Journey of a Bereaved Mama: First Steps

Vienne Juliet is 14 mo. old today.

My little baby girl is pretty much walking now! Very exciting times in our home. She's been walking, holding onto our hands for a few months now - but now she is walking back and forth between me and Mark! And, last night for the first time, she let go of the edge of the table to walk towards my open arms! That was huge! Any day now I know she is just going to let go and walk towards something that she wants instead of towards my arms of security.

She has also been sleeping on her tummy every night and naptime and now I find her on her hands and knees once she is awake. Perhaps she will finally start crawling after she is walking!? That would be funny! Or at least this position is teaching her to sit up on her own....finally!

As far as first words, Vienne has been saying "Mama" and Dada" for quite some time and also says "num num" on occasion and just added "Bob" to the vocabulary. "Bob"? You ask? Oh yes, Bob is one of Grammy's puppies.

Vienne has been mimicking me more and more, which has been totally cute. She now picks up her comb and tries to rub it on her head. She has picked up my makeup brushes and shoved them at her face. Last week she started using her spoon quite accurately. And, of course the organizational skills of hers continue to grow and grow. Have I mentioned these? This girl loves to organize - to put things away, in their place or at least some new place she has assigned them. Rarely does she make a catastrophic mess because she is always putting things in containers and back up on shelves and in little holes. Yes, of course we have covers on the outlets! Her favorite toys are tupperware containers and boxes along with tiny little objects to sort in the boxes and then shut them away with the lids. The other week we were in a little health food store and I set her down on the ground to walk along a shelf that was at her level. The shelf was filled with display boxes of granola bars and such. A normal baby would probably pull everything out of those boxes and strew them all over the floor. Nope. Not my Vienne. She re-organized those boxes in her own terms - removing bars from one box to put them in the next. Not one granola bar was on the floor, nor even on the actual shelf....each of them were in different boxes from their original spot. It was so funny. Of course, I had to put everything back where it belonged before we left - but I was quite impressed.

Growth-wise, Vienne is still so very small. I'm not really concerned because she still has a decent amount of chunk on her thighs, belly, and cheeks. I just wonder when she will have a growth spurt! She is 14 months now and can still fit into 9 mo. size clothing! And last night I just happened to check the tag on one of the jammies she regularly wears...it is size 6 mo.! I put it away for principle's sake! And, man oh man, her feet have never grown!! She still wears a size 2 shoes! That is the same size she was wearing a year ago! Surely saves on the pocketbook! But it's kinda weird, isn't it? At her 12 mo. checkup (which was actually at 11mo.) they said she was "perfect" so I'm not going to think twice, I guess.

And I think that about sums up June for us! And, here's a video of those first steps last week along with a few cute pictures!