Finley Mae - The 13th Month

Here is our 13 month old. She's busy, funny, feisty and curious.

She has been running all around and has now mastered the stairs both up and down (yikes!) and has a great grasp of words. This week she began speaking a whole bunch of "B" words which include: book, bird, ball, bath and her all time favorite "bye-bye!" She also says: Hi there, mommy, daddy, ceesus (for Cecil) , meow, woof - woof, horse, up, down, oh there are MORE I'm sure....like "weeeee" is her word for a swing! She also has sound FX for other things. She sees the car key, the car, the vacuum and the coffee grinder and says bruuuum.

She is signing like a mad woman too which is so awesome. She really works hard to tell us things and ask for things using her signs. Of course her two favorite signs are 1) Cookie and 2) MORE closely followed by signing cookie again. Her signs include: potty, dog, cat, bird, fish, play, more, cookie, food, drink, all done, night- night, brush teeth, bath, sit, shoes, socks, and we are working on please and banana. Although I'm finding the please and thank you hard to translate as you cannot assign an object to it like most of the other words so I'll keep using them and she'll catch on. It's amazing to watch her figure language out. I say the words and sign as I speak and sometime 3 weeks later she just uses the sign in proper context and it then becomes habit. I'm just waiting for her to drop the f-bomb.

She is also insane over music. She asks for us to put the radio on and she dances better than I do. I am SO going to be teaching her the ROBOT very very soon!

As for me - I'm absolutely loving her at this age. What age have I not said that at? But seriously, I have a little playmate now. She entertains me and herself. She is helpful and likes to sort laundry and unload the dishwasher and throw things in the garbage can. I have to check the garbage cans around the house. Lately they are filled with her cups, plates, cars and my hair brush and a pair of my false eyelashes in their plastic case. Yeah - nice! Note to self: push things deep onto the counter top as she is reaching and stealing anything within her grasp!

Finley has been sleeping through the night ever since we weaned her. WHICH ROCKS! It gives me an evening to do stuff I can't do during the day, like prep meals (ha-ha Steve is on nights - I make salads), vacuum, read a book, sit with my feet up! When she's awake I am full on watching her. She is really into hiding and climbing. (I'll save that for another post) So I have to have an eyeball on her at all times.

She loves to read books and we have read Clifford's Big Red Easter and Carl the Dog EVERY NIGHT for the last two months (I wish I was kidding). She is dog obsessed. I take her to see the dogs the Humane Society bring to Pet Smart on Adoption day and you would think I gave a random stranger a million dollars - she gets SO excited. Sometimes we stop into watch the dogs being groomed. She loves it! After our visit there today she began telling her dad all about it when she saw him. Her little arms were waving and she was talking jibberish intertwined with the car sound and the dogs sounds. SO cute!

Sometimes I just watch her play independently, she gives her doll a kiss or tells a whole story to her self. In the following photo she is playing with a great big Gerbera Daisy. She's looking back at the dog who is always near by.

Also, she had just gotten into the FOLDED laundry basket and skattered my clean under wear all over the dining room. I had to carefully crop them out of this photo. Cuz, NO-ONE needs to see my gitch.

Laundry Meets Yoga = Zen

With a string of days in the high 80's I figured it was a perfect time to take the yoga mats from my home studio to the laundry mat so I could wash them up and then hang them out to dry. My students have been working hard on those mats and my dog has also been giving them a work out. He seems to think my mat is for eating his crunchy food over. Like it's perhaps a giant place mat. Then last week just as class was beginning he arrived to class to let me know what he thought of me by taking a dump on my yoga mat. Yeah, real nice. What a total jerk move. So NOT ZEN Cecil!

The truth is you CAN wash your yoga mat. They do get stinky and dusty and whatever else. You have to do them in a washer that does not have a ringer. I have washed one at a time in a ringer washer along with a cotton bath towel but they can get stuck and friction burned. Trust me, this I know from experience. A little soap and a warm cycle then hang the mat to dry. It comes out brand new!

Finley and I loaded the car with all the mats and headed to the local 24 hour laundry mat on Friday morning. It was quiet at the early hour of the day. We shared the space with only two other women who were having a rather animated discussion about the way to raise children and keep them in line. It could have been a conversation on corporal punishment the differences were so slim. I did make note of some of their advice. Get an education, treat people fairly, mind your business and don't be buying no 80 thousand dollar cars and other fancy stuff. It's just stuff.

I split my twenty plus mats into two oversize washers, put my bills into the machine to make change and then Finley and I set the washing . She stood in front of the washers completely mesmerized by the water filling the washer. She pointed and babbled to herself and me as the wash began spinning. Who knew such an ordinary thing as washing would be such a great entertainment for a 13 month old! I just love how ordinary things like doing the laundry becomes an adventure when I see it through Fin's eyes.

Fins watching the washers fill up with water.

Passing time ...

It was a 23 minute wash. We had time for a snack.

Here she is fixated on the spin cycle. All the colours blending to black.

When we arrived home Hubs strung a rope between the trees and I hung the mats to dry.

It looks kinda festive, eh?