Crawling is No Longer COOL Enough

All weekend Isabelle has been walking around the house with mom...but only holding onto ONE of my hands. I lost count yesterday how many times we've gone from the living room, down the hallway, to her room, to the patio door and back again. Sure, she can get places herself by crawling or cruising, but this mode of transport no longer seems to be COOL enough to suit our little stinker. It was just last week that she wasn't so sure about only holding on to ONE hand of mom or dad. Additionally, just before her nap she made up her mind and walked from the couch to a diaper box we happened to be playing with at the time...about 4 steps..all by herself! I believe she's realizing that she just might be able to do this thing without a wall or a helping hand from mom or dad.

Thursday, Dan and I also noticed that she can say 'baby'...and she says it often! So that was kind of cool to hear another recognizable word. She's starting to watch speech very closely and will sometimes try to imitate. Sometimes she will also try to imitate the inflection. My favorite is when she tries to whisper something.

Another development of the last few days is the advent of the pouting cry. By listening, you (or at least Dan and I) can immediately tell that it's fake...and that for whatever reason, something hasn't gone the way she wants, and she's bellyaching/pouting about it. This could be anything from wanting to get down from her high chair and it isn't time yet to being denied access to mom or dad's BlackBerry. This is just the newest chapter in the 'you can't always get what you want' lesson.