Yes, Piper is officially a toddler. In so many ways. Yikes:
- she toddles around all over the places
- the talks to herself or tries talking to you
- she can eat on her own pretty well
- you can tell her to do something (simple) and she can do it (sometimes)
- she really enjoys playing
- she can tell you what she wants
- she is constantly recovering from a massive wipe-out with a nice bruise.
I officially like this age. She has started to demonstrate some "will", but so far, has been pretty good. I still think I've got it pretty lucky with an easy baby.
Piper is loving to dress up right now. Anything she can put on her head, or wear (anything. Including my underwear) she'll put it on. She is really trying to dress herself, too. This time, I wrapped this pashmina around her, thinking she would just kinda shake it off, but she toddled around with it loving it!
Lots of new sounds, and able to mimic some of the ones we do. She'll often now say something like "gankoo" after we give her something. Getting close! Yesterday Matt asked where her pants where and she put up two arms and said something like "go-no". Don't know! How cute.
Still a very happy eater
She will play independantly for a long time in her sandbox, and now has now figured out how to get out of there and get to where she wants to be!
Loves the dirt. It is a bit of a struggle keeping some things planted. We have a special pot of dirt she can just dig in. She loves it. Just pulls up clumps and lets it all drain through her fingers. Then does it again.
Like this. Tossing mud balls. Very fun.
Chomping on a drumstick, gravy everywhere, but so good. On beach days, you're allowed to do anything.
Her love of books has not waned at all. She'll start her day off with a story, and end it that way. She'll often bring a book to bed with her for a nap and look at the pictures for a while before tipping herself over to go to sleep.
Her love of the cat continues to be infinite. The cat is getting better with her, too. I think Piper has grasped the word "gentle", which is good. They are on much better terms. And Piper likes to drop some of her food to Foos... yeah. Real fun.
16 teeth total on this shark-baby. That last set of K-9's were a challenge, but they are all through. For whatever reason, all of Piper's teeth came early, but I feel like we might be done for a while (please Lord!). She has had some much better nights this last week, so maybe she is almost done teething for a while. I don't dare to hope.
And here was her first Laser sailboat ride. She liked most of it. She either wanted to sit right in the bottom, or have me help her stand on the bow. Hmmm... She does have to cutest lifejacket though, and she loves just wearing that around the house.
Health wise, Piper is a superstar. The last week+ she has been working on a bit of a cough and runny nose, but it never got too bad and she seemed to be able to fight it pretty well. It never turned into anything the hospital staff were telling us it might.
We were at hematology yesterday for a check-up and they thought everything looked ok. We never did get her white blood cells levels back in time, but I figured, if they haven't called me, it means that it was the same normal low, of something below zero. I am ok with zero. She has been fine with zero. What is the big deal? Maybe she is just gonna stay there.
The hematologist did mention that this should wear off in a couple months or maybe a year. When it doesn't, then they start looking into something else. I feel like this is her normal... but maybe normal isn't so good? We'll cross that bridge when we get there.
For now, we have a perfectly happy baby, and from the outside, her health is perfect. Her scar is healing up really well (the nurses in cardiology yesterday called it a zipper! So perfect!), and she is wearing those SPF shirts all the time and sunscreen. If she is happy, so am I.
