Month: July 2006

Leilanai’s never been very curious about things, but I think that’s normal for a baby still so young. So it’s also normal now that she’s moving by herself (still belly crawling) for her to start exploring things she can reach. But I sure didn’t expect her to go so quickly.

Today, she found the cats’ water bowl and reached for it. Oddly, she had been sitting not far from it for several minutes without showing any interest, and then one second when I wasn’t watching, she lunged and tipped it over, spilling some of the water. Lessons learned: always watch the baby (but how can we?), and get a new water bowl that doesn’t tip.

Barely 5 minutes later, she reached a kitchen cabinet for the first time, and seeing the door slightly ajar, pulled to open it. She has sat in the kitchen and watched us open cabinets dozens of times, so that’s no surprise. And we were well prepared for this moment, all bottom cabinets have safety catches that I installed 2 months ago. Unfortunately the plastic latch didn’t work, and Leilani got the cabinet all the way open—she really enjoyed that. There’s nothing dangerous in the food pantry, but we just don’t want her to get into the habit of getting into things (yes, we’re planning on giving her one cabinet for her to play in but we haven’t gotten around to it yet …)

So I had to stand there and hold the cabinet door closed. She kept trying 5 or 6 times to pull on it again, got slightly frustrated because her new skill didn’t work anymore, and I felt bad depriving her of the fun. She lost interest, but about a minute later, she crawled to the other edge of the door and tried pulling on that edge. It didn’t open because that was the hinge-side, but she demonstrated a certain amount of reasoning I hadn’t seen before.

And speaking of reasoning, Mommy taught her how to get down from the bed. Several times she has scooted to the edge of the bed and rolled off. We always watch and catch her just over the edge, so she has that feeling of being in danger without hurting herself. Mommy started putting her back on the bed with her feet over the edge, so she slides down and lands on her feet. She can now do this by herself, going from playing on the bed to standing on the floor. Later today, she was crawling across the hard dining room to the sill of the patio door. There is no step there, just a slightly raised sill, but she turned herself around and backed out the door!

Thanks to Leilani, we have new shelves in our rearranged living room:

Actually, they were made by Don, our current tenant in the boat garage. But with Leilani starting to stand by pulling and leaning on furniture, we needed more high shelves to put books and bobbles. The high bookshelves in her playroom were full**, so we needed new ones in the living room.

** full because Andy went to the Library’s book sale. And the boxes in the storage closet were full of these books too….

Andy found a pink sit-on-top truck (or car?) for Leilani at a thrift store. I tried some weak objections, but was overruled by his enthusiasm. A few weeks before that I had gone off against battery operated toys on the blog – but of course the truck’s main purpose was as a riding toy. And Leilani was only 6 months then. Waaaayyyy too young. I figured she’d be a year or so, but last week she discovered it next to the clothesline and wanted to know what it was. I sat her on top, and she immediately found all the levers and buttons, so I cleaned it and brought it upstairs. She needs to be watched all the time when on the truck, because she can’t get off (tried, fallen, but not cried).

A little crash course in German baby talk:

Some people are unhappy about Leilani’s sleep. Not Andy and I, and also many young mothers I know think she is pretty good, but I just got off the phone with a childless and otherwise dear friend, who suggested blaring some horns in the bedroom while she is falling asleep, so she can get used to falling asleep while there is noise!!!! I wonder how she’d like the horns in HER bedroom! I had told her she couldn’t come over after Leilani went to bed (probably around 8) because for the next hour it needs to be fairly quiet. I mean, she sleeps at campgrounds, and naps through lawnmowings (but not always), but if we have guests and she hears Andy and me laughing and talking, she gets up because she wants to see what’s going on and be part of it… I tried to tell her how good Leilani’s sleep is otherwise, always being quiet at night, even when she is awake or sick or teething and hardly ever waking up except for nursing, she didn’t even hear me out. I hate that.

Ever since she was 2 months old Leilani has not pooped her diaper during the night, and has waken us up to go potty a total of only 2 or 3 times (between midnight and dawn). But a while ago there was the lady at Aloha International’s talk story, asking wether she was on a schedule yet, and when told no, with a stern look on her face, if at least she was sleeping thru the night. Leilani started crying right then. At least the comments about her sleeping in our bed have – more or less – stopped.

An excerpt from our parenting philosophy: We won’t put Leilani on a schedule if we can avoid it, instead we’ll try to have her fall asleep, eat, nap, go potty when we notice she needs to. She will sleep in our bed as long as we can manage, up to an age of 3 or 4 from what we read. I will breastfeed her as long as possible, up to 2 or 2 1/2 and she’ll eat very little canned/jar food (have you tasted that stuff?). TV – moving pictures in any form – will not be used as babysitters, and be limited to a few minutes a week, mainly at other people’s homes.

Karla, Klaus, and Ian came to visit us last week (7/20). If you think I haver a hard time tossing (or not posting) photos – I deleted over 90%… still a lot left, but all cute.