Dancing Naked

Train ride

Today we took Clara for a ride on the little train that goes round the park. She loved it! She had a great time waving at all the people we passed, and was rocking back and forth to try and make it go faster! Haha!

Bookworm

I forgot to mention this in last night's post: Yesterday, just before Andras and I left for the spa, I took Clara to the bedroom for a quiet story and then put her down for a nap. I left the book on the chair near her crib. When Dad peeked in on her a little while later, she had woken up from her nap and was sticking her hands out through the bars. The next time Mum went back to peek in, there she was lying on her tummy, propped up on her elbows, with the book in front of her, 'reading' it out loud to herself! Somehow she'd managed to reach through the bars, pull the chair up against the crib, get the book, pull it back through the bars, and was happily reading it just like a big kid! Too funny! (She does love her books!)

Moo

Clara's new thing now is to 'moo'. She has a picture of a cow over her bed and she 'moos' at it (well, actually it sounds more like 'mmmmm'). Last night in the middle of the night she even woke up and started mooing at it. And she's also started mooing at other things too - dogs and cats etc.

She's also learned to 'kiss' and blows us kisses when she feels so inclined. It's soooo cute!

And she loves to mimic lately. She mimics sounds she hears - like Grandad slurping his tea, or Granny sighing after climbing up all the stairs. Very funny. But the funniest one was when she mimicked the mixer when I was making something the other day. She actually did a very realistic rendition of an electric mixer!

She's gotten the hang of this swinging thing too. Granny and Grandad took her back to the park for a second attempt - not only did she enjoy it this time, but she even figured out how to make it go back and forth by swinging her legs after watching an older girl do it!

Today was a Big Day. She spent the whole day (10-6) alone with Granny and Grandad while Mummy and Daddy went to a day spa! (I had a gift certificate) It was the longest we'd ever been apart and I missed her the moment I closed the front door! She, however, didn't seem to notice my absence at all until 6pm, when she started asking for 'mumma'. Fortunately, we got home just after that so it wasn't too traumatic (for anyone!). She was so happy to see me that she gulped down her milk so quickly that she immediately puked half of it back up on me afterwards. How sweet!

10-month birthday

Clara is 10 months old today - she went on a special birthday outing to the park with Granny and Grandad and had her first ever ride on a swing! She wasn't too sure about it....

Fun afternoon

Today our little friend James came to spend the afternoon with us. Clara, James, Grandad and I went for a walk in the early afternoon and then Clara, James, Granny and I went to playgroup. James was a bit shy at first, but he soon warmed up and quietly joined the group for songs, duplo, crafts, and then found a book to read on my knee. Clara was the complete opposite! She 'talked' non-stop all the way there in her stroller and when we got there, the moment Granny set her down on the floor, she was off like a shot towards the duplo box, sending the blocks flying in all directions and giggling like she knew she was up to no good!

We've taken the glass top off the coffee table and it's become her new playtable. She spends most of the day there, playing with her bead thingy from Granny and Grandad, reading books, and throwing coasters around. What fun! Her favourite thing to do lately is to move the beads up and down the coils on her bead thingy and say 'uh-duh!' (up-down!) each time.

Hanging out with Granny and Grandad

Had a nice walk in the park today. Grandad impressed us all with his animal-knowhow. He had the birds and squirrels eating Clara's crackers out of his hand. (They're not really crackers, they're like rice cakes, but made with corn - Clara loves them and so did the birds.) Clara was really interested in the squirrel, she'd never seen one before.

Clara used her 'bear' sign for the first time today when she was reading a book. She's now using signs for 'milk', 'all done', 'more', 'caterpillar', and 'bear'. And of course 'yes' and 'no' and 'hello' and 'goodbye'.

She's not been feeling well the last week or so. She had a cold a few weeks ago that seemed to get better and then it came back even worse than before. She's also teething - her first upper tooth came through this week. And we went to the doctor yesterday and she said that she also has a slight ear infection. So between all of these things, she's feeling rather miserable.

Wake-Up Call

Well we had quite the wake-up call this morning. After giving Clara her 6am milk feeding I tried to put her back to bed but she was not at all interested! So I brought her into our bed instead, thinking she'd play and we could at least stay in bed for another while longer. No sooner had she gotten under the covers than she rolled over onto her tummy and threw up all that milk all over the sheets and pillow! So we had no choice but to get up and put it all in the wash. Not a great start to the day!

