My first kiss!

Chloe has been having a difficult time adjusting to an in-home day care situation. She does beautifully during the day playing with the other children, but when she gets home at night, she becomes very fussy. She cries if she hears the word "No". She tries to scratch and bite us. She cries if we put her down; she cries if we pick her up (and don't take her somewhere). She throws her food(and anything else she can get her hands on) at dinner time. She won't eat what we offer, but cries for more. It has been a rough 4 weeks.

Now she appears to have turned the corner. She has acted "normal" for an entire week. I was really beginning to worry about attachment issues, since she didn't seem happy with me, no matter what I did. Since last Sunday, we have been taking her swimming in our pool. We had tried a couple of weeks earlier, but she was in her fussy stage, and didn't enjoy it at all. Now she really loves it, especially with both parents. She wants us both to hold her and she wants to be passed back and forth repeatedly. She really seems to love the close contact and playing in the water. Unfortunately, last night, we didn't go swimming because we were waiting for the cable guy to show up and change out our cable box. When I arrived home, Chloe was her fussy self. She pointed to the pool and would just cry. She cried for about 45 minutes. I was afraid this would be one of those difficult evenings. He showed up two hours after we were expecting him.

Since we brought Chloe home from China, Pete and I have been showering her with hugs and kisses. She never really had much of a reaction, just kind of ignored it. We tried to teach her how to blow kisses because one of the other babies from her orphanage was blowing kisses from day one. She got the swinging arm part down pretty quickly, but couldn't do anything with the lips. A few days ago, she came home from daycare making a kissing sound. It was so cute beacause she still couldn't put the lips together right, but she had mastered the sound.

Last night while I was laying on the floor with her, playing with her toys and watching her "Baby Shakespeare" video, she crouched down into a squatting position and placed her lips to mine and gave me a real kiss. Wow! What an unexpected surprise. I just smiled and gave her a hug. Throughout the remainder of the evening, I was the happy recipient of about 25 kisses. Dad didn't get any, even though he begged. I have to cherish every affectionate moment possible, because I know Chloe is definitely a "Daddy's Girl".

We have a general policy that whichever parent Chloe is least happy with is the parent that she needs to spend the most time with (barring extreme situations of course), especially the bedtime routine and bottle. After tonight's showering of hugs and kisses on Momma, Daddy got to give her the bottle. First time in a week!

One and One Half Today!

Today Chloe turned 18 months old! Since we missed her first birthday, it kinda feels like a semi-birthday today. We don't have anything exciting planned, not even a present. Maybe we will do something special tonight. Pete and I are really enjoying our time with Chloe and wouldn't change anything.

Two weekends ago, Chloe got to meet her maternal Grandparents for the first time. We all stayed together at our weekend home in Tehachapi. Chloe turned on the charm and made a grand impression. We visited again last weekend and by the end of the visit, she had Grandpa picking her up and carrying her around everywhere. He was her personal transportation system.

Chloe's vocabulary has taken a big turn today. Up until this point, it pretty much consisted of "mama", "baba", "dada", "yaya" (for yo-yo) and "Mam!" (when she wants more food now!). This morning, as I was getting ready to leave, she pointed to a buckle on my purse and loudly exclaimed "Look at that!". She has been trying to say this phrase for awhile now, but this is the first time she said it loud and clear.

She has a ball that spins on a horizontal axis and sounds out the alphabet. For the first few months home, I would spin the ball for her and sing along to the Alphabet Song. She would enjoy listening, but left it to me to spin the ball. Each letter of the alphabet is on the ball and if you press a letter, it will sound out the name. For two weeks now, she has been pressing the letter "o" and trying to immitate the sound. It is really cute, but I was wondering when she would move onto some other letters. Today she repeatedly pressed "k". At this rate, we should have the alphabet down by sometime next year! I will try to post another picture within a few days.