Verbality

I guess we can almost call it a sentence -- a 12-month old's sentence.

Megan had a teething biscuit. Tasha wanted it. Megan pushed Tasha's nose away from her yelling "No! No dog! Mine. Mine. Mine!"

Of course since that moment, Megan has handed Tasha the food in question and has placed herself in the small motorized lime green VW Beatle Logan got one Christmas from his aunts. She figured out the gas pedal this morning but can't reach it with enough force to make the car move. Instead she throws her weight back and forth to make it inch forward. She chants "Vava! VavaooommM!" as she does it. Vroom, vroom!

She then calls me to take her out of the car by singing "Maaaaama! Maaaaaaaaa MAAAA!" I lift her up. She hugs me. She sticks her face close to mine and says softly "nose, nose" which is her way to say "Rub noses." Then she points through the large windows at the back of the room that face our yard. Her finger settles in the direction of her new swing.

"Ow Baa" she commands.

I shake my head no. "Megan Rose, it's too cold and too early to go out back. Logan is still sleeping. And you, miss, still have your footy pajamas on."

She giggles. "Brabah ni-ni." (Brother night-night or Brother is sleeping.) She wiggles around to let me know she wants me to put her down. She toddles around the playroom looking for something to amuse herself with. She settles on pulling colored paper from the art box and then working hard to get Logan's toy tools from their plastic case.

I'm thinking being the little sister to a chatterbox preschooler isn't impeding her language development after all. In fact, it seems to help. Logan had a large vocabulary for his age at a year old, but he was still sticking mostly to single word communiques. Megan easily uses as many words but has been combining them into phrases for some time now. Granted the average stranger would not understand much of what she's trying to say, but those of us that spend time with her pick it up easily.

Scenes from a drop-off

Daddy stayed home today to bring Logan to preschool. The four of us went over together because Logan decreed it a family experience. We were getting ready to leave and I attempted to pry Megan from the Dora books in the corner.

"Go tell Logan good-bye!" I urged her. She toddled over to where Logan was busy playing with a few trucks. She patted his head a few times and smiled at us. Mrs S and Mrs R both said, "Awe, how cute."

Then Megan giggled. She leaned over her brother who was seriously ignoring her attempts at cuteness. She grabbed hold of his head in both arms and bear hugged it. She kissed him and said "Bye-bye brabah!"

And then she ran back to the table covered in a Dora table cloth.

Mrs S commented on Megan's farewell and said to Logan, "Wow, you must be the very best big brother for your sister to want to hug you like that!"

And Logan said "Yup, I am."

Meg is one

Today was Megan's birthday. I referred to Megan, out of habit perhaps, as "baby girl" this morning. Logan stopped me and reprimanded me, telling me she wasn't a baby any more she was a toddler.

And he's right. She is clearly very much into toddlerhood. She's abandoned the hestitate steps of the early walker for the confidence of a runner. She's starting to work on her climing.

She's got a clear aptitude for mischief. Her latest great joy is shoving things in unsuspecting toilets. We try to keep bathroom doors closed but the child has a sixth sense. No matter where she is in the house, she knows when the door has been opened and she can appear in the bathroom before you can shut her out of it. Today she attmpted to toss Logan's sneaker in the toilet...while he was peeing.

She also has a great sense of when someone needs a pick me up. Somehow she knows when a well placed cuddle or big sloppy wet kiss is most needed. If it's her brother needing to feel the love, she'll throw herself on him as she attempts to yell "tackle!" only it never quite sounds like that. "Ta-ul!" is more like it. Then she raises her head and moves herself so that they are practically nose to nose before she busts out into giggles and pets his head. It brings a smile to his lips every time. She clearly knows this.

The active, always on the go child, has developed a real joy for reading. She pads over to her bookshelf and pulls out whatever strikes her fancy. She'll often plop down with her find and flip through pages herself. When she's through admiring the pictures she'll come over to the nearest adult, hand them the chosen story and then lift up her arms in a gesture that says "pick me up now!" She snuggles into the crook of your arm and mummur 'book' until you begin to read. Some of her books now have names - namely the ones of her favorite characters. There is the "Elmah book" (a book on the letter B featuring Sesame Street characters including Elmo.) And of course the now very clearly enunciated "Dora Book." (She actually over enunciates it - Door-rah).

She loves to be silly and to tease. She tries hard to wink on her own for some reason which always results in two eyes scrunched up really tight. She adores her new toddler swing. She loves her dolls - she drops them in the new toy stroller and takes them for walks. She cuddles them and loves them. She drags them around by their arm or hair.