After that the day was good though. She's fine and cheerful, just still has a pesky cold - snotty nose and chest congestion. Don't know why she threw up, maybe just too much milk, maybe the congestion. Anyway, she was perfectly happy after and thought it all rather funny.

Now that she's learned to stand up, she doesn't want to do anything else! She spends hours standing in front of the TV screen (turned off or on, it makes no difference) shouting and laughing at the TV and patting the screen.

Yesterday I put on a video of her for her to watch herself. It was hilarious because in the last scene, Andras was trying to feed her banana and she was refusing it by shaking her head. As she stood there in front of the TV (face about 1cm away from the screen!) she was shouting and shaking her head 'no' vigorously whenever on-screen Daddy asked if she wanted more banana! Too cute!

Spinach and Cheese Fusilli

Last night's dinner. Yes, that is a piece of fusilli behind her ear! We both went straight to the bath after this one!

Good Morning Mummy!

This is what I woke up to this morning:

Miserable

Clara has an infection where her new tooth is coming in (top right one). Her gum is all white and swollen and is obviously hurting her. She has been sooooo miserable all day today. The slightest little thing will set her off - like dropping something, or if she can't reach the toy she wants out of her toybox. And then she throws herself on her belly with her face on the floor and her hands over her eyes. Her whole body shakes as she sobs in misery at her fate! It would be comical if she weren't so genuinely upset. The doctor gave us some kind of gel for it. Hopefully it works.

Nodding Off

Clara asked to go down for a nap today! Very weird. She was crawling up my leg and rubbing her face against it and whining. When I asked her what she wanted she lifted her head up and closed her eyes for a few seconds. So I asked if she wanted to go to sleep and she 'nodded' her head yes!

Clara's nodding is quite funny in itself, actually, she's just starting to use a nod for yes, but she has trouble getting it right - often her head goes diagonally instead of up and down so it can be hard to tell if it's yes or no. In her attempts to correct this, she's started to instead throw her head all the way back and then fling it forward suddenly. Sort of like starting back up a rollercoaster and then it suddenly releases!

First Words - we think

Clara's been using some real words lately. At first we thought it was just coincedence, but more and more it seems like she really understands them.

The first one was 'bup', which she uses (sometimes) for 'up'. When I pick her up, I always say 'up, up, up', which of course when you say it together sounds like 'up-bup-bup'. So now she says 'bup' sometimes when I pick her up or when she is trying to pull herself up on the furniture. But she's not reliable with it, so we've been having trouble deciding if she really understands it or not. But it seems like she does.

The other word is 'baby'. She says it really clearly. Again, we didn't know if she understood it or not, as she first used it correctly (in response to a baby picture and then when I asked her where the baby was she pointed to each of the two babies on the page in her book) but then the next day she said it repeatedly all day long 'baby baby baby'. So then we thought she doesn't really understand it, it was just her favourite sound of the moment. But the last few days she's been using mostly correctly. Andras was on the computer the other day and when he closed the internet down, she saw her picture on the wallpaper (one of her 'nudie' shots! Very cute!) and she smiled a huge smile and said 'baby'! And she often smiles and says 'baby' when she notices photos of herself on the coffee table. And if you ask her where the baby is, she often (but not always) turns to look at her photo on the table. So we're thinking that she does understand it, at least partially.

Bobbing Along

Things are fine here. Clara and I went to a new playgroup today and it was good. Better than the other one I think. Better time of day, as it's in the late afternoon. The other one is in the morning, right in the middle of her naptime.

Tomorrow we're back at baby yoga after several months off, we'll see how it goes. Clara naps at that time now, so I don't know if we'll keep it up.

She's doing really well at swimming though. She can 'swim' (bob with her water wings) about 3 bobs-worth from the teacher to me all by herself! And she can finally crawl across the floating blue mat to get the toy! Yay! This week was the first time she accomplished that because we haven't been in 3 weeks and she wasn't fully crawling at that point yet, which meant that crawling on a wet, puddly, floating mat was very difficult indeed! Now she's an expert!

Mum and Dad have decided to get in one last visit to Dresden before we leave. Dad is sick of the snow. So they're coming in 2 weeks to spend 2 weeks here. We're looking forward to it! I'm hoping it will give me some freedom to sort through stuff to see what to take and what to throw out - 'pre-packing' I call it.