eLLe - 11 months

Dear Luciya,

Happy eleven months!


Well, look who's standing up all by herself. Up until about 3 days ago that was one of the crowning achievements of your eleventh month. And then, you walked. And we're still lolling in the aftershocks of this insane achievement.

You're taking a few steps here and there each day. You wobble and bobble and are so tentative before you take each step, and after you do you look up to our faces to make sure we saw it. Or maybe it's to make sure we're still there, because the ground is suddenly a lot farther away.


A couple weeks ago you started doing the most hilarious thing: drumming your fingers against your lips as you made noises. Your new favorite sound is belup-belup-belup. You'll make this noise when you wake up in the morning or from a nap, happily belup-belupping in your crib for a while until you're ready to come on out and greet the day. You cheeky little monkey, you.


lickteschtein from shemmy on Vimeo.

When you're up, your new favorite activity is the exploration of drawers and cupboards. You've figured out how to pull on knobs and handles, and then you systematically extract the contents and toss them over your shoulder. Just yesterday you figured out how to open the glass doors that encase the DVD player and cable box. I fastened them closed with our trusty friend, the rubber band. Ol' rubber band lives on every pair of cupboards in the kitchen except the ones that hold the towels, the tupperware, and the ziploc baggies. But you know this already. You are a huge fan of pulling the zilpoc bags out of their box one at a time.

Your comprehension of what we say to you is suddenly out of this world. One of my favorite things to say to you is "kisses." If you're standing at one of the full-length closet mirrors and I say "kisses," you'll lean in to the glass and smack one on your pretty little reflection. You'll lean in to me or your daddy so that we can give you kisses when we ask to.

You've also learned "hi" and "bye-bye," or at least what to do when anyone says one or the other. You flail your little arms from the shoulder (sometimes one arm, sometimes two) and bid your fond salutations.

All these firsts are just so much fun to witness. This morning you went to your first Easter egg hunt. I know that next year and in the Springs to follow you'll be bounding through the brush and scooping up all the plastic eggs you can find, dropping fistfuls of sticky jellybeans into your mouth. But today was pretty sweet. You managed to pick up a few eggs and drop them into the ducky basket that Aunty Betskers gave you before you were born (you were due on Easter last year, remember?).


funny bunny from shemmy on Vimeo.

Your culinary tastes have expanded to things like tofu, raspberries, and frozen organic green beans that I run under warm water for a few seconds to soften them up a little before you suck out the still-cold middles. You are becoming such a pro at feeding yourself that you seem irritated when I try to give you food from your bowl or jar. You are also seriously irritated by any type of bib and can yank off whichever type we try to put on you at meal time, be it snap, velcro, over over your head like the cloth diapers I've cut holes in.


Your sleep patterns lately have been random at best. I'd say that on average you sleep completely through the night (and we're talking 12 hours!) about three nights a week. The other nights you've been quite squirmy and squirrelly, and on more than one occasion this month I've gotten up to nurse you at 4 a.m. But my goodness - any number of things could be interfering with your sleep. Your gummy friends Pokey and Buddy continue their ascent. You're gradually becoming bipedal. And you are suddenly huge.

Your daddy figured you must be going through a growth spurt, and sure in enough, this morning your pajamas were torn to shreds, you had a full set of teeth and you were studying for your SATs.


Good thing I can still cuddle you completely in my arms.


I love you, Luciya!

Love,
Mama