She's typically moving and/or talking. She's got a fairly large vocabulary for someone just very newly 12 months old. But not knowing a word never stops her for 'talking.' She babbles incessantly. She yells and points. She shrieks. She makes a load of sounds.

And then, when she's mad she really lets loose. She'll yell. She'll scream. She'll get red in the face and scrunch up her fist. She turns on the tears. If she's overtired and just beside herself, she'll throw her body around too. Try holding an overtired tantruming toddler! Today as we rushed off the boardwalk she was crying as loud as she could with her head buried in my shoulder. She suddenly threw herself backwards, flinging her arms out wide as I supported her head in my hand. The melodrama has already set in.

She is a girlie girl. She loves her feather boa. She loves dressing up - give her access to hats, sunglasses and/or animal ears on a headband and she's all over it. She puts them herself. Sometimes she gets them on right. Sometimes she does not. She loves having her hair brushed and her feet rubbed. She loves to dance. She loves to feed the dog her lunch.

Megan is a little girl who strongly exhibits a very clear passion at a very young age. She loves life it seems. She's generally a happy child that loves to make others happy too.

I held her as she drifted off to sleep this afternoon - freshly off her mid-day meltdown. Kids tend to look so angelic when they sleep. She's no different. She smiles when she sleeps. A faint grin never leaving her face. It traced it with my finger and I thought of how it wasn't that long ago that I sat in a hospital bed holding a 7 pound baby doing the very same thing.

Happy Birthday Baby

one year ago today

We were packing bags and making prepartions. The very next evening I'd be checking into the hospital to begin induction. Megan Rose would arrive less than a day later on September 12th.

To mark the occasion we threw her birthday party today. A few kids of assorted ages and their assorted adults. Lots of gifts. Loads of food for a delighted nearly 1-year old to smush with hands and mash with gums.

She is understandably exhausted.

Girlie Girl

Megan sits still long enough to get her little bits of hair up in two pigtails. The hair sticks straight out to either side when you do this, but its adorable just the same. The moment she was decked out in her new do, she located her white feather boa and draped it around herself. Then she located her maracas and started to play. Hmm...

Mwah!

Today as I pulled out of the driveway to leave for work, I waved to Megan and she yelled "Buh-buh!" as she flapped her arm. Then I blew her a kiss.

And she blew me one right back. She touched her finger tips to her lips and then she pulled her hand away until her palm was flat out before her. Yeah, that made my day.

A First. . .

Grandma, Mommy and the kids headed over to Pt. Pleasant to use up the rest of last seasons ride tickets. Of course we picked a day in the middle of a heatwave but who is counting. The afternoon gave Megan a chance to experience another milestone -- her first boardwalk ride. She got excited as soon as she saw the Merry-go-round. We tried the stationary bench first, but she pulled and cried out "Dat!" as she pointed to the horse nearest her. So we sat her up on one, strapped her in and held on tight. She loved every minute of it!

Elmo's world

Last week, while at Target running errands, Megan and Logan were amusing themselves in the toy aisle. Megan latched on to a wide array of items - most of which were over the $5 limit I had set when I agreed to let them each pick out something. She finally settled on a small, four-sound option See-and-Say featuring Elmo. She hugged the hard plastic image of her hero monster. She kissed it. She chanted his name over and over "Elmah! Elmah! Elmah!"

Logan pushed the arrow button for her. The thing sings. Its Elmo La-la-la-laing his way through his theme song. The arrow points to four different sounds that complete the song, the "Elmo's World" part. We've got bubbles for the underwater part, cell phone for that electronic ring, trumpet for brass sections, and crayon for nails on chalkboard...er, squeaking.

She played with it the entire way home in the car. Megan had just figured out how to turn the arrow and liked the trumpet sounds apparently. I was working on tunin gout the droaning on of that music when Logan's laughter pulled me back into the middle of Elmo's World. Meg was singing it. She was really singing it. My little 11 month old child, was actually "Da, da, da" singing IN TUNE the moment Elmo finished his la-la-la'ing. I thought maybe it was a fluke. But no. She's done it every time she gets that toy in her hand.

11-months old

The update is just a tad late, and perhaps its because Megan's fleet footed exploration keeps me too busy to jot down much of anything. Yes, little Meg transitioned quickly from 'wobbly-tenative' walking to 'running as fast as those little pudge-legs can carry me!' She moves and she moves fast.

