Cats and Dogs

Fiona can now answer the questions: "what does a doggie say?" and "what does a kitty cat say?"

We are finding, however, that to a 15-month old, every animal looks like either a dog or a cat. The lion on her bed sheet says "woof". The hamster on the TV says "meow". And so forth.

She can also point to her ears, nose and teeth and we're working on the eyes and feet.

Neologism

Mamine (mä·mi^-n) pron.

Used to indicate that which Mommy is holding but Fiona believes belongs to her. Combines roots of "mama" and "mine". Examples include: any book or magazine that Mommy is reading; Mommy's coffee cup; Mommy's food; a piece of dust that Mommy has picked off the floor intending to put in the garbage.

Niiiice

Fiona has a new favorite word (besides "no"): "Nice"

Andrea began using the word as a mantra while trying to teach Fiona how to pet Buddy--that is, she ought to be "nice" and stroke him gently. Fiona picked up on the word and started uttering it every time she tried to pet Buddy (which usually lasts for about 3 seconds, until Buddy runs away or Fiona gets excited, forgets to be nice, and starts trying to grab).

After that, she started using it when she pet her stuffed animals.

And then when she started stroking a piece of furniture.

And when Aunt Kathy came over to babysit and Fiona started touching her shirt.

On the way home from the grocery store on Saturday I handed Fiona a toy bear to hold on the car ride home. Before I made my first turn I heard her say: "Nice."

And on Saturday night we woke Fiona up to give her some Tylenol (see Molars post below), and when we put her back in her crib we listened to her babble to herself in incomprehensible baby-ese for a while and, then, clear as day, she started repeating: "niiiice!"

Molars

She's not all sunshine all the time. We're in the middle of Molar Eruption #2 these days, and nobody's having any fun--least of all Fiona. She was up and down all night on Saturday, slept well Sunday night (from exhaustion, no doubt), and then was up and down a bunch last night finally getting up for good at about 5:45 am. She's pulling on her ears a bunch and trying to bite everything she can (the crib rail, daddy's shoulder, mommy's face...) And since getting a tooth lowers her immunity, the stuffy nose that she finally beat has come back with a vengeance.

Our day care provider is very patient and understanding, which is good because it's hard not to feel a little guilty about leaving a teething baby for the day. Unfortunately, neither of us have a great deal of schedule flexibility at the moment, so unless she's clearly ill we have to leave her with Rita. This morning Fiona fell asleep in her stroller on the way from our house to Rita's, which has never happened before.

On the other hand, she's not all misery. She still bounces up and down to Old McDonald and sings along with E-I-E-I-O, and while she's a bit clingier, she's still happy to charge off to climb whatever furniture is nearby. Here's hoping that molar comes soon and everybody (Fiona especially) starts feeling a little more relaxed.

Daredevil

She isn't even walking comfortably yet, but Fiona's moved right on to climbing. She can now climb up onto most of our couches and cushioned chairs.

Unfortunately, skill has arrived before judgment, and we're busy trying to figure out how to reconfigure some of the furniture in her bedroom, because Fiona figures if she's climbed onto a chair, it's only natural to climb from there onto a table, or laundry basket, or wherever else. We understand that she's going to take a few tumbles no matter what--the only way she'll learn a little caution is to take a fall--but we want the risk of actual injury to be as minimal as possible, and everybody has an interest in Fiona being able to play in her room without constant parental supervision. So we're trying to space furniture far enough apart that Fiona won't be tempted to climb onto, say, a table that can't support her.

Website

New photos and movies are up at the website. I was hoping to have some footage of the little girl walking, but she gets shy and/or distracted when the camera starts rolling. There's stuff from Christmas and the first birthday, though, so you should head over there if you haven't already.

http://home.earthlink.net/~fiona-wc

Parrot

Fiona's grandmother tells me children aren't actually parrots. This was in response to my informing her that Fiona often says "oh, shee", and we don't know why; I swear we don't swear around her (at least we try not to), and I don't think we've used the phrase, but it sounds for all the world like she's saying something that would warrant an FCC fine if we put her on network TV.

