Morgan & Erin Dahl

Advances in Dining

Morgan uses a bowl at daycare and puts it in a bin when she is done with her meals.  So we decided we should try to move forward on this front at home as well.  To that end…

We got some plastic kiddie plates (non-skid bottoms).  She eats quite happily off the plate.  She tried to pick it up as though she might hurl it to the ground only once or twice.  When she is done with her meal, she will pick up the plate and hand it to you.

We also got much bigger/deeper spoons.  The spoons we had been using were rated for 4+ months.   She can feed herself yogurt.  I hold the container and she dips the spoon into the yogurt and gets most of the yogurt into her mouth.  She will do this repeatedly without any assistance/interruption from me.  She tends to tire of the process at some point and will thrust the spoon towards me and squawk.  (I also think this is partly because getting yogurt out of the bottom of the container doesn’t go as well).   So I usually end up helping her with the last bit.

Along with the larger spoons, we got her a ‘safety fork.’  The outer tines have rounded ends and the inner tines are shorter than the outer, so it is hard to stab yourself.  We tried this for the first time tonight.  She had been squawking and reaching for the fork in my hand, so I figured we might as well give it a shot.  At the beginning she needed help.  I would hold the cantaloupe and she would place the fork on it but wouldn’t apply any pressure.  So I would help her stab it and she would bring it to her mouth and eat it. (Actually, at first she would hold the fork in one hand, pick up cantaloupe with the other, put the cantaloupe in her mouth, and then follow with the fork in her mouth.  Too cute!)  By the end she managed to pin a couple of pieces against the raised edge of the plate, stab them with the fork herself, and get them into her mouth.

Unbelievable.

Morgan’s new chair

This was actually not staged — she climbs into it herself and picks up books and thumbs through them.

Jimmy Buffett redux

Morgan wowed the Labor Day weekend crowd by having a response to “how cute, her first concert!”  We were able to note that it was actually her 2nd (remember last year).  That put her one ahead of Grandparents Wetzel, who were able to come up for the show.

She loved the tailgating and enjoyed the excitement of the first few songs before she decided it was finally time to get some sleep.

First Word

For awhile we thought Dad (actually Da) would be her first word.  She would use it when seeing Jim, but she also used it in non-Jim situations.  She’ll often use it now when giving you something or pointing to something.

Her actual first word, which she has been using correctly and consistently for a few weeks now, is ‘up,’ as in pick me up.

She still is babbling all the time.  I think she’s working on Mama.  We’ll see what the next week or two holds.

Visiting Great Grandma Newby

Morgan got to visit Great Grandma (Molly’s mother’s mother) Lura in Hertford, NC, this weekend.