Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes. . . . Knees and Toes!

Hannah has been showing a lot of interest in the song, Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes lately so I paired that song with labeling her body parts, my body parts, and the parts on her Whinnie the Pooh doll. All of a sudden it was like a light bulb clicked on and she just got it. She can now correctly point to her head, nose, mouth, eyes, ears, feet, hands, and tummy about 75 % of the time. Many times she will also point to those same body parts on me or Pooh if I ask her too. I'm not convinced that she actually messes up on the times she seems to point to the wrong part or doesn't point at all. There are times when I think she is just trying to pull a fast one on me because she gets this mischievous little grin on her face and then sticks her fingers in her mouth when I ask her where her nose is!

Today the switch to half and half formula and milk was much better. In fact it was a complete turn around. She drank nearly all of her milk today. As always I panicked too soon, but at least I didn't actually call the doctor this time like I have done in the past. They must think I'm a lunatic in that office as often as I call them! They are always patient with me though and for that I am very thankful.

Since our trip to the zoo Hannah has started being more precise when she points out animals she sees in books and on videos. Instead of every animal being "Ella" or "dog" she has really started to try to classify the animals and gets pretty close most of the time. What really amazes Kyle and I is her ability to take the concept of cartoon and toy animals and real ones and realize that they are the same animal. For example, we taught her the sign for "bear" when we were at the zoo. She really seemed to like that one for some reason. Then the other day she started grabbing her Whinnie the Pooh and signing and saying bear (sounds like Buhairrrr). Then she started pointing to bears in her story books (she has several of them) and doing the same thing. I personally don't think Pooh looks very much like a real bear and definitely not like either of the types of bears we saw at the zoo, but somehow she still knows. Tonight when I was reading her a bedtime story that goes through all the animal mommies saying they love their babies we got to the page with the bear (realistic looking) and before I could even start reading the page she said bear! Then when we got to the rabbit she said rabbit and when we got to the duck she said duck! I was absolutely floored! Earlier in the day we were reading her bible (in the bible chair!) and we got to the story of Noah's Ark and it shows cartoon pictures of all the animals exiting the ark. She started pointing to the animals she knew and saying their names. She didn't know some so I told her about the llamas, goats, flamingos, etc and others she didn't have the exact animal, but had the general category right: cat for tiger and lion for example and bird for penguin and peacock. I am just amazed everyday at all she knows and how quickly she learns. I'm sure this is all normal stuff for babies and toddlers since they really do have so much to learn and I've often heard them described as little sponges which is exactly what Hannah seems to be, but I've not been around kids of this age much so it all seems so wondrous and totally insane to me! Regardless, I'm so proud of my little girl and all her accomplishments. Now if we could just get her stubbornness and tantrums under control . . . . I guess there has to be down side to her new found independence and knowledge, but how I wish the tantrums were a little less explosive and scary. Yesterday she threw one on the kitchen floor which is ceramic tile and she absolutely slammed her head face first into the floor because I wouldn't let her climb inside the dishwasher! She throws herself down and hits her head several times a day now and sometimes even deliberately bangs her head against things when she's frustrated or angry. It really scares me that she's going to hurt herself. So far it hasn't seemed to phase her, but it's definitely something I'm going to bring up with the doctor.

Speaking of being in the kitchen, another one of Hannah's newest pursuits is playing with magnets. I went through all of our magnets and put the ones that are all one piece and too large for her to swallow and too weak to cause problems if they were swallowed on the bottom of the fridge so that she could play with them. I put some duplicate pictures I had of her down there as well for her to play with. She loves to point to the pictures and then point to herself and say Hannah. She's also been conducting little experiments to see what the magnets will stick to. She's figured out so far that they stick to the fridge, bottom part of the stove and dishwasher and kitchen door, but not to the cabinets or the top part of the stove. Today she spent at least 15 minutes opening up the bottom drawer of the stove (where we keep the cookie sheets) and sticking the magnets to the inside of the front face of the drawer. She would stick them on, close the drawer, open the drawer back up, take the magnet off, look at it, stick it back on either the inside or the outside, close the drawer again, and then repeat the whole process over and over again.

Here's a video of Hannah practicing climbing. She's getting pretty good at it now and can even turn around and sit down in the chair once she gets up into it! She's not quite able to get up onto the couch by herself yet, but it's not for lack of effort. I'm sure she'll be able to soon as much as she is practicing! http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2418069064794768298&hl=en