Just One Year

One year ago, Adi couldn't walk. She was about to turn two, but walking didn't seem to be on her horizon.

Until something clicked.

Exactly one year ago, Adi mastered walking with a walker.

And now? Adi has recently walked over half a mile in one go. She runs alongside us on our walks. She spontaneously starts hopping in middle of walking.

When I let Adi out of the carriage yesterday and let her loose,

I couldn't help but think back to another day...
A day when her accomplishment wasn't walking over half a mile by herself. But rather a day when she walked over half a block, using her carriage as a walker.

And yes, I was reminded precisely because she is wearing that same outfit!
How we cheered! I took photos and texted them to all of Adi's therapists.

Watching her now, it is hard to believe that she has only been walking for 8 months.

It was just one year, and look how far it took us!

Rosh Hashana is fast approaching, and Adi's third birthday come on the heels of the yomim tovim. Lots of new beginnings. Maybe even the beginning of school for Adi. Life is full of pleasant surprises. The upcoming year is a beautifully sealed gift. I wonder what's inside.

Videos for Genetics

April 2011. Adi showing her words at 2 1/2 years old!

August 2011: More park. Look how well Adi does steps already. :)  (2 years 10 months)

 Adi has a deep and profound obsession with trains. Here we are on the Williamsburg bridge, watching the trains pass really close to us behind the fence.

Is it Really Over? Really?

Blog mimics life, or something like that. And just like I am constantly in awe of the speed of time, I am living in the past on the blog.
I am NOT ready for summer to be over, but since I'm not the boss of the world, it's not my say.
BUT- it will be summer vacation for another couple of weeks in my little virtual world here.

A short outline, I'll expand on it... eventually!

4th week of August, 8th week of summer vacation.

Last week of August, first week of September. 9th week of summer vacation.

And the last little calendar page of this year. *Sad*

Talk about sad, I have a funny Adistory to share.
(This post doesn't have much context anyway, so this will add some spice.)

Today I heard Adi screaming, "Ow! Ow!" When I came to investigate, she was holding a rubber fish toy and sticking her finger in its mouth. There isn't much "in" to the mouth, just fishy lips. I couldn't figure out what could have been hurting her.
Then she put down the fish, covered her face with her hands and wept. She only covers her face when she is pretending to cry, not when she is really crying. But this sounded genuine, and I was confused. I asked, "Adi, did the fishy bite you?" "Yeaaaa," she wailed. Then she put her hands down and went on with her life.

It was an act! It was all an act! She didn't get hurt, and I knew she couldn't have gotten hurt from that toy, but she acted so naturally, I believed her! What a little actress.

Adibaby, 2.5 Year Edition

So while you enjoy these photos of dragonfly Adi from two months ago (when she was 2 years 5 months)...

... I will write a little update about all the cool stuff she can do these days (when she is 2 years 7 months.)

Firstly, she is getting better at walking on uneven ground. This apartment has all the rooms on different levels. The dining room is the highest one on the first floor. There is a small step down into the bedrooms, and a little raised threshold (about a foot wide) that you have to step onto and then down from to go to the kitchen. At first she was falling everywhere she went. But now she can step up and down with ease. I've even seen her do it without holding onto the wall, but not usually. Outside we have lots of different terrain. Asphalt, brick border around the garden, brick border around the sandbox, step down from the asphalt into the grassy back yard... and the parking space is lower than the rest of the year by a good 5 inches. She manages most of the time! She does fall, but gets right up and tries again.
Her balance at the top of a staircase can now be trusted, and although she doesn't walk up and down the stairs yet, she can crawl up very well.

And her vocabulary exploded! She has many words that she can say well, some that only I can understand, and a bunch that she made up. :)

One day I was reading "Baby Happy Baby Sad" for Adi, and she was babbling along. Until I started hearing something... "Ha-ppy, ha-ppy." That was three months ago, and now she is also able to say book (the right way) and "Weeeeed." (Read)

Drink is "Beeyup." Yeah, I know. It's totally odd. And adorable. I think it might be a derivative of "me up," which means "me cup."

I thought I had posted about "apple" before but it seems that I did not. Adi says, "Appoo" on all round fruit.

