Tuesday, January 22, 2008

That's Miss Diva to you!

S is figuring out how to stand. With style.

S has been in a hurry to move around since she noticed that T moves around. And hey - if HE can do it.... So it's been a lot of fun watching her figure out how to get from point a to point b. When T was learning all this, he just wanted to be moving. It didn't matter which direction or if in any direction. We bought him a jumparoo and he would literally jump for hours. This was great because it gave me time to do things like laundry, cooking, going to the bathroom by myself without having to worry about what he might get into, crawl under, or pull down. The jumparoo was stand alone - it didn't attach to a doorway, so I could move it where ever I was going. We didn't bring it with us to Germany. I wish we had, although I suspect Miss Thang would not have liked it. T loved the walker and the exersaucer, S will tolerate the walker, but you can forget the exersaucer, which makes me SO glad that we didn't buy one. If S can't move in it, in the direction she wants to go - you can fugeddaboutit.

Once she learned to crawl, she decided that it was too rough on her knees? too slow? not ladylike?!?!? We have wood floors, and she finds it easier to half sit, half crawl. You have to actually SEE this to understand, but again, when trying to capture it on a camera, she immediately stops. She's very quick, so by the time I find the camera, turn it on, and wait for the picture to take, she's so over it. But back to the description - she sits on her bum, with one leg angled in front of her like she's going to sit indian style. The other leg is folded back like in a hurdle stretch, so that her legs almost make a podium. She'll raise her bum up off the floor just a bit, lean forward and use her arms to glide across the floor. This works fabulously until she hits carpet, which we don't have much of anyway. Only now she's realized that she can stand and seems to associate this with the two legged movement the rest of us do. So, from that sitting position, she'll throw her arms up in the air, and she pushes down with her knees, which allllllllmost gets her to a kneeling position. If she is near anything with leverage (and would you be surprised what she uses!), she'll grab that, stand up, get her balance, slowly let go.....and throw her hands up over her head like she's Mary Lou Retton nailing the perfect floor routine in the Olympics. Since she hasn't figured out how to say Yay! for herself (believe me, it won't be long), she smacks her lips and says, "AHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!", which inevitably makes her giggle, which inevitably causes her to fall down.

Well, this evening, she caught her self and stood back up - threw up her hands a la Mary Lou, smacked her mouth, said "AHHHHHH!!!!" and then CLAPPED for herself. Oh boy, I'm in for it. T, who is anxious to get her walking because he thinks it means 1)they will then be able to wrestle and 2) I can go back to carrying him up and down the stairs (totally not going to happen), will usually stop whatever he is doing, clap for her and shout, "YAAAAAYYYYYY!"

Tonight, what with the huge leap forward she made, I guess she was expecting a really big reaction. T didn't notice because he was busy with his SmartCycle, and Miss Diva did NOT care for that at all. So she crawls over to him, does her routine, waits, and.....still nothing from T. So she pulls on his pants leg, he shakes her off, she plops down on the floor. You can see her think about this for a few seconds, then she looks up at him, opens her mouth and lets out a scream that under any other circumstances would indicate a gunshot wound, slamming your finger in the bathroom door (ahem), or a tumble down the stairs. T leaps off his bike, confused. "Alright 'Ra? Ra, alright???" he asks her worriedly and hugs her. S stops crying, and yanks his hair as she giggles.

I have to leave the room I'm laughing so hard.

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