Finally a New Post

Sorry about the time lapse...

Alexis Grace Edgerton Edgerton (that's her full Nica name) is almost 1 1/2 years old, and that is unbelievable to me. She seems to be growing bigger and bigger every day because she can do so much. She is definitely asserting her independence much more frequently, and we're learning the balance of letting her have that but also of trying to stand firm with discipline. This becomes hard with situations like eating. For example, this afternoon with lunch she didn't want to eat unless she was feeding herself with the spoon; she wouldn't let me feed her. It was a time when it was fine for her to assert her independence, and she could just get messy. However, throwing her food overboard gives a resounding no from us, and sometimes a slap on the hand for reinforcement. (Not in an abusive way... :) It's a difficult balance to try to find, but I think/hope we're doing okay with it.

She still isn't talking much, although she babbles quite a bit and we continue to work with her. She has her checkup in a few weeks, so I'll be interested what her new doctor has to say about her development. However, her language development in the are of hearing seems to be doing well. Yesterday, all in a row she identified her eyes, nose, mouth, head, hair, toes, fingers, and belly button. It was one of the coolest thigns yet! And she has started to give kisses, although the past few days she's been shying away from them. It will melt your heart to get one, or to see her give one to her maardvark or another friend.

The house is great for her, too. In the rec room she now has a play kitchen, which she enjoys a lot, and she loves going up and down the steps, although she wants to do it like an adult. This girl has NO desire to go butt first; she wants to put only one foot on each step. Danger? She LAUGHS in the face of danger. This girl has no fear.

The New House

Alexis is in love with the new house. She wants to go down the steps like an adult, which is adorable, and she loves having more space. Originally I think she was taking a little time to adjust to her rec room downstairs, but now she loves it, ESPECIALLY because of her new toy. I finally bought her a play kitchen off of craigslist, and she is in love with it. It came with a few toys, and she's in love with the french fry it came with, which is hysterical because she adores french fries. The house has made her very happy, and when I look at her now having all of this space, I wonder how we ever would have made it much longer in our old apartment.

She is babbling a ton now, and using words more often, although still fairly infrequently. She doesn't have a huge vocabulary, but she's good at mama and bye bye, and she'll say other things randomly. She has molars coming in right now and seems to be doing okay with that. She continues to eat well and grow well. Seventeen months old today - wow!

I know this is a short post, but (understandably) things have been pretty busy. Alex is happy happy happy, and was overjoyed to have her daddy home after a long trip. I tried posting a brief video of her favorite new pastime, but it wasn't working, so feel free to check it out on my facebook page.

Getting Brighter Every Day, Until She Goes OCD on Me...

Yesterday was a GREAT day in terms of language. In the morning she picked up her ball and said "ball" without me asking what it was or prompting her, when Jason left for work she waved and said "bye bye", and later in the afternoon she identified her book as well. These are good steps! Hooray! However, today she hasn't said much of anything, so she's just going at her own pace. And a few moments ago that consisted of walking in circles around a few of her chosen toys for a few minutes. Last week I think she did it for about fifteen, just round and round and round... It's kind of weird and hypnotic all at the same time. But she does tend to get "involved" in certain things. She didn't want to eat her peas in her chair, but when we took them into her room, she was all about eating on the go. She would come over to me and grab a pea from the bowl, run away to hide behind the door and eat it, and then come back for another one, repeating the cycle. When there were half a dozen peas left, she just squatted down in front of the bowl and rapidly put them in her mouth one by one and then ran away again.

I wish I could see adults doing that...

She also had her first real day of coloring on Sunday. She finally "got" what it was all about, which was pretty cool, but mostly she wanted to take the crayons and examine them in a corner of her room. And by examine, I mean eat.

Hooray for More Space

It looks like we are actually moving. Well, if the inspection is goes well. It's just in time, too. Alexis definitely needs more space to be roaming around, more space to cause chaos, more space to fill with her antics. Speaking of antics, here are the latest ones:

1. Pseudo-somersaults: She likes to stick her butt up in the air, put her head completely upside down, and then ALMOST push herself over. She did it once, kind of, and landed sideways, which was pretty awesome. Jason likes to help her bring those somersaults to fruition, complete with some extra rough-and-tumble time. Which she adores.

