Madeleine - Week 46

It's been another rough week in our house as I'm dealing with some surgery complications (allergic reaction and/or skin infection...think lots of itching) and Madeleine is teething up a storm. There are two pronounced bumps in her lower jaw that are showing a bit of white. This, along with lots of unexplained crying, exciting diapers (too much information?), and a baby with her hand constantly in her mouth, tells me that Miss M is not going to be a toothless wonder for too much longer.

Madeleine continues to be a rock star eater. We really only feed her "baby" food when we're having something she absolutely can't have; otherwise, she eats what we eat. She loves roasted red peppers and devoured her spaghetti and lamb bolognese sauce last night. Over the weekend, George introduced her to Vegemite (she liked it), and yesterday I gave her her first bit of chocolate, Whittaker's dark chocolate (she liked it). Any frustration in the messes she leaves behind is far outweighed by the happiness I derive from seeing her enjoy food. And she does enjoy it!

Miss M takes after her father as a climber. Over the weekend, she twice got herself onto the couch by putting her table up to it, climbing onto the table, and then climbing onto the couch. She is standing unassisted for longer and longer, up to about 20 seconds, but she always ends up seated as soon as she realizes what's going on. It's interesting to see how she is fearless in some ways and utterly cautious in others. Madeleine doesn't stay where she doesn't want to be for long because she is a speed crawler and avid puller upper.

Evidently, the language center in her brain is working at top speed because she has returned to signing within the last week or so. I much prefer a sign of "all done" to banging on the highchair tray, so this is very welcome! Madeleine will sometimes imitate things we say, like repeating two syllables of gibberish after "hello" or three after "banana." Again, really neat to see develop!

Enough talk...or did you skip to here? No judgment passed.

Here is this week's photo, showing a girl on the move and chewing on her hands:

I was lucky enough to catch George on his way out the door for photo assistance this morning. I thought you might like to see what it's like as I have the camera ready and George tries to keep Madeleine in one place for more than a second.

Even though I've been slacking in the blogging department, I promise that I've been crafting up a storm, averaging a project a day this week with two more slated for tomorrow. More posts are coming, so check back later this week.