Outside

It has not been a usual July so far. Lots and lots of rain, and not enough sun. But I probably spend too much time on this blog complaining about the weather. So here is a celebration in photos of the time we have been able to spend outside. By the way, my standard of park-going-weather has changed from 'sunny/warm' to just 'not raining'. When it's not raining, quick, get outside!

Playing football in the park with Sophie...

On the big kid play equipment...

On the steam train with me, Emmelie and Jake...

She didn't hate it, but felt that it was very serious. She held tightly to her crayons the whole time. She wasn't a big fan of the dark, echo-y tunnel and wrapped her arms very tightly around my neck. She likes being able to point at cars.

At the farm with me and my Mum (aka Granny, or Nanny as Ivy says)...

Now Ivy is a bit older she appreciates the farm more, especially as she is really interested in animals at the moment. She likes being able to look down at the pygmy goats, did not like the big (they really are huge) goats looking down at her, and was somewhat intimidated by the pigs too.

Running around on the downs with Kwojo and Charlie...

When she runs, she crews her face up and scrunches her shoulders up high in excitement. Oh yeah, she runs now. I had that realisation as I was taking these photos. She runs?! Lots of running and catching and tickling. 

16 Months

Ivy turned 16 months this week. I am gradually started to loose track of her age in months, and it takes me longer to answer when asked how old she is.

At 16 months Ivy says:

Zis? (This?)
Mum/Mummy/Ma/Mama
Dad/Daddy/Da/Dada
Shoes
Cheese
Toast
Toes
Door (most used word at the moment)
Bee (her bumble bee backpack)
Baby
Owl
Uh-oh (does that count as a word?)
Whee (for fun stuff, again, is that a word?)
Dot (when drawing dots with her pens)
Eye
(Spaghetti - still only that one time!)


She also makes sounds for:

Dog: A-wruh/Woo woo
Car: Hurmm (sounds a bit like a throaty "ham")
Owl: OOooh Ooohh
Gorilla: OOhOOh
Lotion: Pssh


She copies a lot of words too, like: bird, burp, ball wipe, huit (French).

She signs:

Milk
Eat
More
Finished
Daddy (working on it)
Hot
Drink (sometimes)
Nappy (sometimes)
Sleep (sometimes)
Hat
Thank you
Daddy

And a couple of video's from April...


She really loves the keyboard. The whining at the end is because she suddenly noticed the owls on the shelf (they have been there her whole life and she *just* noticed!).





She still loves the phone. She is also wearing loads of clothes because this is what happens when we are inside for too long - she finds coats and asks me to put them on her! She paces on the phone like Kwojo. Notice when she drops the phone she says "shi.."? Oops, may have got that from me, need to make more effort not to swear!

We have a walking baby. A toddler?!

Ivy has very quickly got the hang of the trolley (no more sticking her bum out and arms out stretched - glad I got that on video while it lasted!), even pushes one handed and lifts it to change direction.

She is also getting the hand of walking independently alarmingly quickly! I have been instinctively excited about this, and encouraging her to take steps. But I feel some sadness at the end of the baby era. I'm not sure I am ready for her to stop being a baby and start being a toddler! I felt a little panic yesterday when I realised that there is no going back: she is walking now. I tried to think of the ways I could discourage her but Kwojo brought me back to reality and pointed out that it would be cruel (my suggestion: sitting her down every time she stands up).



Yep, she loves her bells.

Spaghetti

Ivy has started holding objects out towards us and saying "Hmmm?" which is either asking us what it is, or giving it to us (this was a huge surprise as she has, up until now, been very reluctant to part with anything at all ever). This morning she held out a piece of dried spaghetti asking "Hmmm?" so I told her it was spaghetti and she tried to eat it. Then off she crawled and found another piece (paints a lovely picture of our kitchen floor, eh?), and Ivy really clearly said "Spa ghe tti".

And this is my 100th blog entry!

Very Recently

- Ivy has learnt to fake sneeze. And then she looks at you with a big grin all expectantly while she waits for you to return the fake sneezing goodness. It is the most adorable sound she makes as she opens her mouth wide, tips her head back and then forward saying "Aaahh tt". I actually die a little from the cute every time I hear it, and that is a lot of dying per day.

- At dinner this evening she was holding up each item of food towards me and looking at me. At first I thought she was offering it to me so I put out my hand to take it and thank her, but she whisked her hand away and with a cheeky grin swiftly popped it in her mouth. Then I realised she was asking "Mmmm?" each time, so I told her what it was. I ended up saying "Pea!" a LOT in a very short space of time. I think she would be quite happy to eat peas and sweetcorn all day.

- Ivy TOOK A STEP for the very first time today. A single step towards Grandad while double waving. Definitely a case of only doing it while distracted! This was just as I was telling Ivy that as she is one now it is ok if she starts walking. And as my parents were telling me about when I took my first steps (a story I had not heard before).

- Ivy had her first trip to the theatre yesterday! We saw Good Clown Bad Clown at The Old Vic. It's meant to be for 4 years plus, but Steph can get free tickets so we took Ivy anyway. Amazingly, it kept her attention for an entire hour. She got a bit fidgety towards the end when she got a bit peckish but as long as I kept the rice cakes coming she didn't take her eyes off the performance. The stage was on the floor, and we chose a seat right at the front, so the performers got a bit close at times which made Ivy grip onto me tightly. There was also the popping of a balloon quite near the beginning (Ivy's first experience of this), which made her grip very tightly. Mostly she sat transfixed and very still on my lap. Towards the end she even started bouncing and dancing to the music (the song that went "Evil evil evil, bad bad bad" !), waving at the clowns, and decided she wanted to sit on Steph's lap. We will definitely be going along to some more kids shows!