2. Toy box play zone: As opposed to playing with the items INSIDE of her toybox, she chooses to play with the toybox itself. She has become very adept at climbing in and out of it, so she like to hang out there, play with her toys, read a book, make a few phone calls... I had to move it from the side of the couch because she was using it as a stepping stone to get on top of the couch, and we're not allowing that until we move and can arrange things more safely.

3. Drawer love: (No, I'm not talking underwear...) I haven't figured out an effective way to put locks on the bottom two drawers of her dresser. The problem is that her skill set has progressed from simply opening and closing the drawers and putting things inside of them and taking them out again to opening and closing the drawers and putting herself inside of them, occasionally semi-closing herself in. The first time I saw her standing in the bottom drawer was a few days ago, and while it is awfully cute, it's something she can't be allowed to do, and I've had to scold her for it. And she did it a LOT today, and got scolded every time. And sometimes when I do it, it's just about the saddest thing you could ever possibly imagine the way she scrunches up and explodes into tears. Then, of course, I take her in my arms and comfort her immediately. These are the times when it's hard, when she needs to learn that she's going to be told no and that there are consequences to doing things she's not supposed to do, and I have to be firm without being harsh. Quite the challenge.

4. Utensils: She had sweet potatoes with her dinner today, and with a little bit of guidance, ate almost all of them by herself with a spoon. Hooray!

5. Stomp the yard: She has figured out that stomping is fun. And clapping. And sometimes dancing. And even occasionally spinning. That's a pretty funny one to see.

No pics this time, but I'll try and upload the pictures of her relaxing in her box next time. It might be a while before I update due to the move.

Stick a Fork in Her and Call Her Done

Yes, I have discovered the secret to getting any and all children to eat!!!

Perhaps that's an exaggeration..

What I have actually discovered is a way to help my child eat more, and we'll have to see how long it lasts. You see, she has used a spoon (with limited success) frequently, but she's still really had at it, and the appeal of rice cereal splashed across our dining room is limited. However, she has never used a fork. Until now. Alexis' brilliant mother, who in reality is probably way behind the appropriate time range to be doing this, introduced a fork into her eating habits, and she's never been happier! I stuck cubes of sweet potatoes onto her fork, and she LOVED it! The huge advantage here is that while she's building up her fine motor skills, the fork has the ability to maintain its substance as opposed to a wild flinging of said substance across the room. I like forks. They are my new BFF.

In other more pertinent news, Alexis went for her 15 month check up last Thursday and weighs 19 whole pounds! This is great for a number of reasons; it means she's been getting enough to eat the past month and a half, which is almost always a worry for any parent, and she gained good weight, which is great news for us. Plus, she is FINALLY ON THE GROWTH CHART! She's in the third percent, so she's still really small, but she's there. The doctor said she looks fine with everything, and the only thing we're going to watch is her language development because she's a little slower on that. However, she's been really quick with her kinesthetic development and is quite teh explorer, and kids usually develop one or the other more quickly, and that development is not indicative of further tendencies later in life or anything. What's really nice is that, for the first time, she doesn't have to have an interim check-up; she gets to go to her normal, 18-month check up without having to have another one between now and then.

She is turning into quite the toddler, and I am constantly remembering what Earl told me about staying calm and quiet with a low voice. The doctor basically told me the same thing, so when Alex tries to throw a tantrum, which she's learning about, I don't pander to it. She's got other, cooler new tricks than crying for my attention, though. She is saying a few words, albeit sporadically. Yesterday she said the word "ball" twice without being prompted, and I was so proud! She'll also say "hi" occasionally, but it almost seems like once she's figured out how to do something once, she thinks, "Well, that's cool. But what's next?" I'm working with her very specifically trying to name everything and get her to repeat sounds, but she does her own thing, sometimes verbalizing and sometimes not.

She also has gotten into this new thing of now wanting me to lean back, which is absolutely bizarre. If I lean back while sitting on the floor in her room, she will walk up to me and push me forward, and she'll do it over and over and over again. I don't know if she thinks I'm trying to claim her space or what, but she goes behind me to the other side, then back, until I lean back again and she pushes me forward, and we're in a neverending cycle if I would let it continue. Sometimes I make a game out of it and pick her up by her arms onto my back, and she loves that and laughs and laughs.

