Dear Rabbit,
This month you have started crawling with some earnestness. But in your own fashion. I think you are going to be an individual. You certainly have a unique crawling style. You rather remind me of a seal as you commando crawl over the floorboards, flippering up the corridor. You’ll get up on your hands and knees to examine things, or to sit up, but you prefer to flop onto your belly and haul yourself along when you want to get somewhere.
We’ve had to make sure the house is safe for you to enjoy your new-found freedom. You find everything down there on the floor and put it in your mouth. My heart leaps into my mouth at least five times a day as you choke on something you’ve found. I am always pursing your little cheeks and scooping things out of your mouth. Leaves, burrs from Jak’s coat, dried up bits of food that have fallen down between the floor boards.
You are fascinated with the floorboards. You sit in the kitchen and trace the gaps between them with your finger. Deliberately and delicately. You try to prise any bits of fluff or food out and into your mouth. My word for this month is “Yucky!” I now vacuum every day to ensure there’s nothing on the floor that’s likely to do you damage. And I have to pull all the cables up off the floor when you’re around because they fascinate you no end. So, there’s no more work on the laptop while you’re around, unless I can run it on batteries.
You are quite cheeky about your new freedom. If I open the freezer door, you shriek with glee and haul yourself as fast as you can across the kitchen floor in a race before I close it again. What’s the big deal with the freezer, Rabbit? Is it because it’s cold? Similarly, if you’re flippering off somewhere and I come up behind you, you grin determinedly and up your pace, trying to race me to wherever you’re going. I’ve got news for you, rascal. It’s going to be a while before you can outrun me!
Now that the weather’s warmer, I’ve been wearing jeans and a t-shirt and when I’m lying on the floor my t-shirt rides up, exposing my tummy. You think this is wonderful and crawl over to me with a sound of glee and start kissing my tummy and blowing raspberries. What a funny sausage you are!
Actually, now that I recollect, you’ve really developed quite a lot of new tricks this month. You’re trying to pull yourself up, using the furniture. You can sit up in your cot now, and quite often when I come in after you’ve woken up, you’re sitting at the end of your bed, crying woefully to poor old Popcorn. At Grandma and Grandad’s the other day you waved. I think it was at Grandad. I haven’t seen you do it since though. And you also clapped your hands for Grandma. Again, you haven’t done that since either.
Eating has become a fascinating business for you this month. You stick your hands in your mouth while you’re eating and try to scoop food out. Finger foods go in and out of your mouth numerous times before they finally get chewed up and swallowed. You eat really well still. When you like something in particular you give me the sweetest smile after you first taste it and open your mouth up big and wide for more. You started making a clacking noise with your tongue while you were eating, and once you realized that people would repeat it back to you, you have decided that is your game to instigate. Preferably not while you’re eating though, Rabbit.
This month you fell of your Jolly Jumper (long story) and I discovered how much of a neurotic mother I was. I had visions all day of you developing epilepsy or having brain damage due to the fall. Of course, it was such a little distance that you fell that there was minimal damage – a few bruises is all. But I had horrors for a full day.
We visited Auntie Sonia in Perth this month and you had a great time meeting your Auntie and Uncle and your cousins. Thomas and William thought you were fantastic and loved playing with you. They were particularly amused at your penchant for hair-pulling. They offered themselves as willing sacrifices for hair pulling, in order to elicit your “evil laugh” as they named it. You do shriek when you get a good handful of hair! Poor Molly, their dog, didn’t know what to make of you. You, of course, simply adored her.
You had your first ever taste of cake while we were away. Uncle John owns a bakery and makes the best puffs. “Puseys Puffs”, they’re called. When we got to Perth we dropped in to the bakery and you got to eat your first Puseys Puff. A good start to cake eating!
Daddy came home a bit earlier than us and took the opportunity to paint your nursery. It looks stunning now. At last, you have a beautiful bedroom. New furniture holds your toys. Your teddies keep watch. Photos and canvases are on the walls. It looks so lovely. Your Dad is very clever like that.
I can’t believe that in a month’s time we will be having a first birthday party for you. Where has the last year gone? Surely you can’t be nearly one already!
Love you Rabbit!
Mummy
PS. It seems that J has a respiratory infection. But after a day of fever and lethargy, he's made a remarkable recovery. It may be teeth too. I suspect his 12 month molars are starting to inch their way to the surface. Bye for now!
All pink! Not good on a boys' photo....
Just fine! ?? I'm starting to think that I have some electromagnetic charge or some electric aura that is ruining all my photos. Nic, I've emailed you. What did you do that was different to me?
Jamie at my sister's house. He would skitter across to the doorway and just lie there, watching the goings on outside. Like he wished he was older and could go out and join in.
Hmmm... getting into mischief. There was a train set under our bed and that was what he would head for every time I put him on the floor. It didn't matter what toys I laid out on the floor to tempt him, he wanted to get at that train set!!!
With Auntie Sonia and Thomas and William.
