First Steps

Kayley took her first step! Last Thursday night she was standing and took a step forward. Within an hour she took three steps in a row. She got super excited about it and then could barely stand up. She was so cute to watch and Andrew and I are so happy we were both there to witness her first steps. I was afraid we would both miss her first steps. I just knew she’d be adventuring out in steps soon and since Andrew and I had a planned vacation away from Kayley for Friday through Saturday I was worried she would take her first steps then. But God is good and allowed us to witness her first attempts.

Kayley got to spend Friday and Saturday at her aunty and uncle’s house with two of her cousins while Andrew and I spent a lovely time at the Salish Lodge in Snoqualmie. We missed her, but did our best to focus on each other, knowing she was probably having a blast and doing just fine. We were told that while Kayley was there, she took five steps in a row! Go baby girl, go!

Kayley is still very wobbly when it comes to walking, but she has only had a few days of practice. You can tell a part of her is interested in being able to walk like mommy and daddy and she wishes she walked better than what she currently does (sometimes she takes a step as if trying to run and lands hard on the floor. Though she doesn’t complain about falling as much anymore). But her desire to get places is overruling this at the moment, and crawling indeed gets her places fast.

On a completely different note; Kayley had her first taste of Japanese food! We went a Japanese restaurant Sunday after church with some friends and let her try an avocado roll, and inari (fried tofu filled with rice). She seems to enjoy the taste of seaweed and inari. When she gets older we’ll be able to share more Japanese food with her!

Kayley: What is this?

Avocado sushi

Inari

Practice Makes Perfect

Kayley has been doing quite a bit of practicing. Last week a friend gave us their walker for Kayley to use. Kayley loves it! She loves the music it makes and the buttons on the front of it. But most of all she loves pushing it as she walks. 

Happily walking

Peek-a-boo, I see you.

She has actually figure out that when she walks it into a wall she can walk around it and push it from the front until she walks it into another wall. It’s so fun to watch her walk around and problem solve when it gets stuck.

Focused on walking

Kayley has also been working on standing by herself. We started playing a game a few days ago: I sit on the floor in front of her and then put in her a standing position and let go, she then stands for a bit by herself and then leans or jumps toward me. Sometimes she stands there and then goes into a squatting position, squats for a bit and then sits down.  She loves playing this game, and she’s getting pretty good standing alone.

Kaboom!

So excited to be standing alone! She squealed and put her hands together.

I think she is still trying to figure out what she is supposed to do while standing, or what to do next. Oh I love watching her learn and grow!

Gates

We have had baby gates up in our home for a couple weeks now. One thing we didn’t think of when we put the gates up is how much Hoshi, our cat, hates to jump high and over things. Turns out our baby gates aren’t just baby proof, they’re cat proof too. So to make it so Hoshi can get to her food, water, litter box and “throne” (the chair she thinks is her's), we’ve had to make a couple adjustments.

The pressure gate that we use to keep Kayley out of our room sits about 3 inches off the ground so Hoshi can crawl under it.

Silly cat

As for the gate that cuts our apartment in half, well when we plan to have it closed for a lengthy amount of time we place one of our table’s stools on one said of the gate, and another one on the opposite side. We don’t know why, but Hoshi will jump onto the stools, though she won’t just over the gate… Go figure… Otherwise we just open the gate for her when she sits and meows or scratches at it. 

Our third gate blocks the heater that Kayley thinks makes wonderful music when toys are hit against it. We discourage this because when the heater is on, the vent gets hot. We don’t want little burned fingers. Hoshi could care less about this gate and has completely ignored it. 

Oh yes, and we keep a box in front of the entrance to Kayley's room (you can see it in the picture above). She can climb on top of it and push it, but she rarely does either (now). But it's easy to move and step over for Andrew and me.

We still need to figure out how to baby proof our entertainment unit or purchase a new one.  Currently we block it, and divide the living room in half (to keep Kayley away from the fireplace) with our coffee table and two stools lying on their sides. Hoshi just walks right through those. Our home might look weird if you come over and it’s set up like this, but it keep our precious little one out of danger. 

Keeping Kayley away from the fire.