Curie turns one. To be honest, I am not sure how to write this one. Erin started crying on Curie’s birthday and said that Curie wasn’t a baby any more. It begs the question whether second children born two years apart are a direct result of the realization that your baby is not a baby anymore.
This has been a busy month. We still don’t know how much she weighs or what percentile she is. When we go to the doctor, I will make an amendment, but a lot has happened. If you remember, a day before she turned six months, Curie started crawling. On Friday three days before her birthday, Curie started walking. Three steps, but she did it without aid and without thinking. Erin had tears in her eyes. We have a picture of it on our website. Curie actually started standing at the beginning of the month, walking is just the progression. She now does it every day, a little here, a little there, and every time she does, we clap and cheer.
Even before walking, Curie had started to do so many things. She got her two front teeth and has a cute gap between the two. She won’t eat baby food and won’t let us feed her often. She wants to hold it and bite it, even if she only has two teeth. She is very vocal about her opinions and loves the song “Itsy Bitsy Spider” If she hears the song she will do the hand motions. It has become her favorite song over “That’s Amore.” To be honest, she will do the hand motions to almost any song. If there is music she will sway and wiggle and recently she reaches for Albert’s thumb on his other hand when he is holding her to get into the ballroom pose if she wants to dance.
In addition to walking, Curie started talking as well. Her first words are “all done,” and “I did that,” which are technically sentences, but for her they are words. She can imitate other words now and can say “remote,” “hi,” and “water” if you say them to her, but she does not say them herself yet. She likes to pretend to read and says “ladiladiladida” with her tongue. She also has taken to pretending to write; anything that she can hold is a “pen” or “pencil” and anything flat is “paper” and that writes on. It is very interesting to us. As far as other behaviors are concerned, she learned to put things away, and is very proud to put toys into their place (this is an extension of the caps and lids). She gives things to you when asked, can stack blocks, and likes to put her forehead against yours when she is cuddly. She likes the xylophone and the piano, can recognize that her teacher played a flute the day before, and puts play dough into small piles at school. One of the cutest things though is the stuffed animal game she plays where she gives you her animal for you to hug. If you hug it, she will smile a huge grin, and reach for it back to hug herself, then she gives it back to you to hug.
This month Curie also learned to pick her nose, which made us very proud. She started to act coy, and has learned to turn away when the camera is pointed at her when she wants. She also likes to see her picture on the back of the camera after you take one. For firsts, she had her first Indian food, went to her first fair, and had her first non-sugar soft drink. At her birthday, she had her first cake an ice cream. For some reason she now has a lot of hats. Both sets of grandparents came to visit as well as Erin’s cousins and aunt. Erin’s sister and her boyfriend moved down to Alexandria. Curie really bonded with everyone, family is important.
Now a thought for you, the reader. Albert is in a conundrum; for the past year he has been taking a picture a day for the first year for the “365” project. It is actually “366” because of leap year, and “367” if you include her birthday. The year is over but it is hard to stop since it is so amazing to look back and see each day’s picture. And then, do we continue these updates? If you are interested in the “365” project, they are posted on our website in our photo blog. Curie’s birth story will go up as well. So what do you think? Do we continue the pictures? Do we just take the relevant ones? Do we do monthly updates? I know we are emotional right now since there is the sense that she is no longer a baby, but she is still a peanut, and we have a lot more time with her. Here is the thing, it goes by very fast and those of you without children (those with children probably already know this), you need to realize that your parents still see you as their baby when the years pass so quickly. That lump Erin and I have in our throats must be the ones our parents have when they see us and even if they don’t mention it often, your parents are proud of you and love you. How do we know? Because we feel that way about Curie every day.
