Teeth and Tongue

After that tooth erupted, she seems to have discovered all the things her tongue can feel, and we're seeing a lot more of it. Lots of random licking and tongue waggling. She loves to chew on cold sodas and glasses and bottles, and we thought this newer response to that activity was pretty funny. Makes us laugh every time we see her do it.

Movin'...

Time is moving, Maia is moving... so much has happened in the last few weeks (and months) that I can hardly keep up! Maia is crawling... quickly. We'll try to get a video up soon. She's also decided she needs to figure out how to pull herself to standing, but she's not skilled, and therefore dangerous to herself. So here's her first shiner, thanks to a run-in with a bookshelf. She has completely outgrown her cradle, and, we realized, her crib was due to be lowered. She's really enjoying her food. We joke about how she loves to give herself cereal facials at daycare. Despite the look on her face here - she loved carrots! Little Miss Independent got her toys out from the basket all by herself. Her tooth (left lower front) finally erupted on March 18th. I was actually surprised that they didn't come through together, based on how swollen her gums were. Now that the tooth is through, she spends a lot of time pushing her tongue over it with a curious look on her face. What is this strange thing? She seems to be getting bigger and longer every day. She's slept very well for the last few nights, for which we are grateful! I'm very eager for the warm air to settle in so that we might start exploring the world around us some more.

Noisy Toys

Maia got a few toys from Grandma Effie and Aunt Tara for Christmas this year. And they make noise. Lots of noise. We just cracked this one open last week, and she loves it. On the health front, I brought Maia to the on-call pediatrician last night, who confirmed our suspicion that it was, in fact, an ear infection. But even by that point, we were seeing a decrease in her fever. So we're glad to know. We also got confirmation of our growth-spurt suspicion... although they weighed her with her clothes on, she was almost 16.5 pounds. She spent the day with my folks today (thanks again!), and is heading back to daycare tomorrow. She is improving those crawling skills, and seems to be feeling better although she is not quite back to her usual self. She's Maia in slow-motion right now. Also coming soon... her two bottom front teeth. They are sooo close!

She can...

Things are going so quickly over the last month or so that I really struggle to keep up with chronicling everything. And she's so busy! The sitting up that started back in January... she's very good at it now. She even sits with her shoulders back and good posture (unless she's reaching for something). She, of course, rolls front to back, and back to front in both directions, and quickly. She has pulled herself to standing once... in the bath! She has gone from holding on to her toys and banging or shaking them (which she still loves to do) to passing small ones from one hand to the other. In addition to her rattles and crinkly toys, she loves her ring stacker, her leap frog instruments (maracas and drum), her v-tech car dashboard and her rainbow fish bath book (which is very tasty). She still enjoys her exersaucer and now reaches the toys over her head. She loves the jumperoo at school. She goes from sitting to tummy in no time (hasn't quite gotten the reverse yet), and she is on the move in every direction. And if there's something she really wants... she can get it! With all this activity, she has become a distracted nurser, which is a little challenging for me. I struggle to keep her focused on nursing during the day (unless she is sleepy, or VERY hungry). She has come to really enjoy her rice cereal, and is okay with the oatmeal. She struggles with the texture of things that are thicker and pastier. She's tolerating sweet potatoes, but not a fan yet. She did NOT enjoy avocado this morning, but she also can't breathe through her nose today, and I'm not convinced that she would have been interested in any solid food today (usually she kicks excitedly when she's in her high chair, but not today). Maia did, unfortunately, come down with some nasty illness of some undetermined sort. She started with a fever Wednesday/Thursday night and slept fitfully. By 10 am on Thursday, it was 101° and rising. I picked her up from daycare, and stayed with her until my mother came to watch her for the afternoon. Ray was able to stay with her on Friday during a planned day out of the office and her fever spiked at 104°. Yikes! While dosing out the Motrin and Tylenol (which she loves! Tasty like cotton candy!), we wondered about an ear infection, but the pediatrician recommended a wait and see approach, and she seems on the mend today. The fever is running lower, and her spirits are better (as illustrated in the videos above!)