21 Months

Another long stretch without posting, I'm sorry. August was a bit of a rough month for us as Little Djinn got 8 (!!!) teeth, including four molars in one week which involved some sleepless nights and crying inconsolably. Nursing didn't help and she wouldn't let us CalPol (baby tylenol) her, and she normally asks for some whenever she sees the bottle. But she now has four in the front on top and bottom and her first four molars, 12 teeth in total. This has made nursing less fun for me and I'm 90% done, but she still very much wants to nurse so we're trying to find a balance.

We also went down to Pitlochry in August and stayed at The Atholl Palace Hotel where we got married. Some friends of C's were up for a week, having enjoyed their stay during our wedding, and were using APH as their base of operations whilst exploring Perthshire so we went down for two nights to see them and have a mini-break. Apparently there have been some changes (including a remodel of the Stag Bar) with a new manager who was there for a year before getting the boot(?), and the new new manager is going back to the way things were (the way we liked them). Mostly this upheavel showed in the restaurant which had the usual lovely food and the worst service we've ever seen. It's a good thing we were going early (6:30ish) because it got crowded one night and really fell apart. That's not going to leave a good impression with the German tourists on the coach trip who were staying the night and waiting forever for food. Otherwise it was a really good trip and C and I took the opportunity to each get a spa treatment, a manicure and facial for him and a full body massage and scrub for me. Ah, for a little while we felt so relaxed and pampered. When I win EuroMillions there will be more spa days in my future.

In September Little Djinn's playgroups started up again, swim lessons on Mondays (which we had to ourselves for 6 weeks), a new dance class on Tuesdays that sounded perfect for her on paper but she's just not keen on it, the next age-group up for her Wednesday class which is particularly nice as we know all the kids and their (grand)parents and LD is very confident doing the activities. For a while we were in a soft-play on Thursday mornings that she loved - climbing structures, bouncy castles, big soft blocks - but that was only a 6 week course and the following session was booked up, but we're in the one that starts at the end of the month so she'll enjoy that. In the Thursday we met another half American toddler. That's three of us American Moms now, and we've been hanging out after the Tuesday and Wednesday classes. IT's nice being able to talk to other people about the ways things are different from What We Knew.

Little Djinn has really blossomed in the last month or two and she's much more interested in playing with other people. Her godfather, M, came over on Friday and she clung to my leg briefly, then brought him all of her toys and told him to sit next to her on the floor, and basically decided that he's the best thing ever. After swim practice on Monday we were having lunch in the cafe and someone at the next table over started playing peekaboo with her so she got Danni Dinosaur and made him play catch with her and stuff. I think he learned an important lesson about not making eye-contact with toddlers.

She has a lot more signs, including a few she made up like drawing a circle with one finger on the other palm to ask for her favourite telly programme, In the Night Garden (it starts with a random toddler having circles drawn on their palm). She has signs for cat, spider (she tries to do the gesture for Incy Wincy/Itsy Bitsy Spider), thank you and going for a walk. She makes noises for dogs, snakes, cars, and airplanes. She says "bib" (we'd largely stopped using them until she started asking for them), "clonk" when she bumps into things, and I think yesterday she said baby. She "counts" and hums the first line of "How Much Is That Doggy in the Window". She puts on and takes off (and puts on and takes off and puts on...) her shoes and understands if you tell her that she's putting the shoe on the wrong foot. She says Uh-oh and "nee-nah-nee-nah" which is the sound emergency vehicles make here, but we've not explained that part to her yet (one of her friends says it and she's copying the sound).

Little Djinn is very huggy and kissy, habits encouraged by In the Night Garden where one of the characters has "a very kissy day" and goes around kissing everything in the garden. She also does the little dance each character does when they're introduced.

She's starting to be interested in "real" food and so far is a big fan of baked beans, bacon, and salami. She likes peanut butter and sometimes likes bread but isn't interested in peanut butter on bread. She eats fruit, fresh and dried, and sometimes vegetables. We got her some little potties because she was very interested in what we do, but while she knows they're for peeing and she knows when she needs to pee (she'll ask for her nappy if she's naked), she has no interest in the next step.

And, knock/touch wood, bed time is currently going really well for us. We need to be better about putting her to bed at a "reasonable" time, but she gets her story and we nurse for a bit and then I ask if she's ready to go sleep in her cot and she (thinks about it and) says yes, I move her over she lays right down and....that's it. She's still waking in the night and wanting to nurse (and wanting to sleep nurse which is the part I'm not fond of as I wake up sore) but I'm working on either letting her nurse for 10-20 minutes and putting her back in the cot or telling her it's not time to nurse and putting her back.

I gave Little Djinn her first haircut a few weeks ago. We dressed up at the main characters from Monsters' Inc for Halloween. That is largely the State of the Toddler. We're still very much amazed by her every day and every day she's learning new things.