...oh dear). :)

Cruisings...

Holly has really taken to "cruising", which is walking from furniture to furniture (or people) while always hanging on to something. It's more like a shuffle and mostly sideways. She gets a little panicky when she wants to sit down, she hasn't discovered the bending of knees motion yet. So you have to set her down when that happens. Holly is getting into all sorts of things now. I think we might need to move Vader's water dish because she keeps splashing in it and today she knocked it over because it was nearly empty. It was enough to warrant changing her clothes though. Vader was meowing the entire time until I finished fixing it and guarded it afterwards. He's always been a water-kitty, which is pretty weird. Every pet has a quirk right? Now we have a water-baby, which is pretty cute. It's hard making her stop getting into the water dish when it's cracking her up. Holiday laughs when she's following the kitty under the dining room table too. She's also thinks it's funny when she touches his feet...specifically. Vader is good, tolerant kitty.

Fastest Scootcher in the West

Holly is full of Babinese talkitiveness now. It's super cute. Scootching is still her primary mode of locomotion. Now when I set her down in the living room to make her a bottle, she scootches into the kitchen right next to me before I finish. Fastest scootcher in the West I say. She likes to follow our cat around. Rolling a ball back and forth is also a gas. Apparently it's hilarious. She laughed herself to hiccups. We've been taking her to parks and play areas more often now, she loves seeing other kids even though she's not quite big enough to take on the big toy herself. Holly can at least go in the swing and we slide her down slides. Still her preference is just watch kids run around (especially really close to her) while she claps her hands and screams in joy.