Monaloca

We finally caved to Meli’s insistence that her head of hair remain bare and free most the time. (Granted, she’ll sometimes leave a hair-clip in for hours at a stretch, but more often will pull it out within 30 minutes – usually just to see what’s there.)

Since we butchered her bangs so badly when we cut them ourselves right after her first birthday, I insisted we take her to Cool Cuts for Kids, at least for one bang trim. From now on we’ll just follow the line with our scissors at home. (Now that the deed is done I feel like they did no better than we did. And our home haircut was free.)

Melina did great. At first she wanted to sit on the horse, but quickly decided she’d rather walk around the salon and explore. Onto Mama’s lap she went! The stylist added a pretty pink bow after her trim. Melina left this in for her standard thirty minutes.

Btw, Kai chose his sister’s outfit this morning. Doesn’t she look pretty in so much pink?

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Please join me at tonight’s Left Coast Writers event, Labors of Love, Work, and Play, where I’ll be reading from my personal essay, “Stepping into Mamahood.”

The event will run from 5:30-7pm @ Book Passage in the Ferry Building, SF.

For now, attending this event is the only way to “read” this latest essay, as I’m still shopping it around and will not be posting it to my blog anytime soon.

On a semi-related note, I recently lamented to my writing friend and fellow mom how hard it is to find time to write. She mentioned she had just checked out this blog, and asked how much time I spent on it each week. I could only respond “Too much – but it’s my hobby!” to which she replied, “Cut down on the blog posts unless they’ll lead to stories. There’s your writing time.” I’m going to try to take her advice to heart, so my posts may (should) be less frequent, at least for a while.

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I’m not sure when official toddlerhood begins, but if it hadn’t already, it certainly did this past month. Some milestones and traits of mention from our growing 15-month-old!

Though she’s been walking for several months, Melina had never strayed more than 15 or so feet from us in public places. Until this past week. Suddenly she’s taking off to explore every chance she gets. Sometimes it’s out the door, or trying to close the door, or just up to some other folks (aka strangers) to say “hey.” Sometimes it’s down the street.

It doesn’t help us that she’s also running. Or more to the point, doing a fast jog-waddle complete with a synchronized giggle.

More useful to us, she started nodding her head “yes” just after 14 months. And she does it in a meaningful way. I’ll ask if she wants a banana or to read “hop pop” and she’ll usually nod yes. But when I ask if she’s wants some milk or a mushroom she’ll always give a firm head-shake NO!

Speaking of food, I officially weaned the Jelly Bean about two weeks ago. It happened fairly naturally, with the daytime dropping off first (no more pumping helped this), then the morning (she got sidetracked pretty quickly with morning play and big-people food), and finally we decided it was time to cut the bedtime feeding as well. She took to it without a single fuss. I, on the other hand, still have moments of longing for those quiet moments alone with her and feel a bit like this was the final door closing on her babyhood. Not a bad thing, I’m just eternally nostalgic.

Of course Melina’s favorite people are still Mama, Dada, and BroBro (who she distinctly called “Baby” the other day – cute). She and Kai share a room and have started socializing on occasion before they fall asleep at night, and if Kai’s lucky and Meli wakes early, also in the morning before we get her out of her crib. The other week we took some video of Meli helping BroBro wash his hair. She’s not the gentlest person in the world, but for once Kai’s on the receiving end of aggressive affection.

Favorite items? Blankie (one of five, or all at once!) and her stuffed animals. She’s started calling Kai’s stuffed lamb, Chopeater, “Baby” and likes to place him upright in her play stroller and stroll him around the house. Other favorite items: Any bottle she can get her hands on. Tiny airplane-sized bottles of port. A huge bottle of dishwashing liquid from Costco. An empty vinegar bottle. And finally: Books. She still has a hard time sitting through a whole story that’s not interactive, and prefers to bring a whole collection of books to the couch and flip back and forth between them. Joey does the same thing, so if it’s not the age it’s certainly hereditary. And hey, there’s nothing wrong with a home filled with multi-taskers.

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