14 Months

As I've said before, Paige has entered this exciting phase where she is developing so quickly that we can hardly keep up. She plays hide and go seek with her daddy, gets a devilish grin and runs away when I ask her if I can change her diaper (obviously my mistake), and is saying and signing a whole host of words. She is trying to work out how to run at the moment, and I feel like I can almost see all of the little neurons in her brain firing away.

A friend of hers gave her a watering can for her birthday and one of Paige's favorite activities is to fill it with water and water the plans on the deck. She brings the can to me and says "agua." I help her hold the can and she waters the plants, she is clearly her father's daughter.

On the potty training front, she is almost fully there. I ordered her some training pants that I'm hopeful will help her get over the last hump of peeing and telling me simultaneously that she has to go. When we have her at home she is generally without a diaper, and only pees on the floor maybe once a day, if that.

Still no crawling, although now when I ask her to crawl to me she gets on to all fours and stay there for a second before either trying to stand up or flopping onto her belly. Baby steps I guess.

She Is Talking!

Due to a sad chain of events, Paige had to end care with her nanny Zoila and her friend Silver. However, we feel extremely fortunate to have found an incredible new nanny and a wonderful new family for Paige to spend 3 days a week with. The little boys name is Isaac, and Paige LOVES him. He is very sweet with her, and they have a great time. Paige's new nanny is extremely observant and within minutes was signing with her and helping her with exercises to learn to pull herself up to standing. She has also been wonderful about the potty training. Overall, we feel pretty lucky. The other incredible thing that has happened, is that Paige has begun talking, signing a wide variety of words, and playing games we had no idea she was capable of playing.

At 13 months, she has about 15 words she uses on her own including "in" "out" "up" "get down" "all done" "good night (na-night)" "mama" "dada" "agua" "gato" and others I am not thinking of right now. She signs several other words like butterfly, shoes, socks, sleep, milk, eat, more, all done, music and star. Isaac plays a game where he is a scary monster and everyone pretends to be scared of the monster. After two weeks of being in care with Isaac, Paige is playing the same game where she is a scary monster and then also likes to act scared by putting her hands on her cheeks and screaming. She is also saying Isaac's name and playing hide and go seek with him.

I like to think it has not been all one sided. Isaac didn't have any interest in potty training before he and Paige started care together. It seems Paige has changed that. The two of them sit side by side on their potties. Very sweet.

We Made It Through A Year!

Its awful. Paige has entered into this incredibly exciting period where she is developing in leaps and bounds and doing something new and exciting literally every single day. Of course at the same time, for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is the previously mentioned walking bit, I am finding it harder and harder to find the time to write. But enough of the excuses.

On March 15, 2009, Paige turned one year old! The first year was incredible. Paige decided that she wanted to master walking by her first birthday, and she pretty much did. Here is a photo of Paige in her pretty birthday dress, and below is a video of Paige's friends singing her Happy Birthday. Due to the rain, we ended up cramming almost 30 people into our flat. It was a total zoo, but everyone (including the birthday girl) seemed to enjoy themselves. The second video is Paige walking to her mommy on the big day.

Big Girl

Lately, despite the fact that Paige is entering an extremely exciting stage where she is seemingly growing and learning to do new things daily, I've been having a hard time finding the time to keep a record of it all. In the last month she has had a major growth spurt whereby she went up 1-2 clothing and shoe sizes, she two new teeth, she is walking up to about 20 steps herself (and walking to people other than me now), she has started using sign language, she has had two nights where she did not pee in her diaper at all, AND she has turned in to quite the little chatterbox. She speaks in full sentences, albeit in a language we do not understand. She doesn't point at things and grunt or use one syllable sounds, she recites delivers full soliloquies. In addition to the walking, she is working on sitting up by herself, and regularly launches herself from sitting into what is almost a crawling position. Dave and I still have hope she may do a little bit of crawling after all even if it is after she has already walked.

The best part of the last few weeks has been watching the emergence of Paige's personality. She is a happy and playful girl. She is also very sweet. Don't get me wrong, she has her moments, but her overall disposition is a happy one. We are extremely lucky.

Paige is walking!

Over the last few days, Paige has gone from insisting that she only walk while someone is holding both her hands, to walking happily beside me just holding one of my hands. Then, today, her nanny Zoila decided to hold on to the back of Paige's shirt and not hold her hands. Paige likes the security of feeling a hand on her back or something holding her up. When I got home from work, Zoila showed me. Then, because Paige was so excited to see me, Zoila let go and Paige took her first few steps. Dave got home minutes after I did, so we both got to see her taking her first few tentative steps around the living room. It was incredible, and I would be lying if I said we didn't get a little teary-eyed. She is such a big girl!

