We have a tooth!

We were at Babies R Us on Friday, and Abby was hanging out in the cart and getting a little impatient with our shopping. So I started making silly noises to make her laugh, and when she did, I saw something on her gum. Upon closer inspection I realized it wasn't something on her gum, but in it! A tooth! Bottom left, just barely through but definitely there. No fussing or crying or anything to let us know it was on its way, and just a slight increase in the buckets of drool she usually produces. May the rest of them all be so easy!

Adventures at Angels Stadium

Thanks to our friends Marcela and Brian, we got to go to the Angels vs. Red Sox game on Thursday night. We weren't sure how it would go with Abby, since all she wants these days is to crawl and walk, but they were bringing their 10-month-old, Brendan, so I figured Marcela and I could take the kids for a walk if they started getting antsy.

We got there a few minutes after it had started (thanks, traffic) and Abby slept the entire way there, so that was fantastic timing. She was in a good mood going in, and for the first two innings she did great on my lap, standing and bouncing and being entertained by the woman behind us and by Brendan. Then the foul ball came.

We were in row G behind third base--prime broken bat and foul ball territory. Dan and Brian sat on our right so they could shield us from anything that happened to come winging our way. Well, a foul ball got smacked straight to our section, and when I realized it was actually coming really close, I hunched over Abby and tried to cover her head with my arm. The ball went about two rows in front of us, but someone behind us tried to go for it anyway (why?!?!) and landed ON ME. I got smashed into the top edge of the chair's back and my cheek got smooshed, too. I felt like Id have a bruise under my eye, but thankfully I didn't, although I do have a knot on my back from the chair back. And even though Abby didn't get touched, she did get a little squashed when I got squashed, and she was totally traumatized.

She sobbed for quite a while, and then, when she settled down, it was like she was in shock. Dan held her for 15 minutes and she never moved; just had her face pressed against his chest, staring at nothing, looking stunned. After a while I took her and put her in my new (and totally awesome) sling, and she did the same thing: just sat there, huddled against me, not moving.

After a while, around inning 6, I nursed her (my first nursing in public experience, and no one around us was the wiser, thanks to that sling!), because I figured she had to be hungry (hadn't eaten since before we left!) and maybe that would snap her out of it. And it did! They played "Feel Good, Inc." which is a song by The Gorillaz, and Dan and I sing the little intro to her sometimes and it makes her laugh, and when I sang along she smiled. I pulled her out of the sling and stood her up and it was like she'd just woken up: looking around, checking things out as though seeing them for the first time. Poor baby girl. Dan and I felt awful that she was so freaked out. But even after all that she didn't get wigged out by the cheering and yelling and gasping of the 43,000+ crowd. Personal growth! Yay Abby!

Progress

At My Gym yesterday we did the bubble thing again, and Abby didn't cry! Yay! I don't have a wimpy child!

She's all over the furniture now, doing the whole cruising thing. No more plopping her on the floor so I can run to the bathroom or go put my contacts in in the mornings. *sigh*

We have crawling!

Yes! She did it! And, more importantly, continues to do it. Her only motivation, however, is to get over to something she can use to stand up. Or to grab the cord to my laptop. Figures. Honestly, I don't care why she crawls, as long as she does--I'm just hoping now she'll realize it's easier to do and doesn't require a stationary object to hold on to. All this furniture-cruising and pulling-up stuff has me terrified. I just know the one time I'm not looking she'll bite it on the floor and break her adorable little nose or something. And really, it is the most adorable nose. I'd hate to see it crushed.

Saints Preserve Us

Well, she did it. I came out of the kitchen and there she was: STANDING, on her own, next to Dan's recliner, looking pleased as punch. (Albeit a little shaky on those legs--she doesn't get yet that a wider stance gives her more stability, and she tends to put her feet right next to each other.) The rest of the morning she insisted on being up and hanging on to something. I recorded this milestone in her baby book in the last remaining moments I had alone on the couch before she wrangled me into service as her spotter for the next couple hours. She started cruising a little, too, but instead of shuffling her feet along, she crosses one over the other, and most of the time the crossed-over foot gets caught when she tries to bring it around, so I did a lot of catching. She also seems to think she can let go of whatever is holding her up and lunge to grab things. I see many a face-plant in her future.

So I'm looking around the living room and realizing we're nowhere near having this place baby-proofed. Other than the edge of the hearth, which we put bumpers on when she started rolling, nothing is ready. Even though she's been able to move by rolling around, she hasn't expressed that much interest non-baby things--plus she moved slowly enough that we could get to her before she got into trouble. But lately, cords are catching her eye, and remotes, and paper (the smaller the scrap, the better)...I'm sure electrical outlets and whatever she can reach on tabletops are right around the corner. And now, with this whole walking thing on the horizon...yikes.

