The Leen

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Dear Elanor,

Today you are 11 months old! You have changed so dramatically in the past few weeks; your development has just exploded lately. I’m not even sure where to start.

You are not walking without support, although we are thinking more and more now that it’s coming any day. You will push various items around the house and walk behind them — the bar stools, the ottoman, the dining room chairs, your exersaucer — and you’ll walk if we hold your hand, but you won’t do it by yourself yet. You will, however, stand unsupported on your own, which is one of those many developmental things you’ve just started doing over the past week or two.

You will also climb; you climbed this morning from my lap onto the dining room table, and we must be very careful to leave the door to the stairs shut because you’ll head straight over and try to climb them as soon as you hear the door open.

The bath is one of your favorite things. Another thing you’ve started doing recently is you try to climb into the tub when we are in the bathroom. You just love bathie time, and you’ll happily play in the tub for as long as possible. You especially love it when Papa comes in and sits next to the tub and splashes and plays with you. The grin on your face when he puts his face in the water and blows bubbles is huge.

You now have ten teeth. It’s been a rough month, with you getting three more teeth (including your upper canines — ouch) and you still seem to be working on a molar and your lower canines. This round of teeth was by far the worst ones yet; you seemed much more bothered by them than the previous ones. In conjunction with teething, you’ve had a cold for what seems like six weeks. That, combined with the teeth and Papa’s traveling, has made you one cranky little girl. Thankfully, you seem to be handling this next set of teeth better, and maybe once they’re through, your cold symptoms will lessen a bit and you’ll get some relief in general.

Papa and I love to watch you eat. Again, the past few weeks have shown a huge increase of what you’ll eat and how much you’ll eat. Before, you would just play in your food, but now you actually eat. I usually just give you a little of what we’re eating, and you usually eat it right up. You love black bean soup, channa masala, olives, any potato product, cheese, cucumbers, tomatoes (which I just gave you last night and you loved), pizza, Annie’s Mac, and, of course, Veggie Booty.

While we were relatively sure you were signing back at us last month, there is absolutely no doubt you are now. Again, in the past week or two, you will sign milkies, finished, eat, more, and hi/bye in the right contexts. One of my favorite things is when you are nursing and you look up at me and sign milkies as you try to grin despite the fact that you’re eating. You want me to acknowledge what you are saying and you keep looking at me and signing it until I say, “Yes, Nor, you’re having yummy milkies!”

We had a fun month, including a trip to the Walker family house at Seaside. We just spent a lot of time hanging out as a family that weekend, riding bikes on the Prom, walking downtown, and just playing at the house. It was wonderful. We also celebrated your first Thanksgiving this past month. You were very tired by the time we ate dinner, but you managed to eat some stuffing, mashed potatoes, some of your roll, and some peas anyway.

I can’t wait to see what this next month will bring. It seems every day you master a new skill or want to do something new or grow and change in some way. It makes waking up every day so much fun, just to see how you’ll be different from the day before.

I love you, Magoo.

Mama