Jump is "Mmmmmum!" She starts to say "mmm" when she gets ready to jump, and the "um" is said during the actual time off the ground. Which she can do, by the way! Jump up with both feet off the ground!

Sit is "Haya." Sorry, no theories here. She uses it to mean sit on a chair to eat, sit in the carriage to go out, and she used to use it for "swing." But recently she upgraded to "Heen" for swing. And "Hon" for phone. And "Heim" for game (which solely refers to iPad games.)

She graduated from calling Gedalya "Yaya" to "Daya." She still has some trouble with any variation of "Zusha" that we try to get her to pronounce.

Adi loves cats. In this apartment we have our own yard, so we are able to put out Mel's leftover cat food, fish skins, and other leftover meat products for the local cats to eat instead of wasting it. That means lots of opportunities for Adi to see her "ai-nyas." When she sees them, she calls out, "Nya!" and then clucks her tongue instead of saying "ksksks" to call the cat. LOL

"Duuuuuute." Any suggestions? I'm lost. "Shoes," "shirt" and "cute" all came up as suggestions, but haven't been confirmed.

How about another weird one? "Me." Not that weird you say? What would you say when you learn that it means "sandwich"? I thought so.

"Dyatop." I don't even know how to spell it to convey the pronunciation. Sometimes she pronounces it "Doptop." It means insect, and the origins are long and winded.
I did a search on my blog, and was surprised to see that there is only one post on my blog about Laptop. Laptop is a beetle that Gedalya found in our house one time, one year ago. We had let him go, but he kept returning.*

*Which is what the boys believe, that it's the same beetle each time. :)

The boys love Laptop and it's always an exciting time for us all when we find him or one of his relatives in our house. Well, one time, about half a year ago, the boys spotted Laptop on their window, and exclaimed "Laptop!" Adi also pointed at the beetle and shouted, "Dyatop!" Since then, she adopted the term to mean any type of bug.

Once when she found a bug and wanted everyone to see, she waved her hand towards herself and said, "Hum!" (Come!) That was just a few weeks ago. We were all so surprised. She did it again when she wanted my mother to come see her play with a tether ball. And last week, Adi was overwhelmed with all the kids playing in our yard (from the block) andwanted to go inside the house. I wanted to stay out with them and the boys, so I helped Adi walk up the steps and went back out. So you know what the munchkin did? She gestured for me to come and said, "Hum in!" That's two words. I was very impressed and surprised!

I might have mentioned before that she says Adi. "Ah-ti."

There are more words, I'm certain. But I can't think of them right now. So I'll save them for next time and say "Pie" for now! Well, I'm not being totally fair, because recently Adi graduated to the proper "Bye."
The evolution of this word goes like this: Just waving > aye > pie > BYE!

Adibaby

On Shabbos Adi woke up at night. Instead of trying to put her back to sleep, I let her come out and join the seuda. One of the foods I put on her plate was butternut squash. It was hot, and I told her so. We blew on it together to cool it off, and Adel was saying, "Ot! Ot!"

The next day she surprised me. I took some of the same butternut squash, now cold, and handed it to her. She shook her head side to side and said, "Uh-uh" (the sound for no. It's her latest trick, and I love it!) and then she explained to me why she doesn't want it: "Ot!"
I was so proud how she remembered that it was hot and was able to communicate to me that she didn't want it and why.

Right now she is listening to a CD we haven't put on in a while. It's an exercise CD and there are motions to go with the songs. And after several months on not hearing this CD, she remembers some of the motions!

 More random cuteness:

Adi and Gedalya at the library

Adi admiring her work

Adi's friend, Tehilla

Chewey

Adi is happy to announce that...


...She is eating almost all table foods already! Until recently, Adel was able to eat small pieces of finger foods- as long as they dissolved easily. I gave her Bamba, but had to break each piece in thirds, Same thing with the whole grain baby puffs I gave her. She didn't chew- kinda just mashed the food around her mouth.
One day I bought a new food- peanut butter filled pretzel sticks. I handed one to each boy, and naturally Adi wanted one, too. I thought about breaking a piece off, but decided to see how she would do with a whole stick. Since they were peanut butter filled, they weren't solid... they had thin walls and were easy to bite and break up. And since they were long, she couldn't stuff a whole piece in her mouth.


