Body parts

Mira knows her body parts! (At least some of them.)

I was honestly surprised that she could do this. But a few weeks ago, I noticed that when I said "head" she patted her head. By asking her, I discovered that she also knew her mouth and her belly. Since then, we've been working on expanding her body parts vocabulary. So now she knows head, ears, mouth, arm, belly, foot, and toes. We're still working on eyes and nose. Every time I ask her about one of those, she points to her mouth. Which is close. I wonder if some of the eyes/nose/mouth switch up is actually due to a lack of hand-eye coordination and that she really knows what I'm talking about but just has a hard time getting her finger to point to it on her own face.

First steps

Mira's gotten really good at standing unassisted lately. The other day she was playing around with bouncing while not holding onto anything and Brian got this video.

Seconds after this video was taken, she let go of the ottoman again and took 3 completely unassisted steps before falling down. Of course, I had just stepped into the bathroom. :-/ But at least Brian saw it.

She hasn't tried again yet since then, but I'm sure it won't be long. My little baby girl is getting so big! I'm actually kind of looking forward to her walking unassisted. When we go to the park or are hanging out outside, she likes to hold my hand and walk because if she crawls the rocks and sticks and stuff all poke her knees. So I think that having her walk will make those outings much more fun.

Stroller

Shortly after Mira's first birthday, Brian assembled this toy stroller that Mira had received for Christmas from her Gramma Donna. Right away, Mira took to walking behind it, pushing it along.

Unfortunately, she didn't really get the concept of steering. So she'd crash into something and then just stand there behind it, looking at me expectantly. And if I didn't immediately go over and correct the position of the stroller so that she could continue to walk, then she'd get frustrated and start whining. So the stroller lives in the garage where Mira can't see it, and I bring it out for her to play with only when I have the time and patience to follow her around for a half an hour or more. Because if we do it for any less than 30 minutes, she gets really upset when I take it away. That video was taken a month ago, and since then she's gotten quite confident with it. She's still working on the steering part so Brian tied a string to the front of it, so that we can more easily help her steer. On a couple of occasions when the weather was warm enough Brian took it outside and let her walk along the sidewalk with the stroller.

FYI, these pictures were all thanks to our good friend Becky.

Mira's First Birthday Party

This is a bit late in coming, but here are some great pictures from Mira's first birthday party. We had family and friends over for brunch, then opened presents and had cake. The pictures are all thanks to Becky.

FYI, to see any of the pictures larger, you can click on the slideshow to go directly to the Picasa web album.

Junk Food

Bleary eyed I stumbled down the stairs this morning to see my wife scampering into the kitchen with a guilty look on her face, a bag of something anonymous clutched tightly in her hands.

As my wife never scampers I immediately perked up and asked what she was hiding. Laughing at being caught she admitted to feeding the baby Cheetos Puffs for her mid-morning snack.

All I have to say is I get a buy when I get caught feeding the kids chocolate cake.

via videosift.com