Well, it's been far too long (again) since I've written a web log entry about Samantha, and once again it's like living with a completely different person. There have been so many developments, so many firsts ... sometimes it seems like every day she learns something new or tries something different.

For one thing, she's been walking everywhere for at least the past few weeks. I don't remember the last time I saw her crawl anyplace. She's gone from toddling along unsteadily on her feet to toddling along quite steadily -- she doesn't quite have the smooth walking movements down yet, but she can get where she wants to go with surprising speed. She also climbs every piece of furniture she can get a hand or foot onto. I walked into the den one day and found her sitting in the blue reclining chair just like a little miniature adult.

I swear she's got the engineering gene somewhere in her makeup as well. She takes things apart to figure out what's inside them, and if there's a button or lever or control on anything -- no matter how well hidden -- she will find it. She has a new toy that you push balls down the middle of through a tube, and on the way down they press in a small button on the side of the tube that causes lights to flash and music to play. It wasn't more than 5 minutes before she'd reached down the tube, found the button, and pressed it repeatedly while "dancing" (bouncing up and down on her heels with her knees bent) to the sound of the music.

She's also doing all of the usual toddler stuff like stacking things, putting things into containers and taking them out again over and over, and so on. She did surprise me the day she learned to unscrew the cover from a small juice bottle and then screw it back on again.

And she simply loves the outdoors now that the weather is improving. When you carry her outside or take her to the park her whole face lights up and she giggles or shrieks with delight. Now that she's finally over that miserable virus and feeling herself again we get relatively more shrieks of delight and fewer of pain or frustration (unless, of course, she wants to get at something you're keeping her away from!)

More little tidbits from life with Samantha:

• She's getting into cutlery. She used a fork for the first time around a week ago. Before that she'd eat from a fork if you put it in her mouth, but last week she actually picked up the fork herself and brought it to her mouth to eat what was on it. She even managed to skewer a piece of food or two herself. Now it's a week later and she's eating yogurt from a cup with a spoon. She's progressing by leaps and bounds.
  
  
• Two weeks ago I was concerned because Samantha didn't seem inclined to hold her own bottles or drink from a sippy cup. My, how things change! Now she drinks from cups, from juice boxes with a straw, and from a little sport bottle I got her the other day. She still hasn't mastered the skill of keeping all the liquid in her mouth, but the change in the last week or two has been dramatic.
  
  
• She often holds long conversations with herself either in her crib or in her high chair. She's not really using words intelligibly yet, but she has the rhythm and cadence of speech down pat, and sometimes she'll start "talking" to you and look very serious at some points, then burst out laughing at others. It's clear she thinks she's said something very funny; we just don't understand her language yet.
  
  
• On the other hand, she did say "bye bye" (sort of) and waved goodbye to the wait staff at the local Thai restaurant earlier in the week, and she said "Bye" and waved to me as I left for work this morning. I can't wait until she really starts talking.
  
  
• Samantha loves books. She'll make you read them to her over and over, and will sit on the floor next to her bookshelf, or in her crib, or in the den, and leaf through book after book.
  
  
• Perhaps the cutest (and most baffling) thing I've seen her do lately is this:
  
  

  She has a little school-style desk, a chair with an attached writing surface that you can draw on with chalk. She loves sitting at the desk and looking at books, being a little too young to do much in the way of drawing. Yesterday morning she walked up to the desk, stood for a minute, then toddled off to the kitchen.
  
  

  She opened the drawer below the ovens where we keep all the dish towels, took one out, carried it back to the desk, wiped off the seat, took the dish towel back to the kitchen and put it in the drawer, closed the drawer, came back to the dining room and only then sat down at the desk. I couldn't believe it! I'm sure that neither Amy nor I has ever wiped off a chair in Samantha's presence (and have probably never wiped off a chair at all, for that matter), so where on earth did she learn that one? It's a mystery.
  
  

With Samantha around, there is never a dull moment.