Fifteen months old

Delphine is almost fifteen months old. The last couple of weeks have been very interesting. She has demonstrated, numerous times, that she is perfectly capable of walking, and would rather not, thank you. I think she doesn't like the instability of it. Eventually her balance will get better and the convenience of walking with outweigh the security of crawling, but for now it's hands on the floor for her.

Last week she laughed at her first verbal humour: "Socks! Ka-pocks! Shoes! Ka-poes! Pants! Ka-pants!" This is very funny stuff indeed, you have no idea.

She is babbling a lot, and is a pretty competent mimic. She likes "bababa" and "dadada" best (typical!) but has attempted, with varying degrees of success, such diverse words as "cheesestick", "step" and "Zaida".

She doesn't seem to eat much, but she's still nursing a lot. I would like her to nurse less so I can ovulate already, but I'm not sure how to go about it. She's pretty insistent about it when she wants to nurse, and it's the easiest way to get her to sleep, especially during the day when Blake isn't around with his magic shoulder.

She's still sleeping with us, but I would like to move her to the crib. I have thought and thought about it and I think the only way to do it will involve some crying. We've made a couple of attempts to sneak her into the crib after she's asleep, but she always either wakes up when we're putting her down, or wakes up later and cries. I'm planning to do a Ferber type thing, going in to visit her at regular intervals until she falls asleep. I read the Pantley book, The No-Cry Sleep Solution and I don't think her idea of repeatedly picking her up and soothing her, then putting her down in the crib, will work because she cries instantly when we put her down, and we end up spending the whole night holding her. But we're establishing a bedtime routine, and I'm going to see if she finds a transitional object; I do want to make this easy on her, and us. We're starting this weekend. Unless we chicken out, like we have the last two weekends.

I can see her becoming a toddler; she is getting to be much more assertive about her world. She cries when you take something away from her that she wanted, or when you tell her not to do something appealing like put her hand in the toilet or pick up cigarette butts. She will put up a good tug-of-war with other babies if they both want the same toy, although Delphine generally gives up first and cries, thereby winning because the parents inevitably step in and give her the toy, because the other kid looks like the big meany. She is so smart!

She's becoming more fascinated with cats and dogs. She can find the cat in any picture (if there is one, obviously) and she can point to where the real-life cats are, too. She always looks when we see dogs when we're out. I think in September I will take her to the zoo and see what she makes of all the other animals.

I can't think of anything else, except that she's so lovely and interesting and good. This morning we went to the bulk food store, and I parked her in the stroller just inside the door while I collected my groceries, and she just sat there and looked around and didn't make a peep. What a baby.