And while she's growing more independent, she's also growing more dependent. She hugs me now, crashing into me with her arms around my neck, or when I pick her up putting her arms around me a squeezing. I absolutely adore those moment. But then she wants down again immediately to go explore. We went for her first walk today with her new harness, a monkey stuffed animal that goes on her back and clips around so that I she is secure and I can stay attached to her. (Yes, like a leash. I treat my daughter like a dog. Get over it... and isn't a stroller more of a restraint anyway? lol.) We went outside today with it for the first time, and she initially did the first thing she always done when plunked down into wide open spaces. She stands, overwhelmed with excitement, and doesn't move. But then she was off, and it was AWESOME to let her roam and not have to worry nearly as much, giving her freedom and safety all at the same time. Now if only there were something to prevent her from picking up everything on the sidewalk... She made friends with an eldery lady who was outside pruning er bushes. (Honestly, I think she came out hoping that we would come back by because the first time we passed her house, she was looking out of her window with a huge smile on her face.) You could tell she missed her grandkids, and she thought Alex was adorable. But we had a grand old time.

At the moment, though, you'd think that I had sentenced Alex to a life void of love and affection. Yes, she's having a little mini-fit at the moment. Oh well...

And regarding the pictures, well, we've had to move some things around in her room. She wanted to rearrange.

Currently Screaming

She sounds as though she's having the worst morning in the world right now, although the only reason she's crying is because I'm not in the room with her. Poor kid! She's starting to become much more vocal now in general, babbling a lot. It sounds like she is sometimes saying things like "daddy" and "bye", but it's so hard to know! It seems like her whole world is changing right now, and it's hard to get used to. She eats differently, sleeps differently, and plays differently. She also has two top teeth now, but only one of them is in the middle, which makes her look kind of weird when she smiles really big.

Alex is still obsessed with having me read to her, and she likes to curl up in my lap while I'm doing it. She is also obsessed with having Jason chase and tickle her. She ADORES it! He found a ticklish place under her chin and jaw, and he'll wait for her to come get him, and then he'll attack. Alex will run to me and give me a huge hug and bury her face into my arms. Or she'll bend over all the way to her toes and almost fall over, trying to escape but loving it at the same time. It's amazing to hear her just laugh and laugh and laugh.

She's getting so big it seems like. She has a doctor's appointment next week, so we're interested in seeing her stats, especially because she's been such a picky eater the past few weeks. I suppose that's part of being a toddler, though, and she is truly a toddler. We're going to be excited when we finally move and she has true space of her own for playing.

Any suggestions?

Alex and I went to visit Nanny and Papaw this weekend while Jason went to Guatemala. She loved running around in their house and had a blast, and she even got to go "swimming" on Saturday night! She was trying to climb all over things while she was there - the high chair, the fireplace, etc. The first time she tried to get off the fireplace she just kind of walked off and fell over, but the second time she figured out to grab hold of something to help her. However, she kept trying to climb onto one of the side tables.

So, this morning I'm cleaning up the kitchen and walk by her room to check in, and she is sitting on the couch, playing with a pair of socks, as content as can be.

This is not good...

It scared me to death, because how is she going to get down? And there's always stuff on her floor that she could fall onto trying to get down? Plus, if she fell off the side, it's a lot further to fall.

I went in and sat on the couch to see what she would do. She cried and cried, which is unusual, but I think it was because she knew she could get up there and wasn't there. I watched her try to get up again, and after about two minutes she used my knee just a little bit and climbed up the couch as neat as anything.

She is now in her crib with a bunch of her toys. The only thing I can think of is to put something on the couch that would prevent her from being able to climb up without being in danger of falling down from the couch. If anyone has any good ideas, please feel free to let me know!

Update on the DQ

And the DQ stands for drama queen. Yes, she has turned into a drama queen recently. Welcome to toddlerhood. She's actually still a really happy kid most of the time, but she is less content to simply stay in her room and play with her toys. She wants to be out and about, running around the apartment. Literally running, too. She grabbed a hold of walking and almost never crawls anymore, and she is fast fast fast.

