Juliana has been trying a bunch of new "table" foods now. Whenever she sees Brian or me snacking on something, she comes rushing over, grabs our legs, and verbally (and physically) demands to be included in tasting the snack. We have gotten much better on her eating only when she's in her high chair, and she is doing significantly better eating with us on the weekends, rather than only eating her meals at daycare and fussing through meals at home. Here she is testing out french toast. She was a big fan. Which might be due to the butter that I grilled them in? =)
Last week, we had a few nights of FANTASTIC sleep. Tuesday night, she slept 8 hrs straight (no needing Mommy or Daddy to help her resettle). Wednesday night, a rough night, which we chalked up to her tummy being upset (although, who really knows). Thursday night, she slept 8.5 hrs straight. I started thinking that this might be because I started trying to wean her off of Prevacid, so she was getting it every other day instead of every day, and the days she didn't get it were the nights she slept the best. Then Friday night, my theory was blown because she slept 6.5 hrs. And, Saturday night, my theory was blown again, as she was up most of the night. She would only sleep if we had a hand on her back, or were next to her. Sunday night, was pretty close to a repeat of Saturday, and we realized that her molars were what was bothering her and disrupting her sleep so drastically. Hence, the "beaver" has re-appeared and left its teeth marks on the window sill...
And torn the roses off of a headband...
She hasn't settled back into such a long stretch of sleeping yet this week, but we're hopeful that she'll turn the corner soon! =) Since she was so uncomfortable, she also reverted back to extremely short naps on Sunday, so here she is napping with Daddy.
Our little Costco shopper! She's now famous, since we had a mother and daughter (who both work at day care, although I've never formally been introduced to them), call out "Juliana!" while we were waiting for our Costco pizza, and then proceeded to chat with her (and us a little bit). Apparently, even though she's the smallest in the Young Toddler's room, she gives the bigger kids a run for their money running all around the place!
I have been extremely busy with school work, and have been bring a bulk of it home with me to work on in my "free" time. So, I tried one afternoon, to sit with her and Brian while they were playing and work on my laptop analyzing some data... But she was so interested in the laptop (and my pad of paper, and my pen...), that finally I suggested we get an extra keyboard from downstairs and let her "type" on it, instead of on my laptop.
Here's a glimpse at what we mean when we say she's "busy"... Constantly moving, constantly picking things up, dropping, moving things, stepping on us, etc etc.
Perhaps you noticed her "shiner" in some of the previous photos. This happened at the beginning of March when I was in the kitchen washing her bottles and dishes from day care, Brian was downstairs working on our bathroom, and she ran into or tripped into the corner of the wall by the steps and got this nice little knot on her head. I tried to apply an ice pack to it (we have an Elmo Boo Boo Buddy which is amazing at how cold it stays), but she mostly kept taking it off of her head. She did have a few tears and was crying for longer than a minute, but she quickly got over it, and even more quickly was back to putting her "head" into her toddler ways! The bump was completely gone by morning, and she still has residual bruise, but it's now reddish-pink instead of blue and purple.
The iPhone flash wasn't quick enough to catch her with her eyes open, but you can still see her cheesy grin. This was one morning after the time change (it was still dark outside in the morning), and she had been busy! The pacifier was on the floor, and she had thrown one of her pillows on the floor (see the yellow monkey pillow on the floor?)
Remember what I said about her wanting to try all sorts of food that Mommy and Daddy have? Well here's a great example. I was eating a peanut butter spoon (aka a scoop of peanut butter on a spoon), and she was all over me. After briefly consulting Brian, we decided that it'd be fine if she tasted it even though she isn't 1 year old yet. As you can see, it was a big hit.
We believe at day care she watches the teachers clean up periodically through the day and at the end of the day, because when she's home she'll pick washcloths and towels out of the laundry basket in the kitchen and will wipe down things. The floor, the high chair, her toys, the fridge, etc.
Day care has a wooden/plastic gate at the doorway into the baby room, and it has a bar across the middle where you can set the size of the gate to fit the doorway. They have a fabric blanket cover so babies don't "See" the bar and try to climb it... So much for that! Juliana climbs up it and puts her knees on the bar and then throws her head back to giggles and screams of laughter I'm sure!
Brian and I know we'll be in trouble soon when she figures out how to run without tripping or falling! We figure that'll be our exercise plan, just trying to keep up with her!
It's amazing how quickly she's picked up on Baby Signs and other things. But it's also like she'll "forget" something to make room for other developments. For example, about 2 weeks ago she started "blowing" kisses, which meant she made the "kiss" sound with her lips. It was so cute, and she'd do it on demand when asked, but this past week, she wouldn't do it at all! As far as her baby signs, she does "eat" periodically, she can now distinguish between "milk" (with the hand sideways) and "bye bye" (top of the hand facing up to the ceiling), she does "wash hands" which is a smaller gesture than "play" but they both look very similar, she occasionally does "diaper" which is smacking her hip with her arm, or hanging on the baby gate by the steps that go upstairs, she does "duck" on command which is like your hand is the duck quacking, "all done" she will do when prompted and consists of moving her hands out to the sides like pushing a plate away. She will say "bye bye" when waving bye bye, she will say "voom" when I start the van in the morning to go to school, she says "ba" which means "baby" or "book", she will occasionally say "mama" and "dada", she sometimes says "pop", and this morning she started saying "nana." Of course, for now these are mostly just sounds, and her gibber gabber vocabulary is quite extensive. As far as the lesson with doing baby signs, I know she's not getting the signs as consistently as possible because of day care, BUT it's awesome to see her start to pick up on them. And it's also amazing to me how much she understands even if she can't communicate back. For example, she can be very wiggly to try and get her shoes on and her jacket on to go somewhere... One day last week when it was nice weather, her teacher was trying to get her ready to go outside but she was moving and wiggling all over the place! Her teacher said, "Juliana, you're going to go outside!" and she said after that, Juliana sat still and let her jacket be zipped and her shoes put on. So, I'm trying to verbalize with her more to explain what we're doing or where we're going. Although it seems like she does the baby signs whenever she feels so inclined for now, I definitely think there will come a time when she's more consistent with them. For example, one mealtime she was whiny and complaining because she was done and I asked "Juliana, are you all done?", she stopped crying and whimpering, and signed "all done." I said, "Okay, I'm going to wipe off your hands and face and then you can play" and she signed "wash hands." So I'd like to think that she stopped fussing because she knew I understand what she wanted. Now I just need to figure out what signs she should learn next!!
Overall, although it's exhausting most days, there are always moments where you can't help but laugh and enjoy!! Like last night, I was nursing her and going to put her to bed after and Brian came up to ask a question about dinner. She unlatched, looked over at him in the doorway and let out this gigantic, sigh that was like she was agitated with being interrupted. We couldn't help but laugh.
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