11 months

One month away from Tessie’s first birthday. Can you believe how fast it has gone?
Tessie is doing great. She amazes us with her walking/running skills and she gets more secure each day. It’s unusual to see her crawling these days. She has been able to climb up stairs for a while, but she has finally figured out how to climb down. She points at things to let us know what interests her and imitates simple gestures and sounds. She even puts her hands on her head when something falls and says “Oooo Oooo”. No clear words yet, but she does say “mama” a lot…not just for me. For food, or whenever she feels like it. She is eating more fresh foods like grapes, cheese, cucumbers, avocados, and mango- mostly mashable slippery foods. She loves spaghetti (and rocks too but no-fun-mommy doesn’t let her eat them).
We have started searching for daycare so mommy can go back to teaching in the fall. I can’t say the experience has been a nightmare, but it does make me wonder how single parent families can ever do it. Wherever we visit Tessie seems to make herself at home, so I don’t think she’ll have any trouble with the change.
The other big news is Tessie is finally getting a tooth (two actually) on the bottom. I can see where it is sprouting through. She has only been feverish one day, but luckily I was able to distract her with lots of outside time last week while the weather was warmer.

Happy Easter!

10 months

Wow. Tessie is walking everywhere. She is all over the place. She is walking so well that when she is headed for something she shouldn’t be (e.i. Toilet, cabinets, wires, stairs) she able to walk at a pretty good clip almost running while looking over her shoulder to see who is giving chase. We have trouble on our hands.
Tessie is saying lots of words. We still don’t know what they are, but she seems to be sure of what she is trying to say. She is pointing to let us know what interests her. She waves and blows kisses. She kisses/slimes our faces.
We have been starting to give her table food, but we are very limited because she hasn’t grown any teeth yet. So far we haven’t really found many foods that she doesn’t like. But she loves vegetables and even tofu.
We have done a lot of visiting this month. Tessie and Mom went to Long Island, New York for 4 days. With Dad traveling for work and snowboarding, we have gone on other day trips and visits locally. We also have gotten into a project of creating a playroom for Tessie to contain the clutter. (“Good Luck” you’re thinking. Right?) But we are trying. Swim class has ended but we are still staying in touch with friends from class. We have been getting together with other friends we have made at the library too.

9 months

It’s Groundhog Day! Hopefully Px Phil was right about spring arriving early. As mild as the winter has been, we can’t wait for warmer weather to be here. Despite the weather, we have still been getting out a lot and making new friends wherever we go. Tessie loves swim class and we still go to the library weekly. She is born to be a diva. While the librarian reads the story she crawls to the middle of the circle of babies, stands directly in front of the librarian, claps her hands, and makes little happy noises. She loves to be the center of attention.
Speaking of standing, she is getting very good at it, standing for about 30 seconds and taking some steps! I have seen her take as many as 7 steps. Stephen has seen her walk about 12 steps when I went upstairs for about 10 minutes. Isn’t that always the way? Most of the time it’s about 2-3 steps before she drops to the floor.
We have plans to travel to New York again this month, so maybe my friend Kristen will take some more beautiful pictures…hopefully Tessie will cooperate.