Judecorp.

So for the last two days, my child has stayed awake staring at us when we are rocking her to sleep, and then does NOT cry when we put her down in the crib and walk away. Instead, she blabs a bit or something and then goes to sleep.

WHO ARE YOU AND WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO MY BABY??!??!?

~//~

Also, we have been Wii stalking to no avail. And this evening, Jen was headed to Wal*Yuck while I was putting the baby to bed so we can get a little nipple/sippy cup spout basket for our now-installed dishwasher (!!!!!). She just called and said, "Should I get a Wii?" I say, "They have one?" She says, "They have FIVE."

This is the Wal*M that never has ANYTHING.

I should tell her to buy all five. ;)

~//~

It's really cool to walk through my house and see kid stuff. My heart melts every time I walk past the little kid table or see a pile of blocks on the floor or move her little red car. I love babies and I love snuggling them, but it's awesome to have a KID. A kid who says, "Da! Da!" when she is playing with her duckies in the tub, who waves and says, "bye-bye" to everyone at a restaurant and then blows kisses, and who tries to do the hand motions to "The Itsy Bitsy Spider."

I have a kid!

Punk has woken up from each of her naps today after 45 minutes or less and was crying both times - big, real tears, not the "I want you to come get me NOW" yell. She also woke up in the middle of the night sobbing unconsolably, even though I was sleeping with her. This afternoon when it happened I /knew/ she was still tired so I tried to snuggle up with her on the bed and she was snuggly, but still crying. So I did what I never do and took her to the couch with me and let her watch a little bit of PBS so she would stay calm until she got composure. Her face was all blotchy from crying, poor thing.

She has no fever, and does have some teeth coming in, but has a bit of a runny nose today so I called the pedi's office just to see what they thought. Since she has a recent history of ear infections that we don't find out about until they are huge, they suggested bringing her in.

Gosh I hope it's not another ear infection, because then they'll want to talk tubes.

~//~

Recent Punk cuteness:

1. Pretending to brush her hair.
2. Pretending to talk on the phone, but with her shoe.
3. Showing two body parts: belly and foot.
4. Trying to put on her shoe.
5. Saying 'bye bye' and 'ball' (baba and ba respectively), but not consistently.
6. Pushing a toy car on the floor, sometimes with a vroom-vroom noise.
7. Yelling, "MA MA!!!" when she wants something and I'm in another room.
8. Toys she will go and get if you tell her to: car, ball, shapes, blocks, books, bucket.
9. Saying, "RAAAAR!" whenever she sees any kind of animal. Even fish.

So we survived Punk's first year and now her first birthday party, complete with rain because of course I can't have a party that I expect to be outside without a healthy dollop of rain. We invited a lot of people because it was her first birthday and we think she is the coolest ever, and also because of the holiday weekend bringing out of town friends closer, and I really relied on having some outdoor space to put some of these people. Thankfully the rain stopped in the late morning so we could have some folks on the deck, but the yard really didn't get used and I didn't get to have the Baby Pool Party I was dreaming about. (Oh, the photos we could have had!)

Instead we had Babypalooza in our living room and it was the cutest ball of chaos you will ever see. Besides Punk, there was Jack (16 months), Ruby (11 months), Mo (10 months), Charlotte (10 months), Jeremy (6 months) and Anna (12 months). It was crrrrrrazy! But freaking cute. Also, Punk has stopped beating up Mo and has moved on to Jeremy. Mmm, younger men.

~//~

My smurfbrother and SIL (gretastic) were in town for the festivities and as always, that was made of awesome. I just love when they are around because they are the coolest ever and because they are so in love with my kid. I mean, sure, she's the coolest ever, but they are so into her and it is really great. And she is really into them. After a day or so, I could ask, "Where's Uncle Rick?" and she would look at him and then crawl over to this giant ball she has so he could play with her. And of course she knew that Aunt Gretchen would pick her up whenever she wanted to see her balloons out the window. That kid loves her some balloons.

I wish they lived closer to us so badly. It's like an ache.

Also, my brother totally worked his butt off helping us out with the party. On Thursday while I was at work, he did all of my dishes. And on Friday, he mowed the back yard (even though we didn't get to use it). And then he made pounds and pounds and pounds and POUNDS of cook-out food - shrimp and couscous salad, pasta salad, and the most delicious potato salad ever. Yum.

~//~

Punk is just so awesome. So so so awesome. Tonight she was sitting on the floor putting toys in a container and dumping them out. Over and over. It is so neat to see her little wheels turning. Rick taught her how to work one of the buttons on her pop-up toy (now she can do two!), and now I'm trying to teach her how to push a toy car around and say "vroom vroom." Also, she is trying really hard to stack blocks, but she hasn't figured out how to let it go gently yet - she still pushes really hard.

She is such an amazing and perfect little thing, and I just love her so much.

~//~

Tonight is Jen's first night teaching Digital Media at a local adult education school. She is really excited about it because she likes teaching and because it's actually an art job, but I'm not going to lie, the idea of being a single mom twice a week after working long days is really daunting. That, and I need to find someone who can cover from when she has to leave to when I get home two nights a week, which is stressful. But the worst is that she told me it would be a 10-12 week commitment and I knew that no matter how crazy, I could plug away for 10-12 weeks. But then the other day she dropped the bomb that it is actually THIRTY-SIX weeks. As in 9 months. As in that's just crazy talk. That's 9 months of coming home from long work days, doing Punk dinner, Punk clean up, Punk playing, Punk bedtime, Punk toy clean-up, Punk day care bag change-over, the works. I am tired just thinking about it... and it's only the first day.

