Billa Babble: Play, La La La, Paci, Ball, More, All Done, & Bye

Hello all! Still have not gotten the camera back. I'm about to go stalk Michael's cousin's house to see if I can catch him and get it back. In other news, I finally caved and joined Facebook. You can find me under Kelly Guerra. I have to laugh. In three days, I have more friends than Michael has gained in a year. MWAHAHAHA! Victory is mine!

Now, onto the words of the week(s)!

Our first word is PLAY. Billa brought me the remote the other day and handed it to me. I asked her if she wanted me to play some 'toons for her and she repeated the word play. It came out more like 'pay'. Later she brought me the remote again and said 'pay.' We've really got to start limiting our Noggin time...

Our second word is LA LA LA. While this is really a string of words, it's really cute to hear Billa sing. If we start singing to her, she'll sometimes repeat it. I did manage to capture some of it on film, but again, that will have to wait until we retrieve our camera.

Our third word is PACI. Pronounced 'passy' as in pacifier. Yes, Billa still uses one but only at night or in the car when she's really fussy. Anyhoo, when we nurse in the mornings, I usually set her paci on the dresser next to the rocker and give it back to her when we're done. She reached towards it the other morning and said 'paci.' Of course, at 5:45 I wasn't all there and finally realized what she was saying after she said it 5 times.

Our fourth word is BALL. Billa recognizes a ball when she sees ones and today we were playing with one at her Zeti & Tata's. She sad "bah!" and ran towards it. Too cute!

Our fifth word is MORE. This morning we had special pastry bites for breakfast and when she had finished her first one, she pointed at the box and said 'more!' Success!

Our sixth word is ALL DONE. Ok, that's really two words, but it's a big deal. When she finishes her food or we've decided she's had enough of sugar/playtime/chaos, we always tell her "All done!" in a loud voice. Tonight she finished her dinner and said "Da! Da! Ah dunh!" (translated as Daddy, I'm all done!) WE were VERY excited as it can be hard to tell at dinner if she is finished with her food or making poops.

And our final word is BYE. Billa has now coupled the good bye wave with 'bye.' There is no mistaking what she is telling you. She totally stole the cake store ladies' hearts when she waved at them, said 'bye' and then gave them a big gummy smile on our way out after my icing class yesterday.

There are other things she has said in the last few weeks, but since it's so intermittent, it can be hard to remember them until she uses the word in context again, which is why I skipped posting words last week. Anyhoo, it's late and time to head to bed. Until next time,

Kelly & the Gang

Striptease, Stacking & Vocals

With each day that Billa gets older, she amazes us with what she learns and does. Take for example, our wake up call on Saturday morning.

Michael and I had had a date night the evening before to go see a movie while Billa stayed with her Gigi (Michael's mom). So we got home WAY late and so we were all very tired the next morning. Usually on weekends we pull Billa into bed with us when she wakes up at about 7:30 to try and reclaim a few minutes of precious shuteye. She scooted off the bed and started rummaging through stuff and pulling things out. I finally got up and was headed to the shower when Billa brought me a diaper. "Where did you get a diaper from?" I asked her. That was when I noticed that she was naked from the waist down. Whoops! Looks like Daddy's diaper change at 4 am didn't go so well! Fortunately, it was not a poopy diaper, but it certainly was an eye-opener for sure.

Billa has also started to learn how to stack things. We got her a musical star stacker for her birthday and since she has learned how to stack the stars on it, EVERYTHING gets stacked. She's been pulling the DVD's off the shelf and stacking them, books get stacked, the puzzle boards get stacked, etc. We've been trying to get her to replace them when she's done and I guess it's starting to sink in... she placed her paci in the empty space on the DVD shelf!

Vocally, Billa's babble has been morphing into more complex sounds with quite a range. Sometimes she likes to growl and roar, and others she trills and squeals. We've also noticed that she is starting to associate certain words with certain objects, which is really exciting. It's hilarious to ask her where Gumerry is and watch her hunt the cat down.

Anyway, I've been meaning to post some pictures except that a certain someone (Daddy) left our camera at his cousin Stephen's house on St. Patty's Day and we have been unable to retrieve it since. [sigh] I'll definitely post lots of them when I get it back!

