State of the Baby

Good god, it's been a while. Things here are nuts, and let's just say they are not going to change anytime soon. However, just because I have been too busy to blog does not mean Eva has stopped astonishing us about once an hour. For baby archival purposes I will swoop in here to post an update. And then a series of videos for the week.

Anyway, the update. Eva is astonishingly cute.

Duh, mom.

She is working hard on learning to communicate. She points at things she wants or at things in which she is interested. She says "mamama" when she sees me, and "dadadada" when she see Chad. She says "dat" when pointing at something. The other day she reached for her bottle and said "babababa."

She can do the signs for "more" and for "milk" and for "all-done," but really prefers pointing, smiling and crying to get her message across. She is still a great eater, but now requires to be eating the same food we are eating, preferably directly from our plates, preferably with her own utensil. We usually forget to give her a utensil, and then halfway through dinner she notices everyone else has a fork and she'll scream until we figure out that's what the problem is.

Speaking of the screaming, Eva is not a quiet baby. She makes her opinions known. She will be sleeping, and instead of waking and whimpering a bit before going back to sleep, she lays perfectly still and screams at the top of her lungs. Then goes back to sleep.

She and Noah are sharing a room now. In related news, Noah is a trooper.

Eva is totally fearless. In the bath, she'll put her face down and blow bubbles in the water (she started doing this all on her own). She crawls under the guest bed and through the tunnel and into the closet and into the cabinet. She loves to crawl around the playground structures, and would happily fling herself off the edge if given the chance.

Don't worry mom, I've got this.

She is super mobile, crawling and scooting and rolling. But now, her usual mode of transportation is a surprisingly effective bouncing knee walk:

She loves to play with toys, especially Noah's cars and trucks. She likes to put things into boxes. She likes to "draw" with chalk on the chalkboard. She loves books, and will chose one then knee bounce over to you waving the book. If you are busy reading another book, for example, to her brother, she will sit there and cry until you look at her book instead.

No idea where she learned that.

She is so capable. She can rock on a rocking horse. She can use the potty (when we get her all set and sit her on it). She can clap her hands and play peek-a-boo.

Basically, she is totally winning at babyhood.