In other news, Paige seems to have four of her top teeth coming in simultaneously. She has had a rough few days as a result. Poor baby.

She is so close!

Today Paige decided that she no longer needed to hold on to two hands to help her walk. Instead, she is holding my hand and walking along beside me like a big girl. She has taken this new found skill to mean that she can also dictate where we walk...or not walk. As a result, the walk home from the farmer's market took about an hour longer than usual. She stopped, turned around, walked into stores. It was hilarious, and also a little glimpse at what Dave and I have in store for us in the coming months. She is at an amazing stage in her development right now. Everyday she is doing something new and exciting.

The funniest of her new tricks is that she now dances to her favorite songs (she will not dance to every song, she has clear favorites). Here is a short video of Paige doing her thing. A longer and even funnier video appears here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MxsnwG8w0PM

10.5 Months

I was looking at Paige today in disbelief. She is going to be a year old in March. I cannot believe how fast the last year has flown by. Paige is developing into such a funny and self-assured human being. She has a wonderful sense of curiosity, and is extremely social. If we walk into a restaurant or new home, as soon as I let her walk around she will systematically work the entire room, walking up to each person waiting for them to react to her.

As she approaches the one year mark, she has a few "words" although I use the word loosely. She says "bye bye," "hi," "mama," "dada," and "uh oh," but none of them are used exclusively for their correct meaning. For example, she does say uh oh when she drops something (on purpose) but she also says it when she wakes up from her nap or at other seemingly random times. I would say that "mama" is the word she uses most sparingly. She clearly uses it for me, as well as when she wants to nurse and when she wakes up at night and is upset.

She now has two teeth. They are coming in SO SLOWLY. I think it will be a while before she has anymore. Paige is continuing to work on walking and continuing to refuse to crawl. She can walk holding on to just one of my hands now, although she will not do it unless she has something else in her hand. She is very cautious and hates falling or being surprised in some way by her motion. She can balance for about 30 seconds or more standing, but again, will only do it if she doesn't notice. She has to be distracted, or she gets nervous and just sits down. She has now been walking using our fingers since November. I see definite progress, her balance is much improved, but I don't think she is that interested in walking independently. She does not pull up on things, and cannot get into a standing position herself. I suspect Paige will not be a super early walker. Who knows, she may eventually crawl first. I continue to give her as much "tummy time" as she will tolerate. All I can say about that is thank God I was a late walker and didn't crawl first, otherwise I might be a little more concerned about seeming disinterest in independent movement.

In this post is a picture of Paige showing off her first tooth as well as a video of her pushing around a toy at the Upper Noe Valley Rec Center, or as we call it the Day Park. Its an amazing place for the babies to play. I am so thrilled its in such close proximity.

Happy New Year

2008 was a dichotomy. As Dickens would say, "[i]t was the best of times, it was the worst of times." After eight years of feeling shame and disgust with our government, my spirits were lifted when our country elected Barak Obama. His message of change and hope resonated with so many who, until now, felt that our government could and would not represent them. Then, of course there was the crash of the housing market and the recession that followed. For much of the year, we felt pretty insulated here in San Francisco, but as the year drew to a close, the job security both Dave and I had taken for granted suddenly seemed less, well, secure. We watched on helplessly as our own retirement accounts, and more frighteningly those of our parents plummeted in value. Poor Paige's 529 plan is now worth less than our initial deposit into it despite our continued deposits.

Despite all of the chaos that seems to best describe the year, 2008 will always be one of the happiest years of my life. Paige has brought us more joy and happiness than I ever knew was possible. She is an amazing person, and I cannot wait to see what the coming year has in store for all of us

On the Paige front, my very big girl decided that she could not end the year without a single tooth; and so, I am pleased to announce, that at 9.5 months old, Paige cut her first tooth. The timing wasn't great. We were in Maine, and after spending three days with my family where Paige (for the most part) was her funny and charming self, she started to be fussy and cranky just in time to spend the last couple of days of our trip with Dave's family.

Paige continues to work on walking. She now virtually runs when she is holding onto our fingers. She can stand unassisted for a second or two before beginning to wobble. She also will balance herself on furniture. A month ago, Paige would fall to one side or another within a few moments of me taking my hands away. Now, she stands holding on to the couch or other pieces of furniture for several minutes before losing her balance.

She is beginning to "jabber" and imitate our vocal inflections as well. It seems her first words may be right around the corner...