My friend Tina (yep, Pen-Pal Tina from WAY back!) keeps an awesome, very detailed blog about the happenings of her 20-month-old daughter, Sara. After reading about all of Sara's various activities and recent accomplishments, I felt that I had kind of cheated you, dear Reader, out of really knowing who Nia is right now by merely posting pictures the other day. That, and Aunt Marilyn did say the other day how much she appreciates when I take the time to actually write something about Nia (was that a hint?). So, here is an update to go along with the recent pictures of our dear Nia.
Who is she?
Wow. Where to begin? Well, let's start at the beginning of each day. Each morning begins right next to Nia. She sleeps between Joe and I on her sheepskin, and the morning usually begins around 8a with wiggles and talking and lots of smiles. Sometimes it is just she and & I who are awake, so eventually she wakes up Joe by touching his hair or yelling, "Hi!" at him. While I quickly dash to the bathroom, Nia and Joe play with the contents of my bedside table (my cell phone, the stereo remote, the skylight remote) or her favorite right now: Animal pop-up books (with Joe making all the animal sounds).
Then, Nia and I leave Joe to get a couple more hours of sleep while we start our day. We go find Kalli who gets many "gentle touches" (which are actually getting more and more gentle lately, thankfully).Then I grab some clothes for Nia and a clean diaper and we head upstairs to visit Bama and Baba (Nia can say Baba now, but we haven't heard Bama yet). First stop: Baba's lap and looking at pictures of Zomina and Nia on the laptop. Then she spots Bama in the kitchen and goes to visit her. At some point I catch the busy girl and change her. Then its breakfast: Usually steel cut oats, but sometimes un-cooked regular oats with walnuts and raisens. Or eggs and toast. Or fruit and yogurt. Or, on special days, sweet potatoe pancakes!
Often around 9a we go out for a bit, either for a walk or to the park or to a mama/baby sing-along group called Mother Song.
At 11a, Nia goes to Joe and I start working. On M W F, I try to work till about 3p, and on T Th I work till 1:30 or 2p. Every day, around noon, Nia and Joe go for a walk in search of The Nap. 99% of the time, they find it within 30 minutes and then Joe and I lay Nia down on her sheep skin for an hour-long nap with the white noise machine playing (the "waterfall" setting, which could also be called "static).
A couple months ago, we moved the Queen bed out of "Nia's room" and made a nest of blankets and pads on the ground. We did this to keep Crawling Nia from falling off the bed. Because the bed is low, now each day after her nap, Nia silently crawls (or walks maybe) over to the door, which is open an inch, and opens the door to peer out at who ever is waiting for her to wake. It is so cute!
After the nap comes lunch. Lately Nia is enjoying rice cakes or blue corn chips with hummus, turkey, artichoke, cheese, and sunflower butter or almond butter. She signs "food", "more", and now a new sign which is a combination of both "milk" and "water" when she's thirsty. This is super handy!
Once I'm done with work, it is back to playing outside usually. We often go to the park, the library, go swimming, go walk around downtown, play at a friend's house, play at the beach, etc. Nia loves being outside. She loves kids and she loves dogs ("woof!"). Now that she's walking so much, it is really fun to walk to the park with her. She studies everything along the way and we take frequent detours into driveways and pathways. Rocks & plants get special attention (and sometimes a taste).
After dinner (usually the same type of food as she had for lunch -- the artichoke is the mainstay lately), we often go outside again for yet another trip to the park, or a walk in the Harbor (or a walk to the pizza place for mama to get ice cream -- shhhh!).
At 8p we start the night routine. If Joe is home, he and Nia take a bath together and then Nia and I read books, do a massage, sing songs, and finally nurse to sleep. She is usually asleep by 9:30. Now she goes to sleep on the nest of blankets in her room, and then I carry her to bed with me a couple hours later (so we don't have to worry about Crawling Nia tumbling off the bed). Usually she stays asleep till I carry her to bed, but sometimes she needs a bit more nursing (and she still nurses several times in the night -- thankfully I hardly wake up!).
And that's pretty much Nia these days. She's such a happy little girl. Always smiling, and talking so much these days. When we go walking together now, she babbles the whole way. When she sees something interesting she always says, "Oh!" and points. She is so into her books. She always hands us books and then signs "more." "More" can mean a lot of different things, but it is always obvious what she means by it, whether it is "read this book" or "open this bag of chips" or "see more dogs" or "more tickles."
She also likes to hand us the TV remote and sign "more" which in this case means "put on the music now, please." So we turn it to the music station and she boogies down. Her dancing is a combo of twisting at the waste and doing squats.
Oh, one more thing: She is fake laughing now. She wrinkles up her nose, opens her mouth wide and goes, " Ah ha ha ha." That usually is in response to us laughing.
I don't know if this sums her up or not. She's so smart, and so fun. A total delight to be around. I can't imagine a life without playing with her every day. Joe and I talk frequently about how lucky we are to have her and this life. I <3 my life!