Megan is still pulling up most of the time. She'll crawl or scoot to the nearest support, pull herself up and then run. That said, she has been seen standing herself up in the middle of the living room floor without the help of anything at all. Doing so, however, creates a bit of forward momentum that I think unsettles her a bit, so she doesn't do it often.

Not only does Megan walk/run. She also dances. She adores music. Most anything will set her head shaking, but she seems to have a preference for the Beatles and a few good old fashioned children's classics. . .and of course, Chicken Dance Elmo.

Speaking of Elmo. Megan's got a crush on him. But her adoration of Elmo is not nearly as huge as her total and complete love of anything "doll." She LOVES dolls. She has a few in her own personal collection that she mothers over. No one showed her how to cuddle those 'babies' of hers. No one showed her how to hug and kiss them. She just does it, typically as she says "Ahhh, dah!" She carries around one doll or another on and off throughout every day. If she wakes up and a doll is not in her crib she'll yell for whichever one she can see, reaching for it, straining over the side rail until someone comes and hands it to her. Then she hugs it tight and lavishes it with kisses.

If we're talking specific characters - Megan has a thing for Dora the Explorer. She's not actually ever seen the show, but she has a Dora doll at Grandma and Papa's house. Since getting that doll Megan recognzies Dora on everything and anything. Each time she sees the image she excitedly, and very clearly, says "Dow-rah!"

Megan chatters quite a bit. Most of what she says are sounds that represent real words. A perfect stranger would not realize that "Browba!" is now 'brother' but Logan certainly does and since he's Browba, that's all that matters. Speaking of Browba, Megan refuses to call him by name. She can. We've heard her do it on rare occasion, she just won't. (She's called him Oh-win.)

At first, her instance on "brother" was a result of our manner of talking of him. "Megan where is Logan? Where is your big brother?" Now, however, I think she's just being stubborn. We'll say "Megan, can you say Logan? Logan? Can you say Logan?" and she'll stare at him. Smile wide. Then yell "BROWBA!"

Her other words include: Mama, Dada, Papa, Gamama (Grandma), Dawg (dog), Tata (tasha), Ball, Bur (Bird), Baba (bottle), Brah (brush), Doll, Meh (milk), Bay (baby), duck, ROAR! (as in "megan what does the lion say?), Dat! (That!), My, Dow-rah, Elmah, No, Ni-ni (Good night/go to sleep), Book, um (yum).

She's been know to combine 'words' into simple phrases. For example, one night, as I tried to rock her to sleep, she laughed, pushed on my face and shouted "No ni-ni!" Another favorite of hers "My Dah!"

Megan's favorite things, other than her dolls and assorted stuffed characters, are of course whatever Logan has. She's a very good little sister in that regard - not that Logan always views this as good.

all out walker

While she can still be seen crawling - its typically just something she does in order to get to something she can pull up on. Megan is terror on two feet. Her new favorite activity is doing laps around the house. She needs not have a destination in mine nor an object of desire to seek. She just walks. And laughs. But mainly walks.

She's also adding more words to her growing vocabulary. Her current favorite being "that." If Meg wants something she doesn't know the word for, she simply points and says "dat." This works out well as long as you can figure out what she's pointing to. :)

Elmo has competition. . .Dora The Explorer. Not that Meg has seen the show, but she fell in love with the doll at the library. So of course Grandma had to buy it. Dora is Meg's only doll at Grandma & Papa's house. As such, Dora gets lugged around there an awful lot. Sometimes in a great big baby bear hug, other times by the hair. Megan will hug her doll tight, kiss it and say "Door-wah."

So Big!

At her 10 month appointment, Megan Rose was 28 inches tall and 21 pounds. Her growth, while doing the typical "almost one year old slow down" keeps her in the upper percentiles for both height and weight for girls her age. She failed to enjoy her visit with her doctor. No shots this time, yet she was still miserable. Silly doctor thinking Megan might want to lay down still on her back. Crazy lady! Ones back is only good practicing your roll to belly and then sit up move.
Followed quickly by your "find something to grap and pull up" move. Which is then followed either by "cruise around laughing" or "feel brave, let go and walk" moves.

More words

Megan's entering that fun phase where she tries to mimic every sound she hears. The ones that mean something she's attached to she tends to easliy incorporate into her daily use. Its not exactly something most people would recognize as a word without living with the girl, but those of us that do hear what she means. The latest additions:

Elmah - Elmo, which is currently her latest obession. Megan LOVES Elmo. She gets a hold of that red fuzzy stuffed one we have in the house and she smothers it with kisses, then hugs.

