Life is Not Bubble Wrapped » games we play

Games we play #251

Jill — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 02:20:30 +0000

Okay, so this week we have started playing along with ‘patty cake’. Finally. Today she ‘patted’ and ‘rolled’ and I swear to God she said ‘roll it’, but I couldn’t get her to repeat it.

Tomorrow? Her, me and the itsy bitsy spider. It’s on!

Peek a boo has been her mainstay. She finally figured out to cover ‘her’ face and has taken to walking around hiding her face in a blanket. Which leads to falling over a lot.

Today she had 2 near misses and several hits. Fat lip. I wasn’t in the room and Matt was too scared to move (feet up in the recliner) in case he would thump her. It was only sheer luck that she didn’t go face first into the edge of the filing cabinet when I was urging her to go play with her toys and she pulled away, going flying. She also went running (ANOTHER new thing this week!) and went face first about 3 inches from the tv screen. That would have hurt like a… well, you know.

Naked running around the house instead of getting in the bath is fun (socks optional) as well as running away instead of getting a new diaper.

Last week’s games were ’shutting our fingers in the french doors’ and ‘trying to eat dirty snow’…

Oh, the games we play.

11 months old

Jill — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 13:25:32 +0000

We’re practicing for potty training already. Ha! This is a 10 month picture, but as I wanted to post and our 11 month pictures won’t be taken until this PM, this is the one you get! After several weeks of struggling with keeping Keeley on the changing table, I moved her over to the guest bed for diaper changes. Almost immediately the issues went away. Once we supplied a book, toy, or asked her to help by pulling out a wipe (yucky, don’t eat it!), it helped a lot. We had tried giving her toys on the changing table, but I guess she was trying to say she’d outgrown it! Occasionally she still turns around on me, but for the most part, at least she’s on something soft, and here we go with a fine example of what the beginning of a diaper change might look like. Although by the end, she’s usually dropped the book, after having chewed on it. The changing table now holds diapers, toys, and we may move books over soon as well. At least a few of them. For the next couple of weeks I won’t be doing much bending, so she’ll have some limitations on toy and book usage while it’s just the 2 of us at home, otherwise it will be a hazard.

11 months, though, kind of hard to believe. However, she’s crawling, pulling up, standing and letting go for a couple of seconds, able to get back down to what she pulled up to (new this week!) and also babbling a lot more (new this week!). She’s showing a lot more interest in books (one hand me down needs a cover glued already, although since they’ve been through a minimum of 4 kids, I’m not surprised), and notices things like the air conditioner kicking off, and squeals at the blue light over on the wall (temperature panel). She’s observing more, eating more, and all in all, just growing up. Matt seems to not be taking it as well as me, I guess with the surgery I kind of have to take it all in stride. I can’t be worried about things like that! I have to enjoy every minute and little new thing she does! I fully have, too, then again I’m home all day. I keep most of the ‘new’ stuff to myself and let her daddy see them unaided on his own. He’s pointed out stuff to me a few times as well that I didn’t notice (like getting down from pulling up), so it’s pretty interesting.

Well enough rambling, let you get back to juicier things!

Baby, baby

Jill — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 02:37:55 +0000

Keeley loves any song with baby in it. Baby, baby is fine. You can sing baby baby over and over again and she loves it. Today I opened her door and sang ’stand by your maaaaan’…. that was a kick. I think she was mostly glad to see me, because she was hungry, but still, hilarious! I think her sense of humor is finally starting to kick in. I put her (clean) diaper on my head and that made her laugh. I played the ’sailor went to sea sea sea’ game with her and that was a great giggle. Patty cake even almost got a snort, and she hasn’t liked patty cake for a few months. Go figure. Anyway, I guess that’s her prerogative. Here’s the 2 of us getting a good laugh at daddy.

Life with a 10 month old

Jill — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 23:54:17 +0000

Crawl everywhere, particularly everywhere mommy doesn’t want you.
If she sees you, giggle like crazy and hurry up.
Stop, to be sure she will catch you.
Whine a little to protest being caught and then happily wiggle legs.
Scream randomly during diaper changes.
Try to touch the doodie.
Pat at yourself to see what’s down there.
Scream if mommy doesn’t want you to touch the doodie.
Pull out a wipe for mommy.
Try to eat the wipe. Pull it in 2 so you can try and eat the other part when mommy is busy with the other piece of it.
Cry if mommy takes it away.
Ignore all your toys.
Play with everything potentially dangerous you can find.
Bounce in your jumperoo. Scream while bouncing in your jumperoo.
Accidentally bite with your 3 teeth.
Chew on water bottles instead of real cold teethers.
Check out what’s on your shirt, on daddy’s shirt, and pull mommy’s neckline down.
Giggle and go after any toes you can see.
Cry when no one will ‘help you’ pull up, even though you are capable.
Bang on high chair to indicate that you would like another snack, please.
Nap and nurse every 2 hours and then conk out for the night around 8.
Bliss!

