Rest for the wicked

In the interests of recording the positive stuff (as well as all the sleep-related wailing that those of you who follow me on Twitter will have seen):

* Img slept for a four-hour stretch at the beginning of the night on both Monday night & Tuesday night (and each time went back to sleep fairly easily after that waking and the subsequent wakings)! Four hours' sleep in one go! Two nights running! I was feeling almost human! (Though last night was another scratchy one, bah.)

* She can now crawl backwards a bit (and roll a lot). :-) She seems to be very close to crawling forwards -- she gets her legs in the right positions and everything, and occasionally even seems to lurch forwards a bit, but she's not quite got it coordinated yet. She can also stand up if she's holding on to furniture, and 'walk' if I hold her hands -- she really seems to enjoy that, and tries to stand/walk at every available opportunity; I guess she may yet skip crawling altogether!

* She seems to be picking up bits of baby sign language (we are trying to do some of this, & I'm going to Sing & Sign classes with her): she makes the 'milk' sign occasionally (though a bit randomly, not always sure it means what it looks like it means) and she has twice now made the 'more' sign when it's been cold-ish & I've been changing her (I guess this could mean 'more clothes'? -- she stops when she's got all her clothes on, anyway!). This seems like quite a complicated concept so I suspect it may just be coincidence, but at least I know she can definitely do the necessary hand-movements.

* She is 'talking' ALL THE TIME. Currently it's "na na NA NA NA na na na na na NA NA na na NA NA NA" (which is lovely right up to the point where it gets a bit wearing...) but we have also had entire days of "da da da da da", the occasional "ma ma ma", and several days of nothing but blowing raspberries. Occasionally we get much more complicated bits of syllables, so much so that it feels like she's said a real sentence and I've just not quite heard it clearly.

* She managed without me (with addedentry) fairly happily for a whole working day last Thursday when I went into work for one of my 'Keeping In Touch days' (for the annual Staff Day -- a chance to catch up with what everybody's doing -- and a team meeting; no proper work as such but it was really good to feel like I was starting to get involved again).

* She is eating EVERYTHING. Food is ace, isn't it? addedentry points out that it's amazing that she knows what is food & what isn't, given that food comes in so many weird and wonderful forms. (OK, she does chew things that aren't food as well, like books and clothes and my fingers and, well, anything.) She can pick up tiny things like blueberries and peas now, and if she's hungry she'll pick up every last crumb or grain off the plate.

* She can give me a kiss! If I say "big kiss" and give her a kiss, then say "kiss for mummy?" she kisses me on the cheek! Well... she sort of opens her mouth and tries to eat the side of my face. It's unbelievably cute, anyway. :-D

* She is ASLEEP RIGHT NOW in her buggy having her MORNING NAP and I have both hands free. \o/