Next Thing You Know She'll Be Driving

We bought Drea a walker that looks like a pink and white Mustang GT. It has a steering wheel that has lights and plays music. She loves the steering wheel, but she hasn't figured out that she can walk in the walker yet, so she isn't too excited about it at this point.

She's growing so quickly it makes my head spin. Instead of short spurts in the living room, she's now crawling all over the house. She's also gotten really good at pulling up on furniture, and has even started "cruising" - hanging on to things and taking side steps. She likes to pull on my fingers and stand up, and has started trying to take steps with us holding her hands. The evening of Brian's birthday party (July 11) she let go and stood up all alone for a couple of seconds. She's in a hurry to be on the move. I can hardly get a picture of her these days that isn't blurry. She's not a fan of sitting still.

Drea and I have been to a couple of local babywearing meetings with Brian's cousin Katie this month (we're going to miss seeing her and the boys now that they've gone back to Germany), and I'm planning to go back to one of the groups in the future. I haven't decided whether to go to the Clemson or Greenville meeting next month. I think Brian might want to go to the Greenville meeting - there was actually a babywearing father there.

Katie made Brian a mei tai wrap conversion to make it easier to carry Drea on his back. We also bought an Ergo and got a short homemade wrap and sling rings from Katie. So three new options for babywearing in addition to the two wraps we already had. But I still want more.....

Drea has been eating a lot more solid food now that she's gotten much better at feeding herself with her fingers. She refuses to be fed purees from a spoon. She wants things she can pick up and feed herself. She's been eating mashed up bananas, watermelon, cauliflower (steamed), apples (steamed), grapes (sliced into tiny pieces), sweet potatoes, and squash (steamed). For snacks she loves the Gerber graduates snacks for crawlers. Just in the last few days I've noticed that she seems to understand what the sign for "milk" means when I'm getting her bottle. She gets excited when I do the sign and looks at the fridge (we get the bottle from the fridge a lot). I can't wait for her to start doing signs herself, but that's a way off I think. It's possible that she also understands the sign for eat now, but I'm not sure about that one yet.

She's been saying Ma-Ma occasionally when she wants me to get her. Tonight she spent some time at Mama's house while Brian and I went out for our anniversary. Mama attempted to hand her over to Daniel, and she leaned back to Mama and said "Nana!". It's amazing to see the things she seems to learn over night.

She's got three teeth coming in now, and she's been a little clingy and fussy this last week or so. She wants to get down and play, but she keeps coming back to be held every few seconds. She wants two things at once, which is sometimes frustrating for both of us.

In the last two weeks she's started throwing her arms up in the air when she wants me to pick her up. I always pick her up when she does it too - even if I was planning to walk away for something. I can't turn down that sweet little face when she looks me in the eye with a hopeful expression and throws her little hands up. I don't care if people think I'm spoiling her; there will come a day when she no longer wants to be picked up, and I'm pretty sure I won't regret one single time I've done it when that day arrives.

It's all going by so fast. I keep thinking if I blink too slow my baby is going to be replaced by a teenager begging for car keys and heading off to college!