Things Keeley likes…

Jill — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 01:44:45 +0000

The bright red and blue flashing lights on daddy’s computer (drag away from computer and redirect with a toy).
The cord under the table (and now BEHIND the fan AND the playpen) that the fan, lamp, cell phone chargers and night light are plugged into (drag away from cord and explain how cords are dangerous, for the 600th time and redirect with a toy).
The bottom drawers in mommy’s desk (close drawer and prop foot against).
The bathroom (obvious, close door, drag back to LR and redirect with toy).
Anything non-edible that ’seems’ edible on the floor (that’s icky, and it’s NOT food, don’t eat that, throw item away and vow to vacuum, fail to do so for another week, minimum, redirect with toy).
The tv, even if it’s not on, she can see her reflection (DA,RWT).
Mommy’s hair (see #5).
Water bottles, especially empty ones (oh hell, make sure the lid is on tight and let her have it).
The remote control (denied, repeatedly, RWT).
Mommy or daddy talking on the cell phone (hide in other room).
The laptop, especially if mommy is trying to get some peace and quiet once daddy is home, she MUST! MUST! see what mommy is doing (redirect for the 15th time and scowl at husband).
Her hairbrush (chomp away )
The bottle of lotion (wave away, retrieve when dropped.)

Notice that basically none of these things she likes include toys. She does kind of like some of her toys, but I actually spend 99% of the time she is not sleeping dragging her away from #s 1-5. Sometimes, I admit I give up and turn on the tv. Usually, it’s game show network, so it doesn’t make her stare at it, but she is entranced for seconds by a flashing light or clapping audience, and then sits and plays with her own toys for a while. If it’s particularly interesting to her, I turn it off or turn on the music channel, which goes to a simple bouncy directv logo after about 5 minutes. Then, she tries to eat THAT. Good lord. Yesterday, I had Matthew bring in the playpen. I put her in it this morning for a good 20 minutes to play. She didn’t even realize I had come back into the room from washing my hands and getting a drink, thereby allowing me to read a good 15 pages of a book, and actually rest my weary body, before chasing her again. By bring in the playpen, I mean I have never used it before. Her smaller ‘captures’ I hardly used before anyway, unless she was super fussy (swing, anyone?) and for the last 3 months, she has been at least partially mobile and I have chased after her every 2 minutes that she was not sleeping or trapped in her high chair eating. I should have lost 20 pounds with all the moving around I’m doing. Apparently, my scale doesn’t agree.

The mysterious crawling baby

Jill — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 00:29:26 +0000

Why mysterious? You put her in shorts, tshirt, onesie, or pants, or any combination, and she will flop like she’s doing ‘the worm’. Put her in long sleeved/footed pjs and she can use all her limbs and trounce across the floor. What the heck?

What she’s doing now…

Jill — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 10:50:06 +0000

Peek a boo is not necessarily a ‘cover your face with something’ game around our house. We also play peek a boo (the only way she will start it herself), by holding something you can see through, like a teething ring, up to her eyes and then looking at you and grinning. Are we messing her up, or what? She still hasn’t put anything over her face and then laughed about it or anything. Now, if we put say her shorts over her face while we are changing her diaper, she WILL pull them off, laugh hysterically, but that’s it. No repeat unless we put them back over said face. Sigh. She originally started playing peek a boo by looking back and forth around the car seat handle when I would lean up or back to change the radio station. Now she grins when she does it, like it’s a big ‘ol game.

Most of the time we can get her to wave at someone now, if we prompt her and get her arm up and going a bit. We swear she said hi or something like it as well the other day.

New sounds are OH and WHOA! Although I doubt she understands the significance of either one.

Several months ago she started helping by lifting her head up to put her onesies over them. Now she helps with her arms as well, and the last few days, after some big praises for ‘me’ lifting her hips, she will hike her heinie up to slide the new diaper underneath her. Seems like she responds to praise, which is good. She also seemed to react in a “negatory” fashion to me shaking my head and giving her the mommy look, which I also hope is very good. Can you hear me knocking wood over here?

9 month check up is the 23rd. Crossing fingers it goes well!

Why do they do that?

Jill — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 16:35:21 +0000

Why do ‘they’ make books that crinkle and wrinkle up like a plastic bag, so kids LOVE the sound? Then all the sudden they reach for a plastic bag because it crinkles, and we all scream NOOO!! You can’t have that. Can you imagine what the heck they must think of us at that point?

We have feet! And other games we play #201, etc

Jill — Sat, 04 Apr 2009 02:27:58 +0000

Keeley knew she had feet before, she watched them wiggle with striped socks on when she was 2 months old. Between 3 and 4 months old, she began using them to help bump the activity center on her bouncy seat and kick the toy we put at her posterior end.

Now? She pries on the activity center over her bouncy seat until it pops off, props her feet up against the tray on the seat on the swing (sorry Stacy, I knock her feet down every time I catch her at it), and pushes against her crib to help her roll over. Today? She realized she could put her legs up in the air and look at her feet. Made for an interesting ‘no clothes, waiting to get in the tub’ time tonight. Airing her hiney out.

She also learned to splash her feet in the tub. Although she was so surprised at the outcome that she didn’t do it again, although she did flail her arm in the tub once. She also seemed to suck on the vitamin dropper the second time I put it in her mouth. Apparently she believes the ‘num num’ noises we make at the hated grapey smelling stuff.

One more thing…she is learning cause and effect, very slowly. She has learned to drop things out of her chair. She also played in her jumpy thingy, and has learned to roll the small roller to make it make animal noises. She doesn’t seem to be doing it very purposely yet, but it’s getting there.

Games we play # 761: It’s hard to giggle with your fist in your mouth

Jill — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 05:18:50 +0000

five months old