Well, she handled them just great! Bit off pieces and chewed them like a pro! This was on chol hamoed Sukkos, right before she turned two. Zusha was so happy for her and said, "Adi is almost two, and two year olds already know how to chew. So see, she is almost two, so she is starting to chew!" And then, with big-brotherly pride, he added, "But Adi is not even two yet, and look! She is already chewing!"

Well, since then, Adel moved onto regular pretzel sticks, and then to crackers, and whole Bamba pieces. I can't tell you what a relief it is to be able to HAND SOMETHING OVER to Adel instead of breaking off bite-sized pieces and putting them in her mouth. And Adel loves her food freedom as well!
She loves Bamba the best. It's almost comical.Except when it's not. Like every morning.
She comes to the kitchen and points up to the cabinet and says, "Aah awi dea awy a Bamba am." I can only translate the last two words: Bamba eat. And she will demand and demand her Bamba and eat nothing else if she doesn't get her Bamba. We can't leave a grocery without Adel carrying her Bamba bag triumphantly.

Another favorite food is a baby food sandwich. I invented/discovered it one day when we were outside and I wanted something healthier than pretzels or Bamba for Adel to snack on in the park. I bought a loaf of sliced bread and a jar of baby food... and made a quick and simple sandwich! Now it's a daily thing. A couple of spoonfuls of peas, pears, carrots, banana, or blueberries and apples on a lightly toasted (if Adel has patience to wait for it to toast) multi-whole-grain bread and Adel has a healthy mini meal.

Aaand, I might as well finish with the rest of the pictures from the set above. These are the last photos of one-year-old Adel!


I kept trying to get her to walk here, but no luck.


Unlike now! Now I can be cautiously optimistic and say that walking is here to stay as a major part of Adel's life! Finally!

Whooo.... Long Time

So due to the influx of inquiries about where I have been (cough*oneperson*cough) I decided to throw together a post.

The main problem was that our phone and internet conked out for over a week. I did use that time to edit photos, so I have some to put up, but that brings me to another problem. Blogger rotates all my vertical photos. I can fix this by rotating them sideways myself in my photo editing program before uploading to compensate... but then I have to straighten them out after the upload and it's just too much of a hassle. I have decided to use Shutterfly instead, but it's an extra few steps. Also, Shutterfly logs me out after 20 minutes of inactivity, and with a houseful of kids, can you imagine if I need to return to the computer in 19 minute intervals?? Logging back in and finding the photo I was working on takes time... so therefore I usually don't even start.

And then there's Adi. Adi doesn't let me use the computer. And she has been sleeping worse than ever, so I don't feel like starting a blog post because I will certainly not be able to finish it.

So now here I am. A lot has been happening. Adi decided to give walking another chance. She gave it a try two months ago and decided it wasn't really for her. Now she got back into the groove and can walk across the room! I'm not sure if she will decide to stick with it or take another break.

In any case, I do have much to update on. Since this blog is primarily for the purpose of recording my kids' lives, it's important to me to keep it up. Before I had readers, I would write posts and date them back a couple weeks or months to the time the events actually took place. Then when people started reading, I couldn't jump around like that. I had to have my most recent posts at the most recent spot.
Well, now that I skipped so much, I think I will have to go back and fill in posts into the times the events happened. (Like Zusha's birthday! I wrote about it, but there are still some things I want to fill in. And the week-by-week summer summary. I stopped abruptly on the first day of school, but I want to finish it up.) But I will put a link into a recent post for anyone who wants to read!

How Far You've Come!

