Walking too

I forgot to mention that she is also walking quite well now. It took a while before she could go more than a few steps at a time. And then she'd do the drunken sailor in a Gene Kelly dance sequence. And then she'd be fine until she noticed something interesting off to the side when she'd start drifting and then topple over. She's still a little bit in that phase. The new thing now is shoes and walking out side. News flash for Mama: "walking outside" does not mean getting anywhere fast. It means crouching down and examining everything on the ground and tasting it too, if possible.

Her imagination is starting to show. She held up a plastic label to the side of her face and said "hello, hello". And today I gave her her bowl and spoon to play with, and she pantomimed eating. She's also been trying to put on clothes and shoes.

Some time ago a friend commented on how much of what her little son saw and touched every day was artificial. I think she mentioned a toy chicken instead of a real chicken. It really got me thinking, looking at all our plastic toys. She sees a lot of pictures in books (sometimes pictures of toys). (Actually she's learned lots of words from books. It amazes me that little ones can be so good at recognizing abstractions) So I've been looking for ways to let her experience "real" things more. Here are some ways I've found.

There is a hiking trail that starts fairly near where we sometimes go shopping. We've started exploring it.


It was great letting her sit on the ground and touch stuff and get dirty.

I've startetd using candles at night. I put them on after dinner while we just relax a bit together and we use them during bathtime and story time. I find it relaxing and think she does too. She learned the words "candle" and "shadow" right away.

Now that it is dark sooner, she gets a chance to see the real moon. Because we had the candles, we noticed a beautiful harvest moon rising over the mountains across the bay the other night.


I try to find natural materials and objects that are baby-safe for her to explore (some of them only under supervision). So far we've looked at feathers, a wooden box, a woven basket, jade and quartz beads, sticks and branches, my microgreens.

Gravel.

One last pic. Reading with Baba.