The cuter phrase she's picked up lately is "Nanook." For months, everytime we bundle her up in her winter coat we take one look at a baby who's lost all flexibility beneath her bulky parka and we exclaim "It's Nanook of New York!" (Naturally, we're also trying to make sure she's well schooled in cinema, specifically on the early history of the American documentary). On Sunday we pulled out the parka and Fiona shouted out "Nanook!"

Unfortunately for us, Fiona's also discovered another new word that starts with "N". It's two letters long and we expect to hear an awful lot of it over the next few months, years and decades. You get one guess what that word is.

Strong Opinions

Well, we're in for it now. Fiona has started grabbing books away at bedtime when she doesn't like mommy or daddy's choice of story, and this morning she vehemently refused to eat rice cereal because she (apparently) wanted bananas with Cheerios. Up until now she's rolled with whatever we pick out to read or feed to her, but in the past week she seems to have realized that she has power of her own.

So it could be a long haul between now and the day when Fiona is able to express affirmatively what she does want (I spent some time a few nights ago trying to figure out what book she wanted and lucked into Goodnight, Gorilla, but last night she wouldn't make a choice so we had the absurd situation of daddy forcing his daughter to sit through Goodnight, Moon).

On the positive side of self-expression, Fiona continues to let go and try taking more steps on her own, even without a clear destination in mind.

Fresh Data

From yesterday's pediatric checkup:

Height: 29¾"
Weight: 23 lbs.

Dr. Bloom was impressed with her weight gain, which was the first time he's made any comment like that. On the other hand, her last weight (21 lbs., two weeks ago) was taken when she was being checked for the stomach bug and had already, um, expelled a bit of weight.

The Next Big Step

Fiona's back to her walking strength from before the bug--and then some. On Wednesdays, Andrea is in class and doesn't get home until about 7:15 or so, so I had Fiona to myself last night. When Andrea got home Fiona heard her voice and got so excited that she let go of me on her own and started walking across the room to greet her mommy. She only made it about halfway before she fell to her knees, but it was a big step (literally): it was the first time Fiona has let go of one of us to walk without having the prodding of somebody at the other end holding out hands and encouraging her to put one foot in front of the other.

And to those people who say things like "her independence must be a mixed blessing," I'll just say what I always do: I'd really rather not have to write a note to the gym teacher in 2012 asking him to excuse Fiona from gym because she never learned to walk unassisted.

Steve Burns = Thespian Genius

While caring for Fiona during her stomach bug, there wasn't much we could do except hold her and watch TV (Fiona being in no mood to play or read books). She's old enough now to pay attention to what's on TV, which means Mom & Dad can't watch an R-rated flick or old South Park episodes while looking after her the way we could when she was only a week or two old. So we wound up watching a LOT of Nick, jr. and Noggin, the preschool channel.

Noggin's about as good as you can do for preschoolers; there are no commercials (not even between shows), the programs all teach useful stuff like empathy and imagination (as much as vegging in front of the tube can really encourage imagination) without any of those irritating subliminal cries for consumerism that you find on commercial television ("any twentysomething should have a stainless steel kitchen with butcher block island in his/her apartment").

We've scaled way back on the TV since she got healthy (no need to encourage her to watch; like any other American including her parents she'll wind up watching more than she probably should over the course of her life anyway). But we did find a few shows that both parents and Fiona could tolerate. Sesame Street, of course. The Backyardigans on Nick, jr. And on Noggin they show reruns of the cancelled show Oswald and episodes of Blue's Clues featuring the original star, Steve Burns.

Being theatrically trained people, Andrea and I naturally found ourselves talking about Steve's acting technique. He manages to be natural in front of the camera in a way you rarely see on kiddie TV (even on Sesame Street); he's able to talk to the kids in the audience without being patronizing, he seems interested in and excited by hunting Blue's titular clues in a way that doesn't seem forced, and his work in front of a blue screen (i.e. everything he's doing up there) is seamless.

