Oh Christmas Tree…”Ouch” Christmas Tree!

Quinn Examining B.G.'s Ornaments

Quinn Examining B.G.’s Ornaments

I love decorating for the holidays, especially for Christmas. Putting up the lights, garland and tree has always been a childhood favorite of mine, and I want to pass that tradition on to my little girl as well. Last year, at seven months, Quinn did not pay much attention to the tree, but this year she is fascinated with it and loves examining the ornaments. For fun, my husband and I always name our Christmas tree as though he is a part of the family. This year he is “B.G.” (short for Big Green).  Every morning, she enjoys saying, “Hi tree!” or “Hola arbol!” As sweet as this interaction is, Quinn also loves yanking off B.G.’s ornaments and will either stash them in random places or return them to her dad or me with a big grin on her face.

So we came up with a plan which was working for a little while. We convinced her that it hurts him and pretended that he was saying, “Ouch!” whenever she pulled at his ornaments. Initially, she had sympathy for B.G. and would even stroke his tree branch and say, “Sorry” or “No ouch tree!” But lately, she quickly yanks off an ornament and yells out in a high-pitch voice, “Ouch!” Then she scurries off giggling with me or my husband chasing behind her. She thinks this is hilarious, and as much as I want her to stop messing with B.G.’s ornaments, it is quite funny, and I find myself stifling my chuckle from time to time as I catch my little girl sneakily trying to take one of B.G.’s ornaments when she thinks no one is looking. Here’s to new Christmas traditions!

All the best,

Tanya

We Hit the Lotto Baby!

Quinn Getting Ready to Sort

Quinn Getting Ready to Sort

Watching my little 19 month old girl master a skill always puts a smile on my face. She often amazes me and catches me off guard with what she is capable of doing. Since Quinn loves playing on my iPad, I downloaded some  apps through iTunes to stimulate her critical thinking skills. One app in particular which is designed to “enhance vocabulary, hand-eye coordination, categorization, concentration and visual perception” is Tiny Hands Children’s Educational Lotto I. The app involves matching puzzle games where the child drags the object on the card to the identical object on the board. Quinn has been playing this game on occasion for about two months, but she mainly just liked to touch the object so that she could hear the name of it and attempt to repeat it. About a month ago, she figured out how to drag the object across the screen, and within the past couple of weeks, she figured out how the drag the object to the one that matches. Though I still like the “old-fashioned” wooden puzzles and activities that have physical objects she can touch, such as sorting the different color bears as pictured above (as does Quinn), I am extremely impressed with the progress my little one has made in a short duration of time and would highly recommend this app for anyone who has a tech savvy baby like mine. Here’s a video of my little girl matching different clothing items:

All the best,

Tanya

Big Baby is Watching!

Quinn looking at photos of herself

Quinn looking at photos of herself

Though my little girl is only 19 months, she enjoys leafing through the many photos and videos on my iPad. One video in particular that she plays quite frequently is of her walking for the first time at a little under 11 months. She often smiles and points and signals to me or my husband to watch the video with her as she replays this achievement over and over again. Using an iPad has become so natural for her that I should have known what was coming sooner rather than later. On quite a few occasions, Quinn has taken random “selfie” pictures, but the other day, for the first time, Quinn decided that she wanted to film her first video rather than watch. She recorded a 20 second video basically looking at herself. Now that I know what she is capable of doing, I better watch out because my “big baby” girl is watching and just might start filming me. Who knows, maybe I have a future video production professional on my hands!

All the best,

Tanya