The Sweetest Sound

Molly gave me a belated Mother's Day present today -- she said Mama! She's been getting closer and closer to those much-anticipated words over the last couple of weeks. She'd been making a lot of "nnnnnaa nnnnaaa" noises that seemed to be directed to me. But when I was playing with her today, she managed to get out the sweetest little "mmmmmmmaaaa mmmmmmmmmaaaa" and even repeated it several more times (Dad can back me up). That and the fact that she took THREE naps today earned Molly a lot of brownie points. ;)

Molly is working on cutting incisor number eight, so she's been fussy and not sleeping well. She's also been on a nursing strike during the day for the past couple of days, so she's been waking up even more than usual at night to eat. She's getting to the age where she really wants to check out what is going on around her and doesn't want to sit still and take the time to nurse. But, for some reason, she has really been enjoying her solid food meals. Mom and Dad weren't quite fast enough getting her dinner ready last night and she was in her high chair kicking and flailing her arms and yelling for her dinner! We started giving her some flattened peas to try eating on her own and she thinks feeding herself is a great deal of fun (even if a lot of the peas end up in her bib or under her chair).

Max has been enjoying his meals too -- the boy has been eating like a horse! His leg seems to have mended nicely and his limp has all but disappeared. He is very happy to be able to resume his after dinner walks, especially when we go to the neighborhood park (happily, the path to the park is two houses down from ours). Molly usually comes along for the ride in her sling and often falls asleep while we walk.

Max, who has always been interested in books, has decided that he's ready for something a little more thought provoking than the latest issue of Babybug. He's recently taken to perusing my library and selecting a novel to "read." Today he grabbed The Brothers Karamazov off of the shelf, carried it over to the couch (where Molly can't pester him), and sat down to read. He sat there for a good ten minutes, flipping through the book, and "reading" out loud (unlike Alice, Max doesn't seem to have any problems paying attention to a book with no pictures in it). Heart of Darkness and Cosmicomics are other favorites, although he usually passes up Bleak House (unlike Mama, he must not be a Dickens fan). Now if only we could get Molly to appreciate good literature in anything but the gastronomical sense. ;)