Connections

Muffin is beginning to show a deeper understanding of the world. There’s something new almost every day, whether it’s a sound, a facial expression or sign that she understands much of what I’m saying or the way things work. I guess I better stop talking about selling her on eBay.

She’s beginning to recognize objects by qualities and transfer those qualities to other things to define them. She tries to comb her hair with the bottle brush. At the grocery store, anything round is “ball.” Squash and lemons are “nana,” since they are yellow like a banana. Anything vaguely electronic – remote, camera, can opener – she holds up to her ear like a phone.

One of our daily activities is to inventory her body parts. She shows me where her hair, nose, ears, mouth, toes, belly and knees are. Today she about knocked me out when I asked her to show me her eyes, and she batted her eyelashes furiously, like a silent movie starlet.

She’s known “no” for some time, although it’s still hit-or-miss if she’ll listen to it. But now she’s learned that she can say no by nodding her head, and that I understand and will usually respect her feelings. It’s actually exhilarating, having her convey her lack of desire by doing something other than fussing. The only problem is that she doesn't know "yes" yet, so she'll nod no when what she really means is yes. Sometimes no means no, sometimes no means yes, and sometimes Mommy's head hurts.


Also new: initiating peek-a-boo