Until then,
Kelly & the Gang

Billa Babble – Word(s) of the Week: Bubble, Cat, & Water

It's time to introduce a new feature to Lapiz de la Guerra! In the last few weeks, Billa's chattering and babbling has started to take on a lot more sounds and there have been several times where we would swear she just said a word. There are naysayers who are thinking that she's too young to understand what she's saying or what we're saying and that this is just first time parent silliness. To you I say, FIE! When my girl comes running to me, arms outstretched and moaning "A-ma!", I think she understands a lot of what is said to her and is repeating the words she hears. She might not be using them in a gramatically correct complete sentence, but we're working on it! And speaking of working on it, I AM trying to curb my sailor's mouth, so you can all stop right there with your lectures on my swearing habits. Without further ado….

BILLA BABBLE – WORD(S) OF THE WEEK!

Our first word is CAT. On Friday morning, Billa was running around on the patio with Gumerry before we left. She chased him back in the living room where she proceeded to point at him and say loudly: "Ca! Ca!" (As in CAT, but without the T, not 'caw,' like a crow) I wasn't really sure she'd said it until she repeated it again before terrorizing poor Gumerry further.

Our second word is BUBBLE. On Saturday, Mommy found a bottle of bubbles while she and Daddy were unpacking boxes and cleaning/organizing (we were a bit delayed due to Michael's hand injury in December just after we moved in). She LOVED the bubbles and as she stood reaching for them forlornly, she said "Buh-buh" with the same intonation I had been using! She then said it again when I repeated the word.

Our third word is WATER. Monday night I went to the gym and when I got back I was drinking out of a bottle of water. Billa loves water bottles and I gave her mine when I was almost finished with it. Michael continued to play with her while I took a shower and he came running in a few minutes to tell me that she had said water! I asked him what it sounded like and he said it sounded like "Ah-her." We tried to get her to say it again and she said something that sounded like it, but by then she was distracted and ran off.

So there you have it folks! Tune in next time for more Billa Babble!
Love,
the Guerra Gang

One Year Wellcheck, Early Mornings, and Look Ma, No Hands!

Daycare was closed last Friday so I took off from work for a much needed day of rest and to take Billa to the doctor for her 12 month checkup. She got three shots (Dtap, MMR, and Hep A) and did really well with them. She only cried because we held her down and then stuck her, but once she was allowed up to run around, she was good to go. Dr. Patil was impressed with her mobility and Sybilla even performed her Happy Feet for the good doctor! Dr. Patil is also glad that Billa is not a juice fiend, is no longer using bottles (we've been using sippy cups for about 3 months now), and is eating relatively healthy.

Her stats are:

Height – 29" (50th percentile)
Weight – 25# (95th percentile)
Head – 46cm (75th percentile)

Sybilla has been sleeping a lot better lately and has adjusted well to being weaned off bedtime nursings. We're still nursing in the morning when she wakes up and I had considered weaning her off of those now that she's a year old and getting her nutrition from other sources. However, Michael and I have noticed that she really looks forward to these feedings as evidenced by her morning behavior as of late. Usually she would wake up about 4 or so and Michael would go in to give her a pacifier and put her back to sleep. The last couple of mornings however, he's walked in to find that she still has her paci in her mouth! She sees him, makes a disgusted noise and then throws herself down on her pillow to go back to sleep. Apparently Daddy is not what she wanted! This morning was even funnier. Michael went it to find her with TWO pacis—one in her mouth and one in her hand! He put her back to bed and when I went in a bit later, she still had them both and promptly dropped one and spit out the other to get her wake up snack. Too funny!

Sybilla 1 year old, Gardening with the Marino's!

We've also recently discovered that Billa is a little daredevil. She has taken to climbing just about everything she can and she just about gave me a heart attack this weekend when I caught her banging on the wall in the living room. This wouldn't have been so bad if it weren't for the fact that she was standing on a swivel chair doing it! She had pushed her little wicker rocking chair up to the swivel chair and climbed from the floor to her chair, and then into the swivel chair. We've since had to start teaching her to sit down on her bottom in her chair, which she's getting very good at. Lord only knows what she'll learn next!

Until next time,
Kelly & the Gang