My dear Adibaby,
I am truly in awe of how far you have come in the one short year between your first birthday and your second. When you turned one, you were not playing with toys, not crawling (couldn't even support yourself on hands and knees), not even rolling over! You were able to sit, but you couldn't get in or out of the sitting position. You were not making any consonant sounds at all.
And in just one year...
you started to transition in and out of sitting
crawling
babbling
you acquired a vocabulary of close to twenty words!
using those words, along with signs, to tell us what you need
pulling up on furnitute
standing up without any support
beginning to walk!
knowing names of body parts and objects
understanding function of objects
chewing your food (not fully there yet, but I'm so glad not to have to break Cheerios in thirds anymore!)
There is a lot, lot more.
None of this was easy for you. You are a determined little girl, and you press on despite the many frustrations at not being able to meet the high standards set for you by your therapists, despite the many appointments you have to endure (poking, prodding, blood tests, x-rays...). You, my little wonder child, are unstoppable!

You just blossomed, my little flower, you. You keep changing, and you keep changing us!

Click here to view these pictures larger

Just a month ago, I wouldn't be able to take any photos of you standing by yourself in your lovely birthday dress. Actually, now I wasn't able to, either. But not because you are unable to do it. Because by the time I get you to stand and step back to get the camera ready, you have already walked to me!

Lots to Celebrate!!

Chag sameach, everyone!!
Sukkos is such a magical time of the year. So much simcha, celebration, excitement... Living in the sukka is always great fun for the kids, as is the novelty of the lulav and esrog. Not to mention decorations!

Two years ago, another dimension of excitement was added to sukkos. We were waiting for a little someone to make their appearance, and Adi joined us on Simchas Torah!
Needless to say, Sukkos will now be even more special each year.

I've been posting all the exciting stuff Adel has been doing, like walking with a walker. It was a huge deal, because it meant she didn't need to put all her weight on something for support.
Two weeks ago I announced that Adel is finally standing up on her own! No support whatsoever. Here is the visual for your eyes to feast on:




And just now! Two days before sukkos! The most wonderful, amazing, tender moment that I waited so, so long to experience- and didn't know when I'd have the privilege to see...



Count them! Eight! Eight steps!
There is truly a lot to celebrate and be thankful for this Yom Tov.

Adel's BIG Surprise!

So before I let Adi show you her big surprise, here are some hints:

A.


B.

Did you guess?

Oh, yes!

Today, for a Change

I'm always trying to catch up, always feeling behind... trying to remember what we did based on the photos that I took. Well, today we did nothing. By the time I get around to blogging about this week of summer, my summary of Wednesday will be "We just hung around and did nothing special."
But nothing is special.
Here's our day.

I washed, dried and put away diapers and wipes. No diaper laundry till Sunday! I'm enjoying this cloth diapering business! and wipes... oh, how much money I'm saving on the wipes! I have 91 cloth wipes total, and it cost me $41. It seems like a lot of money, but I'd only get 16 packages of disposable wipes for that price (and that's only when they are on sale!). 16 packages would last us about 4 months. These flannel cuties




will last a lot longer!

We redeemed a prize for out S2H Replays! We got 900 points (that's 900 minutes of exercise!) and exchanged them for 25 free photos at Snapfish. The boys chose several of their Paint Shop drawings and craft photos to print out. They have albums into which they will put the photos. Isn't that a great prize? I can just imagine the look on their faces when they receive an actual physical photo of the picture they drew on a computer. This isn't the first prize we got, though. We redeemed 680 points for a $5 Toys 'R' Us gift card and took a trip to the bay to buy a toy with our card. We found a great one for exactly $5.

We're taking it easy this week because I am sick. We didn't go anywhere special. Just to a couple of stores and that's it.

Adel had only one therapy session this week! She will have one tomorrow and one on Friday, too. Since we went to the geneticist on Monday, we canceled everything.for that day. Tuesday we usually have occupational therapy, physical therapy and special ed. PT is on vacation, special ed rescheduled for Friday, and only the OT showed up. Today was supposed to be OT again, but her car broke down. Tomorrow is special ed, all others are out! Friday is special ed as well. Adel is like a free bird!

Adi has a few new tricks.
She walks around on her knees. No holding on, just like regular walking, but it's on her knees. She knows she's too cool, because when I tell the boys to look how Adi is walking, she grins to herself, pretends to ignore us and ups the ante.

