4 posts tagged “toddler”

A Petra update because I haven't posted one for a while.

She'll be two on Sunday.  Already.  This time last year, she was a fat baby who'd just taken her first teetering steps.  Now she runs, jumps, balances on one foot, climbs stairs without holding on, climbs up onto everything she can, and yesterday rode her bike down the hill at Nanny's (much to Nanny's consternation).  Petra's very poised physically and very confident about her abilities - she's only to happy to give things a go.  She might just have some of her father's daredevilry in her.

She's also a big talker.  We have long conversations about things like the helicopters that fly over and the house truck that occasionally parks outside our house (she's having a toddler vehicle enthusiasm at the moment).  She tosses out her words and phrases - truck, copter, noise, look, etc, etc - and I translate them into whole sentences for her.  We then repeat and repeat until we've thoroughly canvassed the subject.  She has a few whole sentences at her disposal as well.  The things she's figured out how to say give a nice insight into the egocentric workings of the toddler mind - "I will do it."  "I don't want it." "I will get it." "Pick up, pick up," said with upraised arms and urgent hand gestures.  "Come here" and "in here," used as she leads us round the house.

We have spent the week recovering from a nasty flu bug - chills, fevers, coughs, the full deal.  The joys of winter in Dunedin.  Actually the weather's been very pleasant since the snow - calm, mild, and sunny - but it's undeniably winter and that's a shock after three years of perpetual summer.  My neighbours have flown off to Rarotonga for two weeks in the sun, leaving me to collect their mail.  I envy them their tropical island.

Hanging out in front of the fire with Petra brings its own satisfactions however.

We're witnessing one of Petra's periodic developmental leaps.  She sings, she dances, she runs around. She sticks stickers on the walls and draws on her feet.  She spends ages quietly absorbed in putting things in other things and taking them out again.  Her language acquisition proceeds at a dazzling pace.  She walks around the room pointing at objects, waiting for us to name them, and repeating the names after us.  She says "look" and "hello" and "up please".  She takes our cellphone and walks round the lounge talking and laughing into the aether.  She's very cuddly.  Leave takings are lengthy affairs because she works her way round the room kissing, and often rekissing, everyone.  She likes to fall asleep at night with her arms wrapped around my neck and her face on mine.  I enjoy that as well - I get to breathe in her baby smell and kiss her soft baby cheeks as she dozes.

She's also revealing her inner egomaniac these days.  Olivia came to stay a couple of weeks ago and Petra was a thug baby with her.  I gave Olivia a drink in a purple cup because Miss O is very very keen on purple and Petra stole the cup, hugged it to her chest and handed Olivia her own, much less desirable green cup.  I had to find another purple cup for Petra to avert a tragedy.  Petra's also discovered that she elicits all sorts of interesting reactions if she pulls Olivia's hair or pokes at her.  I spent a lot of time soothing Olivia's wounded feelings while trying to convince Petra to be gentle.  They did play nicely as well, as long as I hovered nearby to deal with potential trouble.

 

I'm mustering up the courage to attend a nearby playgroup to give Petra a chance to socialize with other kids her own age.  I fear that it will be a nervewracking experience as Petra tests her edges against the other kids.

Petra's nearly 17 months old now.  In that brief time she's changed from a tiny otherworldly dot whose world only extended a few inches from her face and who didn't even know that her hands and feet were her own, to an active mobile little girl capable of quite sophisticated interactions with her environment.  It's a privilege and a delight to get to see her grow and develop.

I find her utterly charming.  She hugs and kisses us, reaching up to wrap her arms around our necks and bestow little lip smacking kisses on our cheeks and lips.  If she rolls near my head in the night, she kisses me before falling back into sleep.  She gives us those open-mouthed slobbery toddler specials when she's feeling particularly enthusiastic.  And she's always up for blowing raspberries on any exposed skin she can find.

She can participate in increasingly complex conversations.  We ask her if she wants her bath and she runs down the hallway yelling ba ba, then stands impatiently by the taps urging us on.  She runs between Travis and me, passing things to us if asked.  She knows what I mean when I tell her it's time for bed.  She heads to the front door saying ca ca if we say we're going out.  She repeats words and phrases - she doesn't always get the pronunciation right but the intonations are clear.  And she understands a lot of what I say - responding to questions and instructions and chatting back in her own private Petra language.  She copies our physical mannerisms as well.  She folds her arms, something I do more often than I realise, and she stands with her hips pushed forwards just like Travis does.

She runs, climbs, dances, gets in, over, under, and generally uses our house as her private adventure playground.  She's also getting much bolder outside.  She opens the front gate, carefully walking it backwards until she can squeeze through, and we walk out onto the footpath.  We look at the old snail shell, the prickly holly hedge, the lichen on the path, at passing cars, children, and dogs.  Petra picks up leaves and bark.  We walk to the corner, then back into our yard.  I close the gate, Petra opens it, and we do the whole walk again, and again, and again, until she gets bored or I discover something else we need to do. 

Yesterday she took the plunge and stepped from the footpath to the rather unkempt grass on our lawn.  She's been very suspicious about grass, refusing to stand on it, even with shoes on, but she suddenly decided that she could do it and followed me all round the yard as I dead-headed the rose bushes.

Here she is looking all grown up.

 

Petra made her first foray into the kitchen cupboards yesterday.  She yanked all the pots out of her way, then climbed right onto the bottom shelf.  It was a bit of a squeeze, but she was unfazed.