aug, 30th - freeform crawling....

day 199:

crawling is still pretty freeform......and not currently compliant with the Baby Standards Regulatory Board (BSRB)....

limi is managing to get up onto her knees and rock backwards and forwards 

but the slippery wooden floors are proving to be a crawling hindrance...... 

she still manages some distance though....by rolling and leopard-crawling across the room.....

very commando-baby!

....and she's....turn-your-back-and-she's-across-the-room-and-under-the-couch quick!

aug, 29th - autumn is here....

day 198:

new hat....better not let her crawl in the grass or she may get eaten by a lion!

aug, 28th - sad day for the locals....

day 197: our wonderful neighbourhood deli/coffee shop/restaurant closed its' doors yesterday. when i have recovered from the shock of wondering how i will spend my mornings.....especially a saturday, like today,.....i will write about all our memories that are intertwined with this gem of a place....

aug, 27th - graduating...

[still not able to take pics at the pool, so another pic from the bath]

day 196:

today, limi graduated from her first term of swimming (yes, it is that serious...even at 6 months). next week, we have a mid-term break and then we're back for term 2.

so, from day 161 she has learnt the following:

• to catch a duck....i learnt to say: reach, reach, reach....hold, hold, hold
• to close her eyes when anyone says Go!.....which may not be useful one day when she's doing the 100 metre sprint....but for swimming it helps because Ready! suggests that she's about to get splashed in the face or plunged under the water....and Go! means the splash or plunge is now happening
• to float on her back (while only being cupped by her cheeks) and listening to a gurgling, underwater version of twinkle, twinkle little star
• to play water polo...okay, slight exaggeration....to pad away the ball when it comes towards her
• to Splash....and Splash some more
• to swoop under the water from the teacher towards me (amazing to watch, especially below the surface)
• to be plucked from the side of the pool and plunged under the water for 2 seconds....and not cry
• to kick....again, this may be a slight exaggeration as it's quite freeform.....you could say that she currently has an interpretative swimming style
• to hold onto the side of the pool.....which usually has an attention span of until she sees the duck/frog/ship float past

i definitely think that swimming is the highlight of her week....she fizzes with excitement as soon as we walk in the door.......bring on the next term and triple twists from a diving board.

aug, 25th - click three times.....

day 194:

my sister sent these shoes for limi......they are definitely ones to wrap up in tissue (once her feet have outgrown them) and keep for her.... 

there's a bit of a theme....for my wedding, my sister had these spectacular numbers custom made for me....

i needed wedges, to negotiate the farm roads

and undulating lawns....

sadly, these have been soundly danced-out and unless we send them to the shoe-clinic (hmmmm, maybe an idea!) they are currently in no state to wrap in tissue and keep for her one day....

aug, 24th - dream feed....

day 193:

so....we've introduced a dream feed. 

as the name suggests, it's a feed that the baby has whilst still sleeping (haven't we all wished that we could manage this at some point). here's a bit more info.

anyway...the idea is to give the baby a warm bottle between 10:30 and 11pm, just before you go to sleep and preferably without waking them...in the hope (beg, pray) that they will sleep for longer.

up until now....although the yoga mums have all been advocating the dream feed since week 3, i've been a bit reluctant to introduce it. to me, it seemed a bit foie-grasesque to feed a sleeping baby, especially when they're not hungry, just to get them to sleep longer for your own benefit. i liked the idea that limi was setting her own patterns and waking and eating only when hungry.

but...*groan....over the past week, she's started waking up twice a night (2am and 4am) instead of just the once (4am)....and i'm feeling the pain....i need sleep and that's more for HER benefit than mine.

so, after debating for awhile, i decided to give the dream-feed a go. and.....my foie-gras-baby is now sleeping through the night (well, except for the strange dream that she's having at 11pm of being chased by a bottle). the interesting part for me is that although i am waking up with a bounce that's been a bit stunted for 6 months,  limi also appears to be enjoying the longer, uninterrupted sleep and is waking up looking very rested, with an even bigger smile....

now, we just need to discuss the 6:30am start time!

aug, 23rd - those cushions....

day 192:

those cushions from The Old Cinema, that i mentioned on day 188.....

and limi in her french-mime-artist inspired outfit.....

let's see, perhaps we can send her off to Paris.....

aug, 22nd - another word for no....

day 191:

i'm trying desperately not to overuse the word No! with Limi. it's probably a case of thinking about it all a bit too hard (you know....lots of time on my hands at the moment and a companion who is only mastering the vowel sounds.) but in these hard-thinking times, i've decided that it would be very easy to become a No household. 'No limi, don't touch!', 'No pulling!', 'No, you can't eat that.' I don't want her overriding memory to be the word 'No'.....In a very Obama-esque way, I want a 'Yes' house. 

now I just need to figure out how to say: 'No, stop yanking out my hair'...without sounding like something out of a New Age parenting guide: 'Limi, i would really appreciate it if you didn't pull at my hair in that fashion'.....hmm....that just doesn't cut it.

aug, 21st - 28 weeks (letter to limi)....

day 190:

aug, 20th - looking back....

day 189:

looking back.....limi on day 6, the day we named her....for months before she arrived, she was 'the bump' and for 5 days, she was 'bumpkin'. now, it's difficult to remember a time when she wasn't called Limi or more formally - Lissom