Mira is officially a walker.

You may recall, about a week ago Mira took her first unaided steps. At that time, she took 3 steps, fell down, and hasn't tried again since. Until today.

Today after breakfast, Mira got down from her highchair and was standing up looking out the window. Once she'd had her fill of gazing at the backyard, she turned around, let go of the windowsill, walked 3 steps, and took hold of the dining room chair that was nearby. Well, it was like she all of a sudden realized "Hey, I can DO this!" She immediately let go of the chair and WALKED. And I don't mean she took 3 more steps and fell down again. No. She walked halfway around the kitchen island. And when she did finally fall down, she didn't stop there. She got back up and did it again. She was at it all day today.

Standing up is the hardest part for her. If she gets her balance after standing, then she can walk quite far. But she gets frustrated when she falls down and realizes she has to go through all the trouble of standing up and getting her balance again. It's so clear that she just wants to GO. At first we were helping her to stand, but once I realized that she could do that on her own, I've been making her do it herself, even though she clearly prefers to have the assistance and asks for help up by holding her hand out for us to take it. I figure she needs to practice it on her own. But that does tend to lead to her getting frustrated more quickly. Plus her little legs just get tired and that frustrates her too. So today was a bit of a challenge, having a perpetually frustrated toddler. I had to do a lot of distracting, reminding her that she had fun toys we could play with or books we could read and that life was not entirely about walking. But she was very focused and very determined.

I've been saying for weeks now that she has the balance to be able to walk, she just hadn't decided that it was time yet. Well, apparently, today it was TIME.