She was at the doctor about a week and a half ago and weighed 17 pounds, 6 ounces. She's gaining decent weight, and there's usually a weight gain slowdown around this time anyway, but they're still watching her simply because she's small. All of her tests and bloodwork came back perfectly normal, which was great, and she's now drinking real milk. We're also supplementing her diet with pediasure to get some extra nutrition in her. We're wondering if she might be allergic to either that or the milk, but we're keeping a close eye on her. It's been fun now that she's eating more solid foods. She enjoys most things that we give her and is big on wanting to feed herself most of the time. She's a pretty independent kid.

She still isn't really talking at all, but apparently I was a late talker, and you see how much that slowed my talking progress... She understands some words, and I've been trying to teach her parts of the body. However, she's still mostly content to just babble.

She is starting to enjoy putting things into other things, which she didn't do too much before. She can put a blue circle into the opening for the blue circle, which is pretty cool, and she'll put some of her toys on the shelf of a cabinet in her room. She also has started to throw her friends overboard. She has a big collection of stuffed animals in her crib, and sometimes she likes to pick them up one at a time and then throw them over until there are no more, and then she cries until we rescue them. It's pretty funny. I think what she likes most, though, is being read to. She's really grabbed hold of this in a huge way in the past week or so. We've always read to her, but now she is very, VERY determined to have us read to her. You know how she used to bring toys over to me and put them in my lap or shoulder? Well, she still does that, but when she does it with books, she doesn't go get anything else. She stands there and kind of bounces up and down a bit and makes commanding noises until I start reading to her. It's gotten a little out of control. Jason apparently read her three books this morning before I got up, and then when I got up I read her a number of books about six times. And just now she kept bringing me book after book, and sometimes she'll interrupt one to start another. It's adorable and pretty funny. I think her favorite is There's a Wocket in My Pocket.

She's also had a few new experiences. We took her to the zoo a few weeks ago. She wasn't very interested in the big animals that were far away, but she LOVED the smaller animals that were closer. She was fascinated by the turtles swimming around in the tanks, and she absolutely loved some small, monkey type of creatures with bright gold manes. They were really active and would get close to the grass, and Alex loved them! We also took her to the playground and she used the swings for the first time and really enjoys that, although she wasn't overly impressed with going down the slide with daddy.

Last but not least, she has a new morning time. 5:30. Ouch, right? Jason sometimes gets up at that time in the morning anyway, but when neither of us does get up, we'll usually get her milk and give it to her in her crib so that we can get a little more sleep, and she's usually pretty content with that. We usually put her down about 7:30, and unless we have company and she wants to be out playing, she'll usually put herself to sleep after a series of playing with the toys attached to her crib, throwing a few animals overboard, and making a series of squeaks and squawks before she settles down.

Overall, happy, healthy, and growing up more every day.

First Words

Alex knows the word book! How appropriate is that? I've been working specifically with a group of words, and book is the first one she's really grabbed a hold of, although it sounds more like "bu" than book. I think k is kind of difficult. We were just playing in her room, and I asked her where the book was, and she looked around the room until she found a book and went straight to it and picked it up and said "bu" when she picked it up. She's done the same thing before, but I realized that I needed to come and update her blog, so right now she's standing at her gate crying and crying because I left.

This means that she is definitely experiencing some separation anxiety. She's always fine when we leave her with people, but she gets very distraught if I'm not with her 24/7. She's learning to cope and I'm trying to learn the balance between being with her and giving her some independence. (She has currently stopped crying and is playing contentedly.) It's a tough thing to figure out, though, because I can't always be with her, but I want to be with her to play with her and talk with her and help her learn things.

All of this ties into her independence. She is choosing to walk a lot more now, even when she's just chilling out in her room. She also wants to eat (almost exclusively) foods that she can feed to herself, which makes some feeding times more difficult. At the same time, though, it's amazing to watch her eating peas and green beans and beans and chicken and other "real people" food that isn't all smashed up. We're still tracking her weight gain pretty carefully, and she'll see the doctor again at the end of the month to check in with her weight and possibly to go on regular milk. I'm always trying to pack in as many calories into the day as I can, and she's having all sorts of fun eating English muffins and trying to scoop up her applesauce with a spoon.

