Dear Leila,
This month’s update is a bit late, I know, but we’ve been a bit busy lately. I was going to wait until next month and include this month in that one but for two things: I do have stuff to tell you about this month that I will have forgotten by then and the next update will be for your first birthday and should be about that only since it’s a big milestone for a little girl. So here we go with month 11.
You’ve been crawling for a month now and you’re very good at it. You’re very quick and we have to make sure that doors are closed and baby barriers in place to keep you from eating Finn’s Lego or licking Dad’s shoes. I’m mortified on a daily basis by how dirty our floor obviously is, going by the state of your knees and feet. I keep resolving to do a better job of cleaning, but I’m really hoping that you’ll move on to walking quickly and the visible dirt will be confined to the soles of your feet.
Your vocabulary now consists of ‘no’ (with head shake and occasional finger wagging), ‘yeah!’ and ‘ta’. That doesn’t seem like a lot of words, but you make the widest possible use of them. ‘No’ is for not eating, not wanting your nappy or clothes changed and for the couple of places you’ve learned that babies are not allowed to go. It doesn’t mean that you don’t go there, just that you’ll look at me and say ‘no’ when you arrive so that I know that you know you’re not supposed to be there. ‘Yeah’ is your happy word, all purpose greeting and way of making conversation.
And ‘ta’ makes for a great game. Your carer at childcare reported that you and another baby spent ages passing a toy back and forth to gleeful cries of ‘ta!’ the other day. You’ll also say it to get me to take things you’re offering and put them on my head. You love that. Especially when they fall off. I know I look stupid with a block on my head but I don’t care when it makes my Little Princess laugh.
Now we come to some of your less pleasant moments. You had quite a bad cold a couple of weeks ago (possibly due to me allowing you to fall into the pool at your first, and thus far only, swimming lesson). Now I understand completely that you felt unwell, were producing an ocean of snot and were running a bit of a temperature for a while, but did you really need to be so annoying about it? I couldn’t put you down and move more than 3 feet away without you screeching at me or throwing yourself on the floor and bawling like the world was ending. It wore on my nerves a bit.
You’ve tried it on a bit since you got better, but I’m not going to give in. Much as I love you, little one, (and I do love you very, very much) I refuse to carry you everywhere with me. You’ll thank me for this little bit of ‘tough love’ when you’re fifteen and want to go out on your own - believe me.
Well Princess Petal Pants, that’s it for another month.
Love,
Mum
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