Somebody's not a carryon item any longer!

Erin

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A critical part of a Time Lady's education is learning how to recognize antagonistic species. Thanks to our friends Spiderbabe and Mr. Boyfriend Pants, she's got her first one down.

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We made carrot cupcakes this afternoon and Bibliobaby learned how to whisk and how to crack an egg. The first egg was a teaching device. The second and third she did with help. The fourth one she did all by herself. Why, yes, I did spend longer picking eggshells out of the egg bowl from the fourth egg than we did whisking all the rest into the batter.

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Oh, December, you are always so packed, with parties and gifting and travel and guests and now a delightful little toddler who sometimes skips her nap. We know that she's not actually ready to give it up yet because the afternoon is complete misery for everyone when that happens. In the meantime, friends visiting from San Francisco are very exciting-so exciting that it is hard for certain kids to fall asleep. 

Bibliobaby is also very interested in the phenomenon of gift wrapping. She's helped me wrap some presents for Grandma, Grandpa, Ga and her aunts and uncles, and beyond demanding to apply more tape, she has also been insisting that it's time to open every present we've wrapped together, even though they're not for her. After all, we do open the boxes when they arrive... Fortunately, we'll be opening presents all through the holidays (solstice, Christmas, New Year's, when we have some time with friends...), so she's going to get lots of practice in giving!

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I wonder what this present could be!

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What do you mean, Halloween is over? Bibliobaby doesn't care about your silly calendar.

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Language is hard.

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Why yes, we have become those parents. This week, among other accomplishments, Bibliobaby has mastered telling us when she's doing number two. 

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We really have been seeing her vocabulary explode over the past few days. She comes out with signs we haven't done in weeks and words that manage to be exactly appropriate for the situation at hand. If she says MONKEY...well, let it simply be said that somewhere? There is a monkey visible. Although she still signs TRAIN whenever an airplane goes by, then PLANE? when I tell her that it's the sound of a plane. So we have room for improvement!

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The last couple of weeks have seen a vocabulary explosion from Bibliobaby, not to mention a height explosion that has her reaching up onto the kitchen counters and climbing into her high chair by herself. I thought we'd have a few more months before there was no safety for plates and apples and papers almost anywhere in the house. How someone so small can wreak so much havoc I'm sure I don't know. She couldn't possibly have gotten it from either of her parents. We also find it very difficult to refuse her things when she asks for them by name, or by saying PLEASE so entreatingly. "Bana?" or BANANA followed by PLEASE! is hard to resist even as we try to limit her to one a day.

We had a visit from Grandma and Grandpa last week, and took many pictures with our new camera from Nana and Papa (an anniversary/early dad's birthday present). It is amazing how many more of my photos turn out right without even really knowing how to use it--I can't wait to see what happens once I have time to absorb any of the manual or quick start guides.

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You see before you the fruits of a two and a half week long visit from our friends S and B. When B didn't finish her black raspberry ice cream cone, I let Bibliobaby have it for a taste, and then was unable to pry it out of her sticky purple hands. She finished the whole cone. Fortunately, B had eaten or dropped all the ice cream off the top first.

Our baby is growing by leaps and bounds and jumps and backward walking and falls off of playground equipment and climbings up stairs. She won't let us wipe her nose, but she does an okay job on her own. She is stubborn and insistent and astonishingly communicative and expanding her vocabulary at an astonishing rate. ("Wait, did you just say ____?" is becoming an almost daily phrase. Recent additions: sticker, MONKEY, caterpillar (and subsequently CATERPILLAR) and SIT.) Often, however, she abandons her extensive vocabulary for yelling to get what she wants. She's taken to bringing us her shoes or the Ergo as an indication that she's bored and wants to go out. We're down to one long nap in the afternoon. (Long, or misery awaits.) No one told me that parenthood would be a constant battle in my heart between the scouts and the rearguard, and now it is fought daily.

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Q: How do you know your baby is a toddler?

A: You laugh at her when she crawls.

Bibliobaby and I were both in fits of giggles when she got down on hands and knees the other day to cross the dining room. Moreover, we went to the park with some friends a week or so ago, and when we left she walked all the way to the end of the bike path from the playground. I mapped it out and it's a whole .2 miles, but that's a long walk for a small girl!

She is just growing. So. Fast. Her vocabulary keeps getting more advanced (PIZZA and PLEASE and strawberry and spin and quack...okay, I'm pretty sure that I'm just imagining quack) and she clearly understands lots of things we say to her. "Can you help me open/close the door/drawer?" and "let's throw that trash in the trash can" and "do you need help?" and "can you put the dustpan back in the cupboard?" and "where's your belly button/toes/nose/ear?" and "do you want to go to the playground?" Oh, does she ever understand the last one.

The last couple of days she has been carrying the Ergo around and handing it to any adult she can find, accompanied by a very insistent "up!" It's clear that she'd like to go out and she knows that's what we use to carry her. Of course, that's just in time for it to change--we took her out in the bike trailer twice earlier this week, and since she seemed to enjoy it both times, I think we'll be using it a lot more. On the other hand, I guess she can bring us her bike helmet instead of the carrier.

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Some friends of ours took Bibliobaby blueberry picking in the Fells today. According to reports, she is an excellent hiker, and according to this photo, she is absolutely astonished that blueberries are available, free for the taking, for anyone who wants them, as many as they want. 

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A good friend of ours brought Bibliobaby a drum back from Rwanda, and she seems to have figured out all the mainstream tricks, most notably which end makes the more pleasing sound.

No drum, no party.

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Completely unprompted, might I add. Bibliobaby loves bouncing on things, and it doesn't take much encouragement from a corrupting influence (like S, or me, or her dad) for her to be giggling and jumping all over the place. 

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The children's museum here is not as good for toddlers as the one in Boston, but it would be great for kids who like art. Each room is an art installation by a different artist that the kids can interact with and there are about a dozen art projects for them to do. The big hits for Bibliobaby were the glass-walled elevator and the stairs.

Bibliobaby's latest things are to pick up a book she wants you to read and hand it to you, then turn all the pages, and to put up her hand to hold yours so she can drag you along on her adventures. She can also show you her belly button, and say cookie and CHEESE. She has also been asking for her daddy since we left him in San Francisco; we're looking forward to seeing him and home again!

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