zombie baby

Our girl is walking. And falling a lot, and still crawling when she's in a hurry, but finally, really, truly walking. She's been taking a few steps here and there for a while, but one evening last week Josh and I just sat on the floor and had her walk back and forth between us over and over and over, and finally some little switch flipped in her brain and she figured it out, and started walking by herself all over the place. Just like that, right then and there. It was such a trip.

Her balance is very iffy and she looks like a zombie walking around, all wobbly with her arms out in front of her and her mouth open. She was walking toward me this weekend and Josh said "Look out babe, she's coming for your brain."

We got some little Delma-sized furniture from Ikea, because when I go to pick her up at school and she's sitting in a mini-chair at a mini-table with all her short friends, it's just so cute that I can't stand it. We got her a little table and chairs set where she will hopefully one day create adorable crafts. Or do puzzles. Or something. And we got her the new kids' size POÄNG, which in addition to being fun to say, is also really nice. We put it together and told Delma it was hers, and she's been climbing on and off it ever since.



We have a strict policy of not letting her walk around with a bottle -- she needs to be sitting in her chair to drink it, just like any other meal or snack. Normally we strap her into her booster seat at the table, but now that she has this chair she likes to sit in it for her bottle, which is fine. It's actually better, since she can get up by herself when she's done instead of us having to untether her. This morning she didn't finish her bottle, so I set it aside on the coffee table. A little while later, she was sitting in her chair and she got off of it, went and got her bottle, and went back to her chair to sit down and drink some more all by herself. I'm constantly amazed by how much she understands now, and all the things she can do.

A year ago she was barely focusing her eyes, grunting and squirming and puking on herself non-stop. And we thought she was amazing. I could not have imagined what kind of person she'd start to become, how fun she would be, that every single day she would give Josh and me reason to just look at each other and say "Babe, how CUTE is that??"