My kid knows how to use a straw now. I have been trying this for a couple of months and had given up. I mean, if she can't use a straw, no big, you know?

She decided to show me using my iced coffee at lunch. Whoops. She didn't like it, though, so she spit it out. Which is what she does to any beverage that isn't water. Heh.

Punk, who is 10 months old today I might add, claps on cue. She actually did it a few days ago but I thought it was a fluke or a coincidence. Because NORMAL babies like to clap when you say, "Yaaaay!" I have been yaying like a maniac for weeks. No go. Because of course that can't be good enough for my Punk. Oh no.

She claps when you say, "Clap your hands." What an overachiever!

Punk had her 9 month check-up this morning. We have pretty much 100% ditched the female pediatrician we saw a couple of times in favor of the male pediatrician that we really like. He is so old school (and was the pedi of several people we know - our age) and kind and sweet and mellow about everything. I guess that's what happens when you have seen kids for so long. Either way, he is the one who was super sweet to me when I had all of the nursing issues and never once got down on me for starving my baby. I love him.

It doesn't hurt that he is always telling me how smart Punk is and how great she is. Because, well, I think that, too! He said her fine motor skills were really good and she obviously has good vision considering how she can pick up tiny things. We chatted at length about her muscle tone and it's funny - the PT is always talking about how abnormal things are and how concerning it is, and the pedi is always talking about how he thinks she's just on "the high end of normal" and she will work it out. He said we should make a neurologist appointment for 6 months out and cancel it if we need to. He also said that he echoed my thoughts that she doesn't need an MRI unless she starts showing major delays. He said she is just a strong kid and will stretch herself out as she stands and walks. It's funny, because he is not concerned AT ALL that she can't sit and play with toys but the developmental person in me is freaking about that.

He also wasn't bothered that her fontanel is nearly closed already. He said that some strong, active babies seem to develop faster like that. When he makes weird statements like that he reminds me of my dad, who was always making stuff up when he didn't know the answer. :) But he sounds so believable! Either way, her head is growing along her curve so I guess it's not a big deal.

I told him we had dropped down to reflux meds once a day but she started urping and stuff again and were thinking of going back to twice. He said it was up to us but he thought the increase in refluxy stuff was probably from increased saliva from teething. He hoped we would be able to stop the meds soon. (ME TOO.) He also said to try her on yogurt and see how that goes, and if it goes well, to try cheese. I haven't done any dairy stuff since she had such a problem with dairy formula when she was little. So I will give it a try.

What's awesome is that when he was walking out, I told her, "Say bye-bye," which she normally NEVER does... and she waved! Which reinforces that he thinks she's a genius, of course.

Also, she is still freakishly tall. 85th percentile for weight at 21 pounds even, and 95th percentile for height at 29.75".

( Height and Weight Charts )

Punk has discovered the world of the "high kneel." She crawls over to something and then reaches up higher and plays on her knees, or grabs things. I love the high kneel. It's cute, and it's a step toward the "pulling up." Besides, being up in a kneel bends her legs. Yay.

So anyway, with the high kneel comes the potential for the falling over. And I really do leave Punk a lot of space to do her thing and fall over, because she needs to figure things out.

Day One of the high kneel and she has a big scratch on the side of her head. And it's not even 9am.

Whoopsie!

Punk had a banner day today.

We were looking for something cheap to do that wasn't the mall (dear God I hate the mall, please smite the mall) and after looking at the admission price for the butterfly exhibit thing ($12/person, ouch), we decided to go to the big Yankee Candle flagship store. What we didn't know is that they were having some sort of Winter Extravaganza event and it was PACKED. Like "stalk someone to their parking spot" packed.

We got to YC a lot later than we intended and I figured we would have an hour there, tops, before Punk had an exhausted meltdown. We went to the restaurant that is there (Chandler's) - whoops, there goes "cheap" - and for the first time ever, Punk sat in the restaurant high chair for the entire meal! I got to eat with TWO HANDS! She was amused with toys and oyster crackers which ended up on the floor and I realized, yep, we're "those people." Oh well. Then we went into the store.

She rode in the stroller a lot longer than I expected her to and was really enthralled by all of the stuff there. We sniffed a million candles and looked at all the other stuff (that place is crazy!) and when she got fussy in the stroller, I put her in the mei tai and she was good for a while more. I think two hours went by before I realized we should really feed here ASAP as she was likely to crash out hard in the car. She sucked down her bottle in one of the gift shops, went to the bathroom with Jen for a diaper change, and did indeed fall asleep in the car. And then took a good 1.5 hour nap (or longer) when we got home!

It's amazing how much older she seems to have gotten almost overnight. It really kind of chokes me up when I think about it. She now can sit by herself pretty well - I can't really leave the room while she's sitting but I don't have to hover over her, either - and was so comfortable in that high chair at the restaurant (which has no support). I spent most of yesterday calling people and leaving the message, "My kid has two teeth and is army crawling all over the house!" and already today I have had two heart attacks when she scooted her way over to outlets and plugs. Time to rearrange things!

She will be dashing around the house on her hands and knees in no time. She can go one or two "steps" that way but then will belly flop and do the rest with her arms. She is amazing. She seems to love to develop new skills in big spurts, which is cute in some ways and an emotional kick in the pants in others.

I need to upload pictures. I have a bunch from as far back as Super Tuesday.

My kid is currently on her hands and knees rocking back and forth. Every so often she gets enough momentum to scoot forward. God help me.

She also has the ridge of a first tooth out as of this morning.

And has taken a 20 minute nap so far today.

*dies*

Punk had her 6 month WBV today, even though she'll be 7 months in a week and a half or so. Oops. We got a little behind.

( Lengthy and Pic Heavy )