Dah - Doll

Dag - Dog

Na! - No

The nice thing is she's not only using her words to have something to say, she's using them to say something. This morning I woke up to hear "Mama! Maaaaaaama! Ma. Ma. MAAAMAAA!"

I went in to find her standing at the side of her crib. She smiled when she saw me and said "Mama. Baba." -- Or in English, "Yo, lady, get me a bottle." We walked to the kitchen. I opened the fridge, she laid on it. She clapped and whispered over and over "Baba! Baba. baba."

Ball girl

One of Megan's favorite games is a good old fashioned game of ball. She likes to throw it. She likes to roll it. She likes to try to catch it as someone rolls it to her. Any old ball will do. As soon as she sees one, she starts to get excited. And now, she can vocalize it too.

We went to the park today. Meg and I sat in the shade as Logan and Daddy played soccer on the big open field. The boys moved on to some football around the time Meg got bored of sitting. She was doing her little cruising by holding one hand thing until something caught her eye and she wanted to move faster. She grabbed for my other hand and as we got closer to her prize she started to giggle.

That's when I heard her say it, clear as day "Ball!"

Getting around

Megan went to bed last night the kind of kid who'd just lay on her belly pushing her upper body from the mattress to peak over the bumpers when she woke up. She woke up the kind that goes from laying down to sitting without adult intervention.

She also went from a girl that could inch her way to something she truly wanted to get her hands on to one that gets herself around quite well -- and did so without working up the courage to really let loose and walk on her own.

For example, Logan needed to use the bathroom and he wanted help. So we left Meg in the center of the living room next to her big toy basket which she normally is beyond content to knock over and empty. But not this time. This time she cried. I yelled back "You're ok Megan Rose. I need one minute to help your brother. We'll be right back."

And then we heard it.

Thud, thud, giggle, giggle. Thud, giggle, Thud. Thud, Thud, giggle.

It got louder and louder.

"I bet you your sister is in the hallway right this very moment." I said to Logan.

"Naw," he said confidently, "She can't go that far."

Thud, giggle, thud, giggle, giggle, giggle, thud. Louder and louder. Seemingly closer and closer.

"Ahh, well, maybe she *IS* in the hallway," he said.

He got just outside the door when he broke out into a fit of laughter - standing at my side as I yelped, "How ever did you get here Megan Rose!"

She laughed from where she sat - just three feet max outside the bathroom door in our hallway. A good "half-the-house" type of trip.

And then she showed us. She leaned forward onto her knees, butt off the floor...and she sort of hopped. Again. Then again. Then again. Moving forward faster than we've seen her do it before. Stopping only long enough to giggle. When she got tired of hopping, she scissor kicked her legs - open and shut, open and shut. She used to just use this as a means of spinning in circles for a new view. She's since added "moving forward at an alarming rate of speed" to its short list of useful tricks.

After that Logan and I went on a hunt in the basement for baby gates well Meg napped. We've got one up between the Living Room and the kitchen. The other needs to be assembled still.

She's gotten around quite a bit today. I put her down in front of the fridge so she could play with her oversized baby magnets and Miss Megan migrated several feet from where I'd put her, sticking her magnets on the metal (thankfully lided) bucket we keep the dog's food in.

She later sat in the office/playroom playing contently. At least for a bit, then she bunny hopped and scissor kicked her way from the center of the decently sized sunroom to the doorway - she used its single step up into the house to pull herself up and was trying to figure out what to do next when I grabbed her up onto my lap and created a cascade of giggles by kissing her neck and tickling her feet.

She took a break from the "need to be in motion" when I broke out the finger paints. She and Logan painted They both wore paint. They both had fun. After clean-up though, it was time to move again. This time, Megan decided she was ready to walk with the aide of a a push toy. Up and down the hall. Up and down the hall. Through the Living Room, into the bedrooms, up and down the hall. Giggle. Giggle. Chase big brother. Giggle some more.

In between it all she squashed in sizable strolls where she walked unassisted. Its a confidence thing for her now. It'll come. If she THINKS you're holding onto her overall straps, she walks without issue for a decent stretch. When she realizes you don't have her at all, she falls over. Its only a matter of time - and now the house is ready.

Summer loving baby!