Her language skills are coming along, and she's learning other new skills as well. She has always been obsessed with taking things OUT, but now she's starting to put things in. She has shaped blocks, and yesterday for the first time she actually put her star block and her circle block into the shaped holes for them! It's really awesome to watch, although sometimes she just chooses to throw the blocks at the general direction. It's never gone in that way, although she's kicked it in when the block was balancing on top of the hole.

And her teeth are just growing and growing, and they are very, very crooked! This doesn't give me hope for having Jason's teeth, which apparently were a TON better than mine were as a kid. Her sleeping schedule has changed some, too, and she's pretty consistently up at 6:00 am and in bed by 7:30 pm, although this morning she was awake before 5:00 and hungry... Hopefully that won't be a constant.

Last but not least, I am sorry to report that we have found one thing that she is absolutely terrified of, and that is The Count from Sesame Street. We've tested in on multiple occasions (NOT with the purpose of terrifying her), and as soon as he comes on the screen, she starts crying like she never cries. It's completely sad and utterly hysterical all at the same time.

First Birthday

Hello! Yes, Alex is now one. And she is still small, but happy and healthy. She had her year check-up and weighs 16 pounds, 7 ounces. Again, still small, but she's doing well. She got poked five times at her appointment, which was hard, but she's a trooper and recovered quickly.

She's walking more and more now, letting go of things on her own and walking instead of crawling. Most of the time she's still crawling, though, and usually only takes a few steps at a time, but she's doing it more and more frequently.

She's also getting her first teeth! She was kind of fussy last week and had a horribly stuffy nose, and Jason noticed a little prick when she started gnawing on his hand. And guess what? It looks like it's not just one but TWO coming in at the same time! I think she was having some pain when it was happening, but she seems good now. In the past 2-3 days we've actually been able to see them poking through.

Her maardvark (don't ask) is her closest friend. Most of the time when we go into her room to see her in the morning, she's holding onto his legs, and she'll drag him around. She's become pretty attached. She's become even more inquisitive and is quite the explorer. One of her favorite activities recently is to crawl under our knees when we're sitting on the floor. She needs tunnels to go spelunking... She also loves to roar at us if we roar at her; it's like this little tiny tiger growl and is absolutely adorable! She also loves Baby Einstein videos, especially the caterpillar at the very beginning beginning. Alex is obsessed with her shoes and socks, pulling them off at every opportunity and putting them in her mouth, as you can see in one of the pictures. She also loves peas and lunch meat and feeding herself. There hasn't been any difficulty switching her from a bottle to strictly a sippy cup, and the doctor's holding off on putting her on whole milk until she sees her again in late June/early July.

And she is still a really happy baby, loves playing, is being a little bit fussier at bedtime but usually puts herself asleep, and is a handful when we go out in the evenings but is usually pretty composed when we're out during the day. There are a bunch of new videos but I have to organize them, so right now it's just pictures.

The Latest Trick

Alex started to walk on Sunday night. She started out with three steps a few times in a row, and then she took seven steps all by herself. She took a few steps yesterday, and a few this afternoon, and this evening she started again for real. Off and running...

Almost Eleven Months

I PROMISE that she'll toggle around a whole lot if she's holding onto our hands. The video just doesn't show it, but I thought it was pretty cute anyway. Alex is doing well; she is having her morning nap right now and is going to her first playgroup today. It's so hard to believe that a year ago we were so anxious and scared about what was going to happen, and now she's happy and healthy. And developing so quickly! She can make all sorts of sounds, but DADADA is by far her favorite. She recently started saying bababa a lot. She also recently has gotten into a phase of not wanting to eat unless she's doing it herself, which presents some complications that we're working through. And new tricks? Well, she has learned to open the door to a side table in her room, and she likes to pull everything out of it, which is fine because I put things in there that she can pull out. However, yesterday I walked in to find her INSIDE of the shelf!

