blog, interrupted

So, this is what pneumonia (now that I've had that, after having shingles last summer, I'm ready for the nursing home), followed by sick husband (to be honest, I though he was doing his whole hypochondriac-overreacting thing, but then it turns out that he developed a staph infection so I felt pretty bad about my crankiness with him because, you know, it's all about me), compounded by annual-insane-fall schedule looks like: no blogging.  Bummer.  For me, anyway.

Because there are a lot of fun things happening in our house which are unrelated to germs and their resulting side effects.  Baby Girl is turning 11 months on Friday (sidebar: WHAT?) and she is becoming, well, not so much Baby anymore - this morning I watched her pull herself up to standing, holding onto her toy box so that she could peer into it and choose toys for herself, and I thought, "who is this little girl living in my house and what did she do with my mewling infant?"  She changes so fast it makes my head spin.

• While she doesn't quite creep around couches, ottomans, and other stable objects, she looooves standing and showing off her increasingly improving balance.  "Improving," however, still implies a lot of falls on the bum.  Mostly this is okay, and I think the cloth diaper thing gives her a bit of extra cush.  
• She also loooves pointing at random objects and saying, "dis?" or, "dat?"  You tell her the name of it - "light," or, "fan," (90% of the time the answer is one of those two) - and she looks at you with utter delight, as if she has just discovered a new crater on the surface of the moon or tasted chocolate for the first time.  It also works in reverse: ask her where the 'light' or 'fan' are, and she'll point right at them.  Most of the time.
• She says "dada" on a regular basis.  "Mama," not so much.  Or, you know, never.  But when you point at me and ask, "who is that?" she responds with enthusiastic lip-smacking, so at least she knows that I taste good.  It's a start.
• Nothing is funnier than a baby intensely focused on pooping. I never laugh at her (out loud) because that doesn't seem very nice, but inwardly I am giggling every time.
• Did you know that there is a baby living in the mirrors of our house who looks just like the baby who lives in the house?  I KNOW.  It is freaky amazing.
• The kind of soul-love I have for things like my child and husband and a really good piece of chocolate, she has for sweet potatoes, blueberries, mum.mum crackers, and, well, just about anything edible.  This kid is an eater.  And exceptionally gifted at finding very, very, tiny pieces of lint on the floor which she delicately picks up and consumes.  Although, these days, after unending repetitions of "no, thank you," she looks at the piece of lint, turns it over carefully, and then reaches out to hand it to us, like, "here, take it, I know you're just going to steal it anyway."
• Please, all that is holy in heaven above, may she learn to sleep past 5:00am.  Soon.

I sent out invitations for her first birthday party and, the whole time, kept thinking, "one? How is that happening?"  I am every parental cliche coming to life, people.  Part of me misses the tiny baby-ness, the curled-up-sleeping infant who laid happily on the playmat and slept in our room, but on the other hand, it's so much fun to watch her figure out the world that I'm always eager to see what she does next.  So that's good.