Little One is getting big.
Around her half birthday, I took some photos of her sitting on the couch. She's pretty good now and will sometimes sit unsupported for decent lengths of time.
I never put her on a hard surface unless I'm right there, though, because she may lean back or fall over at any time - such as when she has the urge to eat her foot.
Super-exciting video of her sitting:
Dolly has enjoyed a special relationship with Mr. Giraffe (zhu-raf-ee'). We generally only give her a pacifier when she goes to sleep (and sometimes at church when we're trying to keep her quiet). She and Mr. Giraffe have had some wonderful times together. She used to break out of her swaddle and then hold him and suck on him (the pacifier part, or the body, or the label) or just clutch him close after she woke up. The lovebirds after naps: |
| Notice how she's sideways in her crib. More on that later. |
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| Again, sideways. |
Dolly loves shoulder rides. She grabs Jim's hair like reins.
Last week we went to the fair. One of Jim's patients had a booth in the woodwork exhibit. He wanted to show Jim that he's legit, so he gave Jim two tickets and even followed up later asking when Jim was going to be there. We thought we needed to support. Plus I love the fair.
First we stumbled upon the "Tuff Trucks" event - modified, tricked-out cars and trucks racing around a dirt track with jumps and bumps. I LOVED it. It was sort of intense and so fun to watch. I am totally white trash at heart, apparently. Ever was digging it, too.
It's my mullet; it's my pride:
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| Dolly's mullet and Jim's hide-a-mullet/beaver tail. We know he really needs a hair cut. |
Below is a better picture of Dolly's double-layer mullet, composed of a long, thin layer with a short layer of new growth (?) underneath. I gave her a mullet cut a long time ago. It obviously needs attention again. And by the way, these photos make her bald spot look really bad, but it's actually filling in quite nicely. (I discovered that regular combing goes a long way toward heading off dreadlocks that must be cut off. [Yes, it took me a while to realize that.] My contribution toward the bald spot has ceased. I can't, however, take credit for her hair growing back. She spends much less time on her back these days, as she has started sleeping on her side and tummy. In fact, she has gotten a couple of starter dreads on the side since all this rolling around began, but I was able to comb them out. Said rolling is discussed further below.)
I tried really hard to get a good picture of a mobile going over the big jump. This is about the best I could do. See the red truck in the distance?
Enjoying daddy/daughter time:
The lady next to us couldn't believe that Ever wasn't bothered by the noise. And then a super-loud mobile came out, and Dolly started to lose it. The lady next to us was telling us to cover Ever's ears, so we mostly missed when the super-loud mobile crashed. On its side:
After that, we went through the animal area, where Dolly bonded with a goat named "Mischief."
We didn't notice the goat's name until we were leaving, but we thought it highly appropriately because Lil' Miss has become Lil' Mischievous has become Miss Chavez. All three incarnations of the name are currently in use.
This is the face Jim makes when he's loving on Dolly:
He bites his lower lip. I curl both lips around my teeth and bite down, if that makes sense. It is ugly and is rapidly worsening my smile-line wrinkles, I'm sure, but I just can't enjoy her squeeziness and softitude unless I make that face along with the squeezing and softing (thank you, Clara, for making "soft" a verb). It's like when I used to rub the ruffle on my pink blanket when I was a kid; I had to suck my thumb at the same time to really maximize the enjoyment. Unfortunately, I squeeze and soft the dolly all day long, so I'm making the face all the time. What I have learned from Dolly is that I am Lenny from Of Mice and Men. I can't get enough of the squeezing and softing. But I digress...
From the goats, we moved on to the cows. Dolly got a ride and was very happy about it.
Doesn't it look as if they're inside the pen with the cow?
Shoulder rides deteriorate into head-sucking (or in this case, hat-sucking) after a while:
All I want to do is squish my cheek into her cheek every second of the day. Her cheeks are incredible. Lenny would like them.
After the animals, we went to the woodworking area and saw Jim's patient and his wife. There was some pretty amazing stuff. We headed out shortly after that. The awkward news is that neither Jim nor I paid any attention to where we parked, so we spent a good 40 minutes walking around the parking lot trying to find our car. A worker guy even drove his golf cart around looking for it. He didn't take us with him, though, and we found the car before he came back.
In other Dolly news, we had her six-month checkup. She was almost 14 pounds, which put her in the 13th percentile for weight (up from the 9th percentile at her last appointment). She was in the 60th percentile for height, and her head was in the 70-something-th percentile. So she's probably going to be a tall, skinny brainiac.
She's getting her first tooth.
She sticks her little tongue out a lot. I love it.
She makes "g" sounds sometimes but is still more of a fan of vowels. She also clucks, does a deep-throated gurgle, squawks, and screams for fun. When she really wants to have a conversation, she makes a mumbling sound followed by a high-pitched, sucking-in noise that's really cute. She and Jim were going back and forth doing the high-pitched thing, but she got distracted and didn't do it so well after I took out the video camera. This backlit video is all we got:
She still spends some time in the Bumbo.
She wants to grab EVERYTHING in sight.
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| Coming for the camera. |
She is especially obsessed with my yellow purse, computer, and phone. She also likes remotes, paper products, and pretty much everything I don't want her to have.
Upon learning of her love of plastic bags, we started letting her play with this packing material from an Amazon box (which has pictures of kids x-ed out all over it). The other day she leaned for it and almost got into crawling position.
She didn't like that.
I don't think she's going to keep up with the Rob-and-Anna kids' timetable for crawling.
She's gotten quite good at solids, at least when she's in the mood. Force-feeding her when she's more interested in playing, however, is extremely frustrating. There's a lot of hands-in-mouth...
... and spitting:
She can chow down on rice cereal. Orange foods have gone over very well - sweet potatoes, carrots, squash. She'll also eat apples, pears, and peaches. She's less excited about green beans and peas but sometimes does OK with those, too. The only food she has pretty much completely rejected is straight chicken (or was it turkey?). She enjoys bath time. Jim had a hard time getting her out the other day because she wouldn't let go of the side of the tub.
She has become a crazy sleeper. More often than not, she's either sideways or completely upside-down when she wakes up.
She has gotten too big to be sideways in her crib, so limbs are popping out.