First Step

She has taken ONE step. Not two, just one. She stands really well for about 10 seconds at a time, but she's not walking quite yet. However, I went out this afternoon, and when I came back Jason had taught her a trick. She grabbed hold of his fingers and used him to balance, and then just shot off putting one foot in front of another REALLY fast. It was SO COOL and she did it a bit for me. We tried to videotape it, but of course, she wasn't doing it for the camera. She's not a circus monkey, after all... She's getting so independent, though. She does a wonderful job holding her own bottle now, and she's cruising all over the place, and having lots of fun with the first toy that we've bought for her as parents! (That was pretty cool.) We'll keep all of you updated as she approaches the walking stage. It might be soon, it might still be months. She just seems too small to be walking!!!!!!

Baby in the Box

Yes, it's only been one day since the last post, but you know how I mentioned that Alexis had begun pushing her toybox around? Well, she was playing in her room, and I started to hear her crying a bit. Not really upset crying, more like not being able to solve a problem crying. Or stuck crying. Which she was.



Somehow, she got herself inside of the box... it was pretty funny.

On a separate note for grandparents and family, I'm posting a list of some birthday items that would be great for Alex to get. I know it's not until May, but I thought I'd go ahead and list some things. If you get her something and want to let other people know about it, you can just leave a comment like you did for my Christmas list. Here goes:

Board books: (Goodnight Moon, Happy Baby Sad Baby, Yummy Yucky, Big Little, The Happy Egg, or Baby Einstein books for 12-18 months old) - We have a number of classic books already, so you may want to ask before purchasing books.

Baby Einstein Discovery Cards - You can usually get these on ebay cheaply or in TJMaxx, etc. We have the seasons one but would like others. Baby Noah, Numbers, Colors, etc.

Crayola Tadoodles for 12M+ crayon buddies - these also come for older kids, but she would need the 12M+ ones. And maybe some paper to go with it - feel free to save old paper so that it can be recycled on the other side :)

Gifts or gift certificates to Carter's. (There's a store close to our house.)

Cherokee blue ocean infant girls plaid shirtdress 12M

If you can find these inexpensively on ebay, there's a set of 25 Baby Einstein dvd's, or a Treasury of 100 Storybook Classics on dvd. (I think amazon has the stories one for about 50 dollars, which is a good price for it but still kind of expensive.)

SHOES! She needs a few pairs of casual shoes.

bibs with a toy attached - Nanny got her one of these and it is the BEST thing ever for going out! It has a hole in the bottom and a toy attaches to it. I think she got it at Wal-mart but I didn't find it when I looked. It would be great to have 1-2 more of these.

She also has a wish list on amazon.com

These are just some ideas! :)Also, if you get clothes, we aren't trying to be picky, but it would be great if you include a gift receipt. Her sizing is so hard to know sometimes, although generally speaking she's running about three months behind. That varies a lot, though, even within the same brand.

10 Months and My First Mohawk

It's really hard to believe that Alex is soon going to be one. Time certainly flies. Some friends from Nicaragua just had a baby, and when I looked at pictures, it was hard to believe that Alex was ever that small. She's starting to morph into the toddler stage, although she is still very much a baby. Her bald spot is finally gone, she's babbling a whole bunch at different times, and some of her favorite new things to do are blow raspberries, attempt standing up (which she does every day now for a few seconds at a time), putting her leg up when she's eating in her high chair, and pushing her toy box from one part of the room to another. That's a new one from yesterday... She seems to enjoy it, though.

Jason was in Peru last week, so we went to Richmond and Yorktown to visit family there. I think the conclusion is that our daughter is the family dustbuster. She crawls along the floor and picks up any tiny, minuscule speck that she sees lying around, and then she puts it in her mouth. It's pretty funny to watch. She didn't get sick this time, which made for a much nicer trip. When Jason got back into town, she got herself so excited that she wouldn't go to sleep that night and ended up staying awake until almost 1 1/2 hours after her bedtime. However, for the past week or so, she's been sleeping in usually until about 7:00, which is awesome! I've been up before her most days. This is MUCH better than the two week phase of getting up at 5:20...

And here she is with her first mohawk.

9 1/2 Months

Alexis Grace Edgerton has turned into a little ball of spunk, curiosity, laughter, and delight! We always knew that we would love our kid, but I don't think either of us ever imagined that we would enjoy our kid so much.

