My lovely girl

My lovely girl was so well documented until this summer and I fret that my memory will not keep up with all the moments of the past few months. So here are a few of the most recent.

On her first birthday she was flying around on a push toy that Grandma had given her when we arrived. That toy lived at our house and she used the kitchen chair at Mom and Dads. Worked a charm since just a couple of weeks later she is walking all on her own. I don´t remember any "first step" moment. It just progressed over a few days and then there she is off across the room. It is no longer cool to use a push toy and a helping hand is most often waived away. She loves walking around and is closing in on running most of the time. Of course she can´t actually run but the falling down doesn´t seem to bother her in the slightest. She does have a great sense of balance so the falls are few.

She looks like she is going to be a toughy.

So casual, just strolling on by.

She has started signing a lot. And now likes to learn a word a day. I have to make an effort to keep up. It´s like having homework or something. For the record, she signs:

milk
food/hungry
dog
flower
bird
tired
finished
cookie
banana
want
car

Oh, and she has one word that we can understand. Hello. Seems appropriate and she finds it useful a LOT. Hello in the morning, hello to strangers, hello to bird, to doll, to car... you get the picture.

The sign I love the most is tired. It is amazing. She tells me she is tired. I put her into bed. No crying, no fussing, just sleeping. A week ago I had the best moment ever putting her to bed. She was in her pjs, all tucked up in her sleeping bag, and breastfeeding in our super comfy chair in her room. She has her own kiss sound she makes and in between feeding she´d stick her head up and give me a kiss. Then I thought she was finished as she came off and just sat quietly for a minute. She signed milk and went back on for a bit. Then signed tired and pointed to bed. I put her in bed. She gave me a kiss, signed tired again and waved goodbye to me. I mean really, the difference between that and an hour of crying which we had at the beginning of the summer is just soooo nice. I´ll never forget her little face waving me goodbye from her bed. So sweet.

I have a couple of videos to add, which are on another computer, so I´ll try and do that soon. For now here are some photos of her 1st birthday.

Her first doll. Not sure why, but she is into hugging stuffed animals. I never showed her this was the thing to do. And then we noticed one day in the shops that she really liked dolls. So, grandma obliged. The doll lives in the car so Halía has someone to talk to in the back.


Yes, I still look tired one year on. But very happy!