10 Months Old Today!

Hallelujah! Sweet words to my ears - we've learned to say "mamammam amammam
mamama!"
Yes, Indeed, Kalyna is 10 months old now and completely clear on whom she is. She is very assertive about what she likes, dislikes (shows this by throwing food onto the floor that doesn't meet her interests), what makes her happy, and when we've upset her. She now has 4 teeth with which to wreak havoc on food items, mama's chin and nose! and is making hilarious "clicking" noises all the time. F thinks that she's mimicking the sound of kissing which could be the case.

Kalyna has also taken to "sharing' her food with me. This generally takes the form of her grabbing food off her plate, putting it in her mouth, pulling it out, then shoving it towards my mouth. Thinking that this was very advanced and generous, I've started taking the offerings. Yesterday, it all went awry when I was fed (think Sea World and the orcas) a piece of hard toast, was munching on it, then baby K shot her index finger in between my teeth, and blammo - a little crunch for me, and lots of crying for Kalyna:-(

This one is turning out to be a real talker AND has an extremely loud voice when she wants to - pretty hilarious for now... wonder if I'll feel that way once she replaces her demands with actually words?

A huge new development, which has me more pinned down to her side is that Kalyna has started to pull up on the laundry basket and sometimes our hands. Within the span of 4 days she went from needing to be fully supported on her feet, to making her way on her own around the laundry basket, down the book self (pulling every book down along the way), and dancing to Beyonce and Rhianna! She's got rhythm! So now I'm an unglorified spotter shadowing her every move. Unfortunately, every day we have some nasty spills, but they're quickly put behind us as we move onto the next shelf, or storage bin pursuit.

In other news, Mama has started working a few 1/2 days a week at MacDonald Realty, so baby K has found a temporary part time home at a friend's house who has a nanny share arrangement with a wonderful Australian woman. My heart has seriously ached every time I've dropped her off, and I've tried to hide my welling up, but it's GUT-WRENCHING leaving her with someone else. Fortunately though, she apparently does very well, is very happy, eats well, just doesn't sleep while she's there... too much to take in I suppose? She is staring to learn some tricks from her 20mths old friend, Cole, which is interesting to watch.

I've found that breastfeeding is now taking a greater toll on me. I get pretty drained at the end of the day, and have an exceptionally muddled head for a while after feedings. It's worse than before, and I'm trying to figure out if it's because I have a lot on the go apart from just being a mom, or if my body has reached a point where it is taking more to churn out the goods and is taking resources from my brain (sugars etc.). Regardless, I'm trying to figure out a plan for how to handle the eventual weaning as it's going to be a shocker for both Kalyna and me. Oh joy.