Who says you have to crawl before you can walk?

Well, it looks like Abby will be bypassing the crawling stage altogether. She is so close, but she just won't move her hands forward when she moves her legs. Instead, she pushes her legs and braces her hands on the ground, and eventually her feet and knees slip out from under her and she ends up back on her belly. Then, if she's still motivated, she'll keep pushing with her arms and end up sliding ever so slowly backwards.

But lately she's not even doing that. She's getting her knees under her, then pushing onto her feet to try to stand. And yesterday she was holding onto my thumbs while she stood, and she let go--and I didn't hold on. She stood on her own for five whole seconds--not long unless you're counting and expecting her to fall and she's not. Now all she does when she's on the floor is try to stand up. If we sit on the floor with her, we become mere props to, well, prop her up.

Suddenly I'm aware of how unprepared I am for a child who moves.

Extreme Cuddling

Trying to snuggle in bed with hubby and baby is not nearly as pictureque and sweet as one might hope when the baby wants nothing more than to stand and bounce on your stomach. So went our morning.

And speaking of cuddling--she hugs now! She wraps her arms around my neck and rests her head on my shoulder for just a moment then pushes off to grab my hair, or chew my chin, or whatever else she may feel like doing. But it's so adorable. And she sits in my lap now when she's first woken up or getting close to naptime, and lets me hug her or read her a book. I love it. I'm so glad I had a kid who likes to cuddle--at least at this age. Long may it last!

Updates, updates

Well, it's been quite the time around here lately. Last Thursday Abby got sick for the first time--and she did it up big! I'd been awake around 4:30 and was just falling back to sleep when I hear her suddenly start gagging and choking next to me, but she's not moving or anything. I sit her up quick and am rewarded with vomit all over my pj's and the bed. (I've hit the P-trifecta: I've been baptised in pee, poop, and puke!) Dan changes the sheets while I clean her up and change both our clothes. Luckily she's in a fine mood, smiling at herself in the bathroom mirror and everything. Back to bed around 5:15, and at 5:30--same thing! Choke, gag, sit her up, woosh. This time I turned her towards me so the bed didn't get hit (we only have two sets of sheets!). In the end, she threw up 4 times and had diarrhea until Monday or so. She still doesn't have much of an appetite--she eats hardly any solid food at all, although she's nursing back on schedule now, so that's good. Poor kid.

She is so close to crawling you almost get the sense she knows what to do but is just choosing not to do it. However, I wouldn't be surprised if she skipped crawling altogether--twice yesterday she pulled herself up to standing without any help (other than letting her hold our hands). She manages to shimmy around on the floor, but you don't really notice it; you just realize at some point that she's 5 feet from where you set her down.

My favorite new development, however, is that she likes books! She gets herself scooted over to a book and then fussses until you pick it up and read it to her. And if you set her in your lap to read she actually sits there. So far she only goes for board books; if I try books with real pages she just wants to pull at them and chew the covers. (Oddly, she does not chew the board books.) And since we only have three board books...well, lets just say that I can "read" all three books to her while simultaneously watching TV. Her favorite is "Belly Button Book!" by Sandra Boynton. (Luckily it's my favorite, too.) So I guess we'll be on the hunt for more books soon.

She still loves going to My Gym with her 9-month-old friend, Brendan. The one thing there she does not like is the bubbles. Yes, my child is a bubble-phobic. Not sure why. When we went to visit Dan's parents this weekend (during which Dan got what Abby had, but about 10 times worse), Dan's mom ("Greena" is what our nephew Simon calls her) got out the bubbles that Simon loves so much. She blew about three or four and Abby went ballistic. What the heck?!

We took her to the park for the first time last night. It was about 7 PM and she was bored out of her mind, and I felt bad for her being stuck here all day, so into the car we went to go somewhere and swing since she loves swings so much. Well, it took us three stops before we actually found a park with swings--what's up with that?!--but it was teeming with kids, so two more stops later we finally found a park with swings and hardly any kids. (Sad: Dan was pushing Abby and I hopped onto one of the "big kid" swings, thinking, "I used to love swinging!" Well, turns out my stomach can't handle it anymore and I nearly hurled. I was so bummed.) Abby really enjoyed it--swings, slides, see-saws, and it's a cute little park, too, lots of grass and hills and a little ampetheater and roller hockey rink. It's right across the street from the library, which I have a feeling we'll be visiting quite a lot for the next few years. That makes me happy. I wish we lived a little closer so Abby could go there alone when she got older. I remember trekking to the library all the time as a kid, and it was quite the distance, too, but not with the kinds of big roads that we have here. And it's sad--I get the sense people just don't let their kids do that kind of take-off-for-hours-on-end-just-be-home-in-time-for-dinner stuff anymore. So unfortunate.