Meg gets into the swing of summer with her first two piece bathing suit. She's got a thing against cold sprinklers and pools (can you blame her?) but she LOVEs to splash around in puddles and the tepid water of a shallow, sun warmed kiddie pool or the stairs of the inground at her grandparents' house. She also loves just hanging out all dressed up yet causing some trouble with the things she can grab and torment. . .as she is in these photos:

Walking, yes siree

So Meg is walking.

She's not walking laps. She's not walking distances. But she is walking.

Megan seems to stand better, sometimes, when she's got something to hold in each hand. Its as if having her hands full distracts her from getting over excited and tripping herself up. So we placed an oversized toy key in other hand after she pulled herself up using me as leverage.

She stood still for a moment and then she started to move. One step. Then another. Dropped the keys. Another step. And another...and another...until she had moved just shy of half the room to the coffee table. All on her own. All without a single hand helping her balance.

When she got her hands down on the table she laughed. She does that when she's proud of herself. She laughs. Then she cheers, "AYYYY!!" Then she claps. And she did all that after her walk.

I yelled "ACK! LOGAN! DID YOU SEE THAT?! DID YOU!?"

And he was one giant proud smile. He nodded and he said very proudly "Yes I did, she walked! She walked all by herself!" Of course, he then attempted to pry her hands off the table to make her do it again. If he knew the word Encore, he'd have been yelling it.

Megan went walking several more times this evening - this time between Bruce and I. Logan did this when he first started walking. Its all he'd do - all he felt confident enough to do. From Mom to Dad. Dad to Mom. Over and over until he could it consistantly without falling. And now Meg does the same thing. Back and for, back and forth. Sometimes she gets a bit overzealous and she reaches her arms out ahead of her farther ahead than her feet can keep up, which makes her fall. Other times she gets cocky and she attempts to change direction, hanging a 180, midstride, which sometimes works, and other times knocks her on her keister.

Regardless, the girl is walking.

Baby Steps

If there is one thing Megan has really mastered, its getting herself from one spot to another. She has a number of methods from crawling to butt scooting. She cruises - which is her most favorite thing to do actually. And lately, Megan has increased her tinkering with walking. You almost wonder if she would get a lot further with the walking if her excitement was a tad lower. She does about 3 steps at a time every now and again. She gets so excited though that she starts to flap her arms wildly and then reach out for her intended target - a combined move that tends to knock her off balance. Once she takes those few steps she gets so worked up to do it again she jsut can't. She starts to reach forward too soon with too much force that she ends up lunging from table to big-person more than walking to her/him.

She's now 9 months old. Anyone want to place a bet on when those few solo steps extend to something we can actually refer to as "walking?"

One arrived

After what started to feel like endless teething that never led to anything, Megan's first tooth broke through yesterday. She's now sporting the tip of one little bitty baby tooth - the one on the lower left of her center teeth. If she follows the typical pattern of children growing teeth the 2nd lower, center tooth should appear relatively soon.

If you're happy and you know it. . .

Megan's taken up hand clapping - and its wonderful. She tried it out a few weeks ago doing it the experimental way of smacking open palm against the back of her other hand. It took her very little time to figure out the right way to clap and now she does it all the time!

If you sing "Pat-a-cake" to her, she claps and laughs.

If you say happily "Yayyyyyy" as you clap, she claps (and yes laughs).

If she's happy about something - she claps. Yup. Let's say she's been sitting on the floor mad that Mom is off helping Logan with his shoes, for example. She's yelling "MAMA! MAMA! MAMA! AHHHHHH!" and teeters on the verge on crying. Then Mom gets up and heads over to Megan; well Megan then laughs and claps her hands.

Give her food she likes - she claps.

A toy she's been eyeing - claps.

Yup, clapping has become Megan's way of communicating her pleasure at everything and anything.
--

More new sounds -- Megan quacks like a duck, sort of. We were playing during her bath tonight as we always do - playing with the big rubber duck that would be over the spigot if only the spout weren't too big for it. This spout covering duck has a little bath cap on that lifts up so that, in theory, you could fill it with bubble bath and then the bubble stuff would in turn drip down into the running water filling the tub with loads o' bubble. Megan likes to sit in her bath flipping the duck's lid open and shut.

Tonight I also told her, what I do most nights we play wiht "Mr. Duck." I hold it up for her to see the duck's face clearly and I say to her "Megan, duck says 'quack, quack!"

Tonight though, unlike every other night before it, Megan did not just smile and reach for the duck. No, she smiled, reached for the duck and said "Quah! Quah!"