Clap Your Hands Say Yeah

Here's G knocking into her lunchtime milk today. These days she's down to just two helpings a day of cow's milk which she drinks herself out of beakers, instead of the old daily regime of five bottles of formula. There's no sign she's inherited her mum's lactose intolerance, although it means we've now got up to three bottles of milk open at any one time in the fridge. Semi-skimmed for me, lacto-free for Mrs J, and whole milk for G who needs the extra fat. At this point we may be keeping the British dairy industry going on our own.

Meanwhile, G has learned another new skill, clapping. I'd tried to teach it to her periodically over the last few months, but she never showed much interest. Until Saturday that is. Mrs J had Strictly Come Dancing on, and G had stood up and propped herself against the front of the telly, just as lots of people were shown applauding. She then turned round and started clapping herself.

The delighted reaction she got from us means G thinks she's very clever indeed, and has done little else since. I suppose it's slightly embarrassing when TV teaches your child something you probably should have taught her yourself. Good to see the BBC can still educate as well as entertain, though.

Nosey

Here's G during a walk along our local canal earlier. As the cover on the pushchair suggests, it was raining, and typically G had managed to poke her feet out of the bottom. Even though G doesn't seem to mind getting her feet a bit damp, I should really work out a better way of making sure the cover actually stays where it's supposed to.

Yesterday I took her to interview the manager of the new local supermarket for one of my other websites, Saddleworth News. I left one of the manager's colleagues looking after G in the next room while I started the interview. During the first question I could see the door move slightly out of the corner of my eye, and then I heard the familiar and unsubtle noise of G of crawling gradually towards where I was sitting. By the end of the first answer, G had managed to stand herself up against my chair, and was listening intently to what the manager was saying.

Although it was sweet that she wanted to see what I was doing, I picked her up and put her back outside with the door shut for the rest of the interview. Sometimes that's all that will keep my nosey little girl in check.

Thinking About Walking

G is one year old later this week. She certainly looks a lot more like a toddler than a baby now. The only thing is, she doesn't actually toddle anywhere, at least not without me holding on to one or both of her hands.

This picture shows a typical scene. She's steady enough on her feet, and is barely holding on to the sofa. But try to edge her away and she'll just plop straight down and start crawling. She's been crawling for so long, and is able to go so quickly, I don't think she really sees the point of toddling yet. No doubt once she starts I'll curse the day she ever learned. But then parenthood is full of these little contradictions.

G's singing group has started up again on Fridays, and last week as I looked around the room I realised G was just about the biggest baby there (toddlers go at a different time). This gave G a significant advantage, and she crawled around stealing toys from the other babies, even making off with one poor boy's sock. In fact, I thought she fitted rather too well into the role of playground bully. Hopefully she'll start walking soon, so she'll be the smallest one in the class again.

Standing Up

G hasn't been crawling for all that long, but already she's keen to move on to the next thing. In this case, lifting herself up to standing using chairs, tables and anything else within reach. She's still a bit unsteady on her feet, so scenes like this are often followed by her slumping back down, usually with a bump and some inevitable tears.

But even when that happens, as soon as she's stopped crying she starts reaching back up again. Sometimes she's even able to balance on her feet, propping herself up with one hand while she waves the other one around. At this rate I don't think it'll be long before she starts walking, which means she'll find it even easier to get up to no good.