All this is true. But it's got to be disturbing sign that parenthood has permanently warped your brain #6273 that Andrea and I wound up spending our entire dinner one night discussing Steve's technique on a preschool show using adjectives that wouldn't have been out of place talking about Brando or Newman or Morgan Freeman.

I guess the real danger will be if we buy a Tivo so we can watch Blue's Clues together at night if we missed it during the day.

New Skills

Actually, some of her newfound skills disappeared during the weeklong sickness (she's not walking as confidently as she was, for example), but here are some of the new things Fiona has learned to do in recent weeks:

• When we read the book "What Do Babies Say?", Fiona can tell you that a hungry baby says "Ba-ba", a busy baby says "Uh-oh" and a tired baby says "Night-night". She was on the verge of announcing that a sad baby says "Boo-hoo" when the lost week hit.
  
  Coolest of all, Fiona was able to answer most of those questions without aid of a book. There she'd be, cruising along, grabbing subscription cards out of magazines, and one of us would ask "Fiona, what does a hungry baby say?" and without looking up she'd reply "Ba-ba".
  
  Interestingly enough, she can still do this with the "Night night" question; unfortunately, she's also started answering "night night" to most of the other questions. Obviously what we have on our hands is a baby who understands sounds without meaning, unless she really thinks that a hungry or cuddly baby really wants to go night night. Her own behavior belies that possibility.
  
  
• When reading the book "Toes, Ears and Nose", Fiona started grabbing her ear when we asked her where her ear was. This trick disappeared entirely during the sickness, but she is starting to identify body parts.
  
  
• When asked what a cat says, Fiona replies "meow". She'll also meow when she sees Buddy. And sometimes when she sees a picture of a dog or duck or butterfly or for no reason whatsoever. But there does seem to be a primary association with our feline friends.
  
  
• When the phone rings or we make a call, Fiona puts her hand to her ear. She also says something that sounds a bit like "hello" when she talks into her toy cell phone (which she holds up to her ear with no regard for where the mouthpiece might be).
  
  
• Fiona has started trying to sing. This is post-illness, so it's a skill (or at least an interest) that's really coming in. On Thursday, Andrea sang Old McDonald to her and Fiona enjoyed piping in with "E-I-E-I-O". She varies the tones, so she's beginning to recognize some of the differences between song and speech.
  
  And, because we're ironic Gen-X parents, we've made a habit of singing those famous few C&C Music Factory bars featuring the phrase "Everybody Dance Now" when we reach the page about it being party time for the little bears in Fiona's book "Teddy Bear". Fiona likes to bounce along and try to join us in singing. Yep, her first song is going to be "Gonna Make You Sweat"; we couldn't be more proud.

Scary Week

We're glad to see February gone. The month started with Fiona getting a cold that she couldn't shake; by the time we finally took her to the doctor she had fluid in her ears and we had to put her on decongestants. We had a week of healthy Fiona (during which time I wound up getting sick, naturally), and then the next bug hit.

Fiona stopped holding food down on Friday evening. On Saturday we took her to the doctor and were told to put her on lots of fluids until she could hold food down. Fiona did great on Pedialyte on Saturday, but starting Sunday she decided she'd had enough of fluids and stopped drinking much of anything. In our ignorance, we thought maybe her body was telling her not to drink right then, but when she wouldn't take any fluids on Monday we found ourselves with a dehydrated baby.

In order to get her back to health, we had to basically hold Fiona down on Monday while forcing a couple of teaspoons at a time down her throat with a dropper. All the while we were monitoring the coming snowstorm in the NY area, because we knew that if she didn't respond to the fluids we were going to have to take her to the pediatric ER.

Thankfully, the fluids did their trick. It took another couple of days for Fiona to build her strength back up (not eating for three days will sap an infant's energy), but this morning (for the first time since last Friday) she greeted me in her crib by standing up, and when I picked her up to take her to her room to get dressed she screamed bloody murder because I was taking her away from her toys. It's good to have the real Fiona back.