Up and Up

Ray went out of town for five days this week, the longest amount of time that we've been single girls. We had a fun, lowkey weekend with business as usual on the weekdays. We discovered that the laundry basket is a fun and interesting toy/seat.

She's a big help with folding the laundry, pulling out anything that has a string on it and playing peekaboo with Daddy's T-shirts.

Lyla is getting all over the place now! Following me from living room to kitchen to the dining room and beyond. She also has finally figured out how to sit herself from her stomach; that was a long time coming! On Saturday morning I was getting dressed and watching the monitor; one moment she was laying down, and when I looked a few minutes later she was sitting!

She's still getting around by army crawling, though she's pretty fast now. Still working on the real crawl, but I have begun to wonder if she might skip that and move straight to standing and walking. Sometimes I can tell that she is trying to figure out how to get on her feet and straighten her legs.

She LOVES to stand and look out the window, now that she can be there by herself. I'm always close by, but she can hold her own for a long time, until she is distracted with something else and gets unsteady on her feet.

When Ray came home he was surprised by the changes he saw in Lyla in such a short time. I have to agree, there is a recognizable shift in her immature jargon, the way she addresses me.

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I received some nice feedback on my rant post, both online and off. Some advice, but more was some nice understanding that's always good to hear. It also made me realize that, while I have this list of things that we struggle with, there's a much longer list of things that we've really got down. Better to dwell on those things! Just a few off the top of my head..

1. Messy poopy diaper changes with a squirmy baby trying to turn over- Mastered.

2. Changing massive blowouts in the back of my car- Mastered. (Though having to change all her clothes seems to be a thing of the past now that her poop is more solid and comes out with less... velocity.)

3. Nursing- Mastered. The struggle it was for the first two months is a distant memory now. She has four teeth now too, so that hurdle/fear is passed.

4. Cooking dinner holding an 18-lb kid- Mastered. With or without the help of a sling.

mother-daughter portrait, September 10th

Oh yea, and those jeans? Haven't been able to fit into them since January 2010. Boo-ya!

Still would like to lose 5 lbs, but it will happen in the next few months and I feel good about where I am.

gimme the phone!

:-)