one track mind

tablewalking
Originally uploaded by Kristy and Eva.

i really like the lighting in this photo. i took all of these last week, she's harder to catch in a good shot now that she can move all over.

yesterday i bought some of those suction cup balls for eva because she seemed to really like them in her physical therapy. i stuck them to the window, and she was so excited about them that even in her overtired nap-needing state, she crawled right over to them. after i identified them as "ball", she immediately signed for ball even though i haven't shown her that sign for a few weeks. i did it back to her, and she signed for ball excitedly over and over (sort of flapping your arm like you're throwing) until i finally got her down for a nap. she woke up an hour later, looked at me, signed for ball, and fell back asleep! it seemed like she had been dreaming about her new fun toy. then when she woke up for real an hour later (nice long nap, huh?), here eyes popped open like i'd flipped a switch, and she signed for ball and promptly craned her head around to look at them stuck to the window. she pointed at them, said "ooh ooh ooh!" and squirmed off my lap so she could crawl over to them. i just thought it was really fun that she was so excited about this.

eleven months

even as i write this, i feel that i must be making it up or somehow exaggerating, but apparently eva is 11 months old today. at least that's what they tell me. too crazy.

this past month has been her busiest yet, with dizzying advances in all sorts of areas. she became mobile (crawling, cruising around on furniture, and taking a few steps at a time), and you'd think that would be enough, but in addition the lights have really come on in terms of signing. to me, her ability to communicate her observations and needs with me is almost a bigger deal than her mobility -- but combine the two and she's a whole different person than i had around a month ago.

she started using 5 new signs since yesterday (although i'm sure we missed one or two of them on the first earlier attempts?) so it seems time for a sign inventory. here they are, roughly in order: light (bottom photo), dog (top photo), fan, fish, flower, tree, milk (my favorite, so practical!), all done, baby, food, drink, more (also very helpful), and music. well, and waving "bye-bye" which i guess really is a sign, too.

i could go on and on about signs (uh... i could and i am, apparently), but i'm just so excited that she can communicate. i told larry at dinner (after she signed for more pasta and then some water, then told us she heard music and saw the dog) that the signing really colors my perception of her. she can tell me what she wants and what she sees, and if she couldn't do so this readily, i might not know how much is going on in her head. what a big payoff for so little effort -- most things in parenting are not that way.

oh, also in the photo you can get a good view of the remains of her neck lump as i call it (fibromatosis colii). she had her last physical therapy appointment yesterday, she's officially caught up. well, she might walk a bit on the later side due to the crawling being late, but she's totally fine now and needs no more treatment. yea, eva!

down and up

i see you
Originally uploaded by Kristy and Eva.

about 15 minutes after that last bleary-eyed post (which contains thinly-veiled hints at the coming desperation, clear to me only in hindsight), i tried to get eva to sleep, and she was clearly having none of it. it was 11:00, i was reaching my limit, so i got up to walk down the hall for one minute. she gave out one cry of protest, then quieted (foreshadow for mamas in the know). she made a second peep, so i headed back to the room (again, i was away for no more than a minute) and as i was walking back, i heard her fall from the bed onto the floor, followed by the freaked out crying. (the mattress and box spring are on the floor, and we have rails along both sides of the bed and a chair blocking most of the foot of the bed, but she apparently crawled after me straight toward the two foot wide open space at the end of the bed.)

she seemed mostly shaken and largely unharmed, but as i sat on the floor rocking her back and forth in my lap, i think i honestly was crying more for my guilt than for her pain. i felt like the worst mom ever, because the only reason she fell was that i left her because i was not handling it and needed to walk away. i stood at the end of the hallway thinking (for the first time ever, or at least in a mighty long time), "okay, i can't let her cry it out, but i can't do *this* every night either so what are my other options?" and this is what gives me that aching mama guilt: at the very moment i was thinking about how to get away from her, she was crawling trying to get to me, and fell. i'm still not entirely sure what the message is in all this (other than to move the mattress off the boxspring). be better about asking for help? that what she needs most is a mom who takes care of herself and isn't crazy? i don't know, but i'm really hoping it's not "see what happens when you have a fleeting negative thought about your child? she nearly dies. so there, serves you right, you bad mama."

i've been having a challenging couple of weeks, but maybe that was the worst of it, because today things were looking up. i saw people, ran some errands, spent an entire hour all by myself, and now eva is actually sleeping. you may be wondering what an uber-hipster cool mom-about-town like myself does with her free hour. well, i can't spill all the exclusive details (hint: it involves washing the car because eva cries when i attempt that with her in it), but i can tell you that i listened to the first two tracks on my new CD with the volume on 14 rather than in the baby-approved volume range of between 6 and 10. that's right, 14, people! i know, it's too crazy. try to contain yourselves.

awake

not much blogging lately (or much of anything else that i can't do with eva) because she's come up with this new plan of "napping" at bedtime, then waking up an hour later and staying up until 10, or 11. it's 10:50 right now and she's up, larry's singing to her. she's alternating between drooping her eyes, crying for 2 seconds, and signing for "dog". i feel like i've tried the obvious tricks, adjusted numbers and timing of naps, moved bedtime earlier, moved it later, held her for the first few hours after she falls asleep, putting her to sleep in bed, etc. i think the solution might be that there isn't necessarily a solution, and i just need to let her go through this phase (oh please let it be a phase!). i'm trying to go with the flow but if it goes on much longer, i may very well lose my mind, because between this and larry's needing to work more for a big deadline, i have nearly zero time for myself. well, larry's calling me, eva's crying. off i go... she's so tired, why won't she just give in and sleep? poor baby.

yea, milk!

yesterday eva had a small bonk while walking around the coffee table. when i picked her up to comfort her, she signed for milk. this is a first, since she had so far only used signs for labeling (dog, fish, fan, etc) and not for requests. she nursed for a bit and when she was done, she looked at me, grinned, and clapped. as in, "yea, milk!" well, i'm glad she approves. (we didn't previously do a lot of clapping, so either she picked it up from what little we did or from watching the other kids? in any case, it is cute, and now i can't help but clap when she does) as is the case with many of these little new skill developments, she does something once and then seemingly constantly. the rest of the day, she was signing for milk and clapping when she was done. even at 1 a.m. she nursed back to sleep, rolled over, and clapped three times. yea, indeed.