Free Standing

Recently Ivy has started standing unsupported a LOT. And by recently I mean today. It is really impressive. And it's also slightly scary/sad because it is one step closer to walking. Walking meaning that she would officially be a toddler and no longer a baby.

I'm surprised that this is the first time I've felt any sadness over her growing, in that panicky "OMG slow down!" way. I've never wished for her to still be tiny because I've always been enjoying the age that she is in the present so much. And I've loved each stage more than the last, but maybe that's the thing - I'm loving her right now so much it's hard to believe it'll get better! (I probably had also been too sleep deprived to realise she was growing or to think to be nostalgic).

And walking. Walking is something totally different. Walking is what separates babies from adults. Walking is kind of a big deal.

But it's ok because she's not walking yet. She's only just standing. So I should just relax and enjoy it while it lasts.

Yesterday (standing but holding on. Still no photos of free standing. I am too slow with the camera.):

October

It has been so long since I last put photos on the computer that I hadn't even created an "October" file. It now contains 685 photos and vidoes.

October was the month of:

- MANY teeth. Ivy now has 7. (Mid September she had none)
When she had just one top tooth:



- Changing seasons. It is now officially Autumn. Which means hats, woolly jumpers and bear-suit time. The month started with summer temperatures.



- Today, Ivy's first Halloween, and turning 10 months. We all have skeleton costumes!

- Sleeping! Ivy is now fairly regularly sleeping through the night which is amazing. (Sleeping through the night = 5 hour stretches). Not totally consistent yet, but enough that my default state is no long Zombie.

- Realising that Ivy's hear needs brushing semi often to avoid dreadlocks. Oops! Luckily she doesn't seem to mind (having her hair brushed, not having dreads).



- Teeth means eating loads more. And this month she is loving potato, pasta, peas and yogurt. And actually being able to eat corn on the cob!



- Teeth also meaning tooth brushing. Ivy became so attached to her first toothbrush that she refused to let go of it and so it got lost.



- Ivy learnt to wave, and although she is fairly inconsistent with it she has said "hi" and "buh-bye" at the appropriate time while waving!

- She also learnt to clap, working really hard on it day and night (she would wake and enthusiastically but sleepily clap at all hours, which was both adorable and frustrating because there are plenty of daylight hours to practice!) but once she had mastered it, she lost interest. Clapping now has it's place first thing in the morning, and only very occasionally at other times.

- Clapping sort of generalised to everything when Ivy realised that you can clap your hands against things, as well as clap things against things. This is also known as bashing stuff, or drumming. She does this all the time, especially when she is at the table waiting for food (both hands slapping on table).

- Finally mastering her beaker, and then dropping it multiple times until it cracked. She now has a cheaper, more robust, but more difficult to master, beaker.



- Ivy has really started to love being read to, and it has become a lovely part of her bedtime routine. She turns the pages, and has even learnt how to open the flaps on Dear Zoo. She may be asking for more lift the flap books for Christmas! Also has taken an interest in touchy feely books.



- We have had to baby proof the kitchen cupboards as Ivy discovered the joys of pulling everything out of them. Which was quite sweet until she broke four bowls. Baby sitting surrounded by shards of ceramic is just not great. Also had to move the sofa in front of the book shelf. It was cute that she was pulling her books off the shelf, but not great that all the books were in a crumpled pile on the floor which she was standing on to try to reach anything else that might somehow still be left on the shelf.



- Ivy has been saying lots of "mum-mum" and similar. To begin with it seemed to mean that she wanted comfort, to be picked up. But now it just means "I want (something)", like yogurt, or your phone.

- Independence and confidence. In the park or at other people's houses Ivy used to only crawl over me and very close by, but this month she has started to just crawl off and explore.



- Ivy has started signing for milk! She started off amazingly well and I could hardly believe how quickly she grasped it, but now she is very inconsistent with it.

- Going to the park everyday. Ivy loves watching the dogs run around, and going on the swings and wobbly things. (I don't remember the park sounding this loud when we were there yesterday, but you can hear Ivy's happy little sounds too)

Sunday

Sunday was a day of big-baby firsts.

A sharp little thing broke through Ivy's gums. (We didn't even notice until my Mum felt it!)

And Ivy stood unsupported for a few seconds!

I have no photos of these things, so here is Ivy wearing the hoody that Helen's Mum started knitting 23 years ago when she was pregnant with Helen and finished this year for Ivy!

Crawling

I realised that I never got around to posting any crawling videos. So here is Ivy at 6.5 months having just figured it out and still a little wobbly.



And yesterday at 8 months (and a bit) crawling, standing, cruising. Pretty skillful and pretty fast (despite too-long trousers).



She says "hey" really high-pitched in the video, we often have an exchange of hey's and hi's that lasts ages. I am trying to get this on camera but as soon as I start filming she stops because the camera is too interesting (she is plotting to eat it).

Stand

Yep, she is pulling up to stand and cruising all over the place!

Sitting

An early attempt at sitting in March, nearly 3 months old:



(I don't know how to rotate the video)

And some pretty successful sitting at 4.5 months old:



Sitting is now official. Look, no hands!



And she is not even 5 months old yet :)