San Diego

We have mostly gotten ourselves situated here in San Diego. We are well. Sophie [almost 15 months] is over her cold and is still crawling up a storm. She enjoys standing up by herself with no hands but hasn't taken the next step [hehheh, get it?!?] toward walking. She stood and drank her juice last week in the middle of the floor. She has learned to say a few more words, such as baby, mama, dada, yumyum, beep beep, yeah, and her little inquisitive sounds. She understands a lot of what we say, she just can't answer, and I think it's frustrating for her.
She has made a huge leap this week in communicating. She has learned to sign! She can sign for eat, drink, and more, please! We are so proud of her! This morning even, I asked if she wanted more. She went to make the sign for "eat" and stopped midway, then made the sign for more, please. I think she actually knows what it means and isn't just making the sign when she hears us. We're so proud of her!
She attended a new Kindermusik class Tuesday with about 10 other infants and toddlers, all under 18 months. They and the parents are wonderful! We sang, danced, played with balls and scarves, played with egg shakers, read a book, and smelled rosemary. This kind of learning and social interaction is really wonderful for her. There are a few other kids that are walking, so hopefully she can see them and try to mimic them, like she does with us. She is a little tape recorder! The other day, we were outside and there was a truck beeping. I made the sound just to be funny and she did it back to me! She is such a sweetheart! She makes me laugh all day. She adores anything to do with music. She was really whiny a few weeks ago and I got out my flute and she was instantly "cured" of whatever was bothering her. In fact, her bottom lip made an appearance when I put it away.














She has a table with all these tabs and buttons that make music whenever she manipulates them that she plays with constantly. A big thanks goes out to my cousin Stacy who let us borrow it. She does this really cute little wiggle when the music comes on. Here's a clip from Irvine. Not the best camera work, and I didn't edit, but you get the idea.

She is also very curious about what we eat, so even if we just fed her, she wants to try everything we have. We let her, of course, but it's funny. She's honestly like a begging puppy with her eight teeth. Oh, she barks too! Last month, we were watching the Discovery Channel and there was a foal. She saw it, pointed and started barking. I know it doesn't seem like much, but she's making connections. Like, hey, that animal has four legs and looks like a doggy. She's categorizing things already! I know I'm a bit biased, but I think this girl is really, really bright.