It feels like Christmas was so long ago and now I’m ready for Spring! I feel like Maddy grew soooo much over the holidays and so here is her update.
Ooops! I just went back to check her 14 months update and I realized that I didn’t actually do one!! I blame all the craziness of the holiday season. I guess that explains why I feel like she’s changed so much. Ha ha! Well she is still crawling around but she is a super whiz at it now. I can no longer leave her somewhere and quickly dash in and out to grab something. She loves to crawl around the coffee table as we chase her around and pretend to catch her. Lots of laugh and great for tiring her out in hopes of a nice long nap! She is also doing a lot of furniture cruising. She’s getting much faster and can now do it with her hands full of toys as well. On the actual walking she can walk somewhat quickly if we hold her hands and she can use the toy walker to walk all on her own. The only problem is that she doesn’t quite know how to turn it around so when she hits a wall she’s stuck.
As far as eating, Maddy eats just about everything. We just haven’t given her nuts, shellfish or strawberries yet. She’s had starwberry yogurt though so I think we’re good. She is fully eating what we eat and since the holidays I’ve been busy cooking and freezing things, being sure to freeze in portions for three now. She really LOVES the food at her daycare so I’ve been going to T&T to try and cook ‘more Chinese’ style. I even grilled Lucy to see what and how she makes it. After all the work I offered it Maddy. Didn’t want it. What?!?! Luckily I tried again and I found that she likes to eat if I shovel the food into her mouth! She wouldn’t use the spoon herself. Didn’t want to use her hands. Wouldn’t take it if I tried spooning it into her mouth. As soon as I left it in the bowl and then used the spoon as a shovel, she ate an entire bowl of noodles!! I guess that’s her Chinese side coming out since that is how we eat rice from a bowl. She’s also a Dutch girl at heart because she loves Pannenkoek (thin crepe-like pancakes). They freeze well, so I make a bunch and she has one just about everyday for snack. She’ll have them with mashed bananas, cream cheese, melted cheese or shredded apple. I even put some bean paste in there once and she was all over it!
Playtime is fun and changing too. She now likes to feed her stuffed animals and dolls. In Revelstoke she really loved Auntie Lyn’s old bottle for her Cabbage Patch Kid. When we got home, I bought Maddy and bottle and ever since it’s been with her all the time. She’ll get monkey or Winnie the Pooh and hold the bottle up to the mouth while making eating noises. It’s so cute to watch.
The biggest growth since last time is Maddy’s speech. It’s like she learned some new words overnight. She knows UP, HELP (“EP” which we often confuse with “UP”), PLEASE (“PEAS”), DOG (“DOUGGI”), CAT (“MI MI” comes from ‘meow’ I think), BIRD (“BRRR”). I get the feeling that she is more verbal than physical and she loves to just sit there and “chat”. She definitely understand A LOT of what we say and I guess we’ll have to be more mindful of what we say from now on because she copies everything.
Potty time is still working well. Over the holidays Josh started asking her if she was “all done” while she was on the pot. There were a couple of time she’d shake her head saying “no”. He said that he left her and a few seconds later she’d be bearing down again!! At first I didn’t believe that she could know if she still had more to “go”, but it happens quite often now. We’re getting in the habit of letting her tell us if she is ready to come off the potty now. It works well that we let her play while on the potty. It keeps her occupied long enough for her to get the urge to go. She looks so funny sometimes sitting on the potty, one leg crossed over the other and with a book in her hands!
That’s about all for now. Lately Maddy and I have spent a lot of time indoors at home. To pass the time she loves to sit and watch old videos of herself on the computer. It’s so hard to believe that she has changed so much in what feels like such a short period of time. I remember those times like they were yesterday, except she is such a different girl now. She’s grown and changed so much! I love looking at the videos as much as she does and as hard as it is to get video of her now (she often will stop what she’s doing to come and grab the camera), I have to be sure to continue to get more videos. Pictures are nice but they don’t show nearly as much!! :)
Here's a short video of Maddy "then" and "now". What difference from the summer!
Saturday, January 17, 2009
Saturday, January 3, 2009
Christmas with the Blommesteins
We just got back yesterday from Revelstoke and judging by all the snow we’ve had today, it was the perfect time to come home. We had an awesome time hanging out with family and Maddy had a blast playing with Oma and Opa everyday.
The drive there was great. Maddy slept well in the car and we only made one stop in Merrit for lunch and gas. It’s so much easier now that she can have her milk in a sippy cup instead of having to pull over to nurse her. The road conditions were good and we didn’t run into any trouble. This trip was also easier because Maddy is now more or less eating the same things we do. No more having to pack food for the road or while we are visiting. She loved Oma’s cooking and at times looked as though she was packing it in for fear that there would be no food the next day.
We celebrated Christmas the following night and it’s alway so much fun seeing what everyone comes up with for ‘surprisa’. Every year the adults draw names and in addition to getting a gift for your person, we also make some kind of a gag gift for that person too. Usually there is some type of a riddle or poem that goes with the ‘surprisa’. We had a great time.
Kim made me my dream crafting room and mom made Josh some overalls to wear when he works on his “man-cave” (the Westy).
Maddy also had a good time this year. She was pretty into opening the presents and then keeping up with her older cousin Kaes and his friend Sophia. By the time we put her to bed, she was pooped.
We had so many plans for the rest of the week, but Maddy was a little sick and so we tried to really stick to her naps and stayed home for a whole day. We did get to take her sledding a couple of times. She loved it the first time, especially when a couple of the neighbourhood dogs tagged along. The second time we took her out, she wasn’t as enthusiastic about it and by then she’d learned to say “up” and demanded to be picked up for the way back.
We didn’t plan to go skiing this year so we left all of our equipment at home. We did take the new gondola up to the top. Well it wasn’t the very top, seeing as there was yet another chair. The snow looked great and for those you skiers or boarders, we hear that the new mountain is great.
It is a Dutch tradition to make Olibal (oil balls) for New Years. It is a dough batter filled with raisins, currants and apples. It is then deep fried and served with powdered sugar. Mom said that the recipe is a lot of work so when she makes them, she usually makes a lot. She wasn’t kidding!! Everyone had multiple Olibals to ring in the new year and we have a freezer full to last us for a while. Maddy still gets all excited when she sees us eating one and madly signs for “more”.
That tub of batter is the same sized tub we use to bathe Maddy in at home!
On our last day we went to visit Uncle Pascal, Auntie Kim and Kaes. Again Maddy went nuts when she saw Yoda the cat and kept screaming “hi” at him. Yoda was amazingly patient and let her pet him quite a bit. Maddy also had a great time playing with Kaes and his ‘big boy’ toys. Every January 1st, the cross country ski club hosts a Lantern Ski at night. They light the x-country ski trail with lanterns and the trail is a 5km loop with a stop at the cabin for cookies and hot chocolate. It’s really dark and that is the magical part of it, but it’s also freaky to be going down hill in darkness with nothing but head lamp. We had a lot of laughs and it was a great time.
The next day we packed up the car right after breakfast in hopes of being on the road early. We were making great time and just finished saying our last goodbyes. Josh and I went to get in the car when we realized the doors were locked, with the engine running and Maddy inside!! BIG TIME Ooops!!! We still don’t know how it happened but luckily BCAA was there quickly and Maddy was just fine. At least the car was nice and warm by the time we got in!
Thanks for a great week Blommestein clan! We’re already looking forward to camping at Canon Beach this summer.
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