Yay, Hallie's not
afraid of the bath anymore! We have many people to thank for this fact: Grandmas, who have both made extended visits in the past month and are willing to
go the extra mile to make the bath seem less scary; Erin, who bought some sweet bath toys to make the bath more fun (as you can see in these pictures - yes, funnels are super fun); and Will, who has assumed the role of distractor/bath game inventor to keep Hallie occupied in the tub.
Hallie is clearly a very smart little girl, she is learning quite a bit and demonstrates it the best way she can. Her vocabulary right now consists of
"no", "dada", "whee-o" [Will], "hayee" [Hallie], "nana" [banana, maybe], and
"bye", and she uses those words fairly reliably. Except she usually responds "no" to any question you ask her, even when she means yes. You can sometimes tell if she really means "yes" by the tone in her voice and how quickly she says it in response to your question, as in "no, don't ask me any more questions; yes, of course I want a cookie". So "no" means both no and yes to Hallie, the same way that "dada" refers to either dad or mom.
Another evidence of Hallie's expanding intellect is how interested she is in reading books these days. She will frequently approach Erin or I clutching a book and that means we'd better sit down quickly and catch her because she will turn around and immediately plop down on her butt and expects a lap to be there for her. She has a collection of baby books that she "speed reads" - never gives you enough time to explain what's going on, pretty much seeing how quickly she can turn each page. But you can quickly say a word or two about the pictures on the page, and she will still reliably make a "roar" sound whenever there's a lion (she learned this
from her brother), and makes a high pitched "hi!" greeting and touches/pets any picture of a cute kitten or other baby animal.
May God have mercy on your soul if you engage in reading time with Hallie and are not prepared to read the same book at least 8 times. If you, for example, need to get up after the second time through Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What Do You Hear? (current favorite, has a lion in it) to go to work or wipe Will's butt, she will cry like she's never been more wronged in her life. And she holds a grudge for awhile, sometimes complete with
stink eye.
Her physical coordination skills are also coming along very well. She's going to be quite the dancer (both
classical and
jazz styles). And she gives excellent high-fives. She doesn't do it so much anymore and I lament not catching it on video, but she used to let you know she wanted to five by approaching with her hand on her head behind her right ear - like she's winding up to throw you the hardest five she could muster. Even though they are actually excited/dance poses in the pictures above, we think she might have been responding to Woody's high-five pose there in the pic on the right.
Here you go: smart
and coordinated. This is Hallie's response to the question: "Where's Hallie's nose?" Close enough.
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