She loves to talk to us in a conversational way. She figured out what gets responses and says those things often. Like, if she says hi, we will answer. So she just says it randomly throughout the day. If I know our special ed teacher, she will be discouraging the excessive "hi"s from Adel, but I love them! Her newest response-getting phrase is, "Yeah? Yeah? Yeah?" She knows someone will answer her, "Yeah, Adi!"
And a new spontaneous word! We didn't drill this into her head, she just said it out of nowhere. "A boo."

Any guesses?


It's "a ball!" Cool, huh?

Baby Baby Ah-Mia

Whoops, I just found this post from a couple of weeks ago... I thought it got posted, but I guess not. So, tonight there is a bonus.

Here is Adel's beloved ah-mya (meow/cat):


At one point, Adel discovered that we have another "ah-mya" living in our house.

Oh, how surprised she was! She has seen him before, obviously, but I guess then she didn't really understand what it was and wasn't too impressed.
But at one point, several months ago, something clicked. And when I took Moorkitz out for Adel to play with, she flipped with excitement. It was just like her ah-mya, but mini!

Now she starts giggling when I carry her past the cage and she spies the hamster out of his hole. When I take him out, she just soars from happiness. She hugs him by putting her cheek on him. She lifts her arms and crosses them above the hamster. And she even said the word "nice"! "Naiiii, naiiii," as she was petting him! For the first time! And she's been using it properly and consistently since then. My awesome girl.

Speaking of Adel's vocabulary, I can't believe I forgot to mention Adel's latest and greatest word!

MORE! MMUH!

 She is finally saying "more" instead of screaming. When I don't give her the next spoonful of food fast enough. When I try to take her out of the swing before she is ready. So many possibilities!

 This is also when I learned that Adel is a master signer. This baby thrives on sign language! When the therapists were all trying to get Adel to understand the concept of "more," Adel kinda tuned them all out. She didn't seem to care much. Soon they started using the sign for more, and Adi's interest perked up. She looked like she was understanding what they wanted of her! She sometimes mimicked them, saying, "Mmm."

One day I was just so frustrated at Adi's screaming for more of whatever it was that I just took her hands and formed them into the sign, saying, "More, Adi, more."

And then a light went on in her head. I'm serious. I saw it. And then she just stopped screaming for more, and politely signed to me, saying, "Mmmuh."

Yesterday in OT she was having a great time with the toys and whenever the therapist wanted to change to a different toy, Adel was "moremoremoring" at her.

Another recent funnie is "Ow!" She uses it so appropriately, it's hilarious. She says "ow" when she bumps or plops down but doesn't get hurt. If she gets hurt, she SCREAMS. I much prefer her adorable ow!

So these are Adi's three new words. 

Naii/Nice

Mmuh/More

Ow!

Brought to you by: animals, sign language and a sense of humor!

It's Adi Time!

So what is the sweetie up to lately?
A lot!

She's developing in leaps and bounds.
*She is saying sentences!
Probably not the way you'd expect, but she really is. Once we went into a store that we go to occasionally. Near the cash register, there is a a rack of beanie babies and I usually give one to Adi to hold while we wait. She loves her "ah-myas." Well, one time we went into the store and as soon as we got in, Adel put her palms out in a "where" gesture and said, "Uh-uh... ah-mya!" which translates to, "Uh-oh, where are the cats?" Is this child brilliant, or what?!
Another time I was sharing a snack with her. Usually if she wants more food, she'll say, "Am." If she is feeling verbal. she'll say, "Moooh."  (more). But this time, she said, "Moooh am." More food. Wow, Adi!
And... she is finally using "up" properly! She says it when she wants to be picked up and raises her arms.
 

*She is calling me Mama!
She was able to say the word mama for a while, but didn't use it purposefully to mean me. One time I was busy and felt a little hand banging on me, saying repeatedly, "MamaMamaMama..." Now, as a mother of three young children, I always have someone pounding on me and saying mamamama. At first I kind of tuned it out, but then I realized... it was Adel! What! Was I ever surprised.