First, the stats. She is 27 inches long and 14 pounds, 2 ounces. She's still on the small side, but she's been gaining more weight recently and we changed around some of her eating habits, and she's doing really well. She did get sick for the first time a few weeks ago with ear infections in both ears. She was so sad during that time but is all better now. She appears to be on track developmentally as well.

Now for the fun stuff. She transitioned great into Virginia and did a wonderful job with the "world tour" that we took when we first arrived. A couple of days after we moved we had to take a big trip to IKEA. There was this crazy puppet that she really liked and was inexpensive, so we got it for her. (It feels really good to be able to do little things like that now sometimes...) Anyway, Jason was playing with the puppet with her while she was in the stroller (a new addition to our life which has been WONDERFUL!) and when the puppet went away, she actually looked for it! It was the first time that we really, truly saw her understand the idea of object permanence. Now, she's always looking for things and remembers where things are. For example, we had to move her diaper stacker and simply nail it to the wall because she was she started always going back to it and pulling diapers out.

She's crawls amazingly well now. She's really fast, and if we put her down in her room for one moment without the gate on her door, she's headed out as fast as she can go. ESCAPE!!! It's really funny. She seems really coordinated so far, something she certainly didn't get from me. A lot of times when she's in her nursery she's standing holding on to the couch or holding on to the edge of the plastic tub that has her toys. And, of course, she stands up in her new crib. She LOVES her new bed, except when she wants out, of course. It has so much more room than the pack and play did, and she can crawl all around it and have her toys in it. She's starting to want to walk we think, because she tries to stand on her own occasionally and because when she crawls, she's gotten into the habit of putting her left foot flat on the floor with her knee up, like she's trying to get on her little legs. She loves to pull out the entire contents of her toybox and leave them all over her room, and when she's had enough, she goes to the gate and pulls herself up and cries for us to come get her. It's especially cute when she's in her crib and we walk into the room and she's standing in it. The side facing the door is solid, and she's so tall now that we can see her little eyes peering over at us as we come in, and she gets absolutely delighted.

Speaking of which, Alex is in love with being surprised and being attacked, especially by her daddy. Peek-a-boo is a great game especially when we're hiding around corners and not just under blankts or behind our hands. But she adores it when she's in my arms and Jason will come up and "attack" her! She screams and buries her head into my chest with absolute trust and excitement. Her favorite version of this is actually when he's across the apartment. I don't think either of us has ever seen her as excited as last night. Alex and I were on the bed playing, and Jason came and started to attack her from the other room. Alex saw him coming and bounced up and down on her butt, fell over, and then rolled over a couple of times like she was trying to escape but wanted to be caught. And we did this over and over and over again and she never got bored of it! It was amazing, and she just laughed and laughed. She likes being tossed onto the bed and rolled around like a sack of potatoes. And she loves being on Jason's shoulders; that's the best place in the world!

She is babbling a ton, although she does it in spurts. She was getting really good at both M and D, but then switched completely to D, and last weekend we really think she said "da da" twice, but then she stopped babbling for a couple of days, and this morning she was saying N. Regardless, she's always very vocal and will sometimes have little conversations with people. And she still loves all people. She has a definite preference for us, but she's done really well being in nurseries as we've visited churches, and she's done great with family. And she'll love you especially if you have a necklace, glasses, id tags, or buttons.

And she's weird. Just this morning she started taking her leg and sticking it on top of the feeding tray of her high chair, another thing it's great to have! She can always be amused with a sock, and it doesn't matter if it's a big person sock or a little person sock. She loves them all indiscriminately. What else does she love? Her bath time. She got a little inflatable tub to stick int eh bathtub, and she has some toys, and she has the most fun. We have to take her out because she starts to get pruney. She loves eating crackers, biter biscuits, cheerios, and especially these little Gerber puffed stars that we buy. She also loves muenster cheese, although recently she's been playing with it more than eating it. I think she's fascinated with the texture.

Alex is just an incredibly happy kid, and we feel so blessed for that. She's healthy, curious, high-spirited, and a joy to be around, even though she drools an awful lot.