*She is doing much better physically.
Adel pulled up on her own in the photo above! And she isn't terrified of walking holding onto one hand only. One of us can hold just one of  Adi's hands and she will walk! It's not smooth, though. She walks very jerkily and stiffly, but going from two hands holding on for dear life to just one hand is HUGE. When we used to let go of one of her hands, she'd shriek and grasp at something to hold on to. Usually, it was her ear or sunhat. Funny girl.
She is also working on standing up without holding on. On my bed, she often pulls up on the bedrail and then lets go. She topples after a moment, but it's obvious that she is attempting to keep her balance longer. And one time, she actually got up in middle of my bed! Without holding on! She stood for about two seconds. Zusha was so excited! He kept re-enacting it. "Look how she got up!" "Look how long she was standing!!" And he'd remain standing for about ten seconds before falling. He really loves that girl.

*She is beginning to chew!
On Friday I was reading on my bed and watching Adel out of the corner of my eye on the floor. She was busy with something... I couldn't see what, but she was quiet and happy, so I relaxed for a while. Until the "quiet happiness" became suspicious. I took a look, and there was Adi. Face smeared brown. Chunks of brown all around her. Luckily, it was chocolate cake. I have no idea how she got it! We didn't have chocolate cake at home. I did buy soft chocolate cookies, which this food resembled, but the box was sealed and in a bag, just as I last saw it. I so wanted to take a picture of it! But Adel has a very high sense of right and wrong. As soon as she saw me looking at her, she burst into tears! She started spitting out the cake, throwing pieces as far away from her as possible, and crawled away, crying. I have no idea why she reacts this way when I catch her eating off the floor. I never scold her. All I do is take it away and say no. But she acts so remorseful if I find her eating off the floor!
In any case, on Shabbos I found her on the floor with a family sized bag of potato chips which she sneaked from somewhere, crunching away. And today, she found a raw piece of curly spaghetti on the floor and popped it into her mouth. and I heard a CRUNCH. She was chewing! In each of those situations, Adel had to do some chewing. Yay!

*She is realizing that body parts have names
Whereas before she thought that drumming on her belly while singing, "Yummy in my tummy..." was a fun game, I sense that now she is understanding that her tummy has a name. She says "popa" (tushie) when she is making, which is totally unexpected and gives me hope that she might be able to be toilet trained at an average age! Her favorite part of the body to show are her toesies.

Keep on growing, little bird!

Week Four!

After a looong, fun and busy day at Prospect Park on Sunday, we went to our regular spot on Monday- the library. We're dedicated participants in the toddler RIF program there!

Adi gets happy over a giant "ah-mya."

Tuesday was Tisha B'Av.

On Wednesday we were back at the library for arts and crafts. They were making lanyard key chains, something that is too hard for little boys. So we didn't do it.
We were playing in the main room when Adel crawled over to a 13 month old little girl and started playing with her.

She was kinda poking her at first, and I reminded her to be "nice." (Petting gently while saying "niiice.") Well, what do you know? Adel actually said "naiiii, naiiii" to the little girl! She was making nice to this little girl, Tehilla, and Tehilla was reciprocating. Soon enough they began to hug, giggle, kiss, giggle, and hug and kiss.

If you would have been there, you'd have fainted of the cute.
All the librarians stopped working and strolled on over to watch. They were fawning over the two sweetie pies who were acting like they were best friends since birth. The librarian who does the toddler program took these photos with her camera phone and sent them to me.

It was the most awwww experience.
Adel has seen her new friend a couple of times since then and each time they smiled and giggled at each other.

Now! Thursday! There is too, too much to write about Thursday.

We went to Manhattan to see a gastroenterologist. Adel needed to get a few tests done because of her digestive and elimination problems. We turned it into a fun, fun trip, including a park, river, helipad, book store, pet shop, and even managed to fit in an unplanned visit to the hospital to get Adel's blood drawn in the lab since the GI doesn't do it in her office. Poor, poor Adi had six tubes of blood drawn. They tested for a bunch of things, including celiac disease and food allergies. My feeling is that it will all come out normal, and it's just her digestive muscles that are weak. Hopefully I will get results soon.

Friday and Sunday were uneventful for a change. On Sunday my mother came to visit and Adel, in her desire to compete for her attention, actually stood up and cruised around her grandmother's chair! She is able to do it, but it's hard for her so she never does. But what an injustice! Why should she share attention with her brothers? Hmmm? This calls for desperate measures.