Freezing the picture: Grace at one year old

Dearest Grace… One year ago, you were a tiny, velvety little bundle in my arms. And now a year later, here you are, a giggly, smiley, roly-poly little girl.

With all the bigger kids for company at our house these days, you are often the youngest one in the group. Everyone adores you to bits and calls you ‘Baby’. So much so, that I think you actually believe that is your name. But your size and age doesn’t really matter as you always insist on tagging along in all the bigger kids’ activities and are quite capable of holding up your own.

I know you are growing fast, but I still can’t help calling you my baby girl, to cling on to your baby-ness for as long as I can before it slips away. If I could, I wish I could preserve a little bit of your baby-ness and bottle it up to keep forever. If only I could. So as a consolation, here is my feeble attempt to freeze this picture of you now…

Things you love

• Walking – which officially commenced at 11 months old which was quite early compared to most children… you were definitely eager to get to places. Now you are trotting everywhere on two feet, thoroughly exploring every single nook and cranny you can find.
• Books – you often trot over to our reading corner, and pull down every single book off the shelf before making your selection. At story time, you always eagerly trot over and wriggle your way right in front of all the other kids.
• Playing chasey – especially with your big brother… all you need to hear are those magic words “I’m gonna getcha!” to set you off trotting and laughing excitedly away as quick as your little legs can carry you.
• Getting stuck into whatever your big brother is doing – wherever he is, that’s where you need to be. When he moves to play something else, you’ll be following right behind him. I cannot get over how much you adore and look up to your big brother.
• Food – you are pretty much game to try anything. It’s hard to find something you would not eat or try. You are also very adamant about holding your own food and feeding yourself (with your hands and fingers) which can be frustrating for us at times.
  

Words you can say

• Mum-mum = eat/food/I’m hungry/feed me/I wanna eat that/I’m starving
• Shish = Cheese
• Na-na = Banana
• Trrr-trrr or Prrr-prrr = Water
• Tay-ten = Nathan (your big brother)
• Pap = Up (which means ‘carry me’)
• Pfffuh = Poo (which you will repeat while I’m cleaning your bum)
• Papa = which your daddy insists that you are referring to him when you say this
• Bah-bah = Bye-bye
• Boh = Ball
  

Some of your cleverness

• Waving and saying “bye-bye” to people
• Trotting over to the meal table and calling out “mum-mum” whenever I announce that it’s time for breakfast/morning-tea/lunch/afternoon-tea/dinner
• Trotting to the bathroom when your daddy announces that it’s bath time
• Pushing and rolling Duplo trucks across the floor and attempting to place the little Duplo man into the driver’s seat of one of the Duplo trucks
• Shaking music shakers or tambourines during music time and singing “Aaaaaaaahhhhhh” loudly whenever I say “Let’s sing LOUD” and stopping when I say “Now let’s be quiet, shhhhh…”
  

Favourite foods
This is a tricky one because you really love your food and will pretty much eat anything. But some notable favourites would include…

• Fruits – All kinds of fruits. You especially enjoy bananas, grapes, mandarin oranges, strawberries, kiwi, cherries, plums, apples, mangoes. But I don’t think you’d ever refuse any kind of fruit actually.
• Bread – Any sort of bread really. Plain toast, rolls, flat bread, chapati, paratha.
• Cheese
  

Some of your funny quirks

• You absolutely hate it whenever anyone tells you “No”… that’s all it takes for you launch into meltdown mode (but you cheer up pretty easily in the next minute)
• You like to make funny “woh-woh-woh” sounds by tapping your hand over your mouth repeatedly (like the Red Indians do for their war whoop)
• You love drinking water. At regular intervals throughout the way, you never fail to ask for “Trrr-trrr
  or “Prrr-prrr”. Sometimes you drink so much, I wonder if you would have any room left for food. But you always do.
• You always insist on eating the same food as what the big kids and adults are having. Nothing escapes your keen eye. I often have to plan the timing of the food and courses I offer strategically when you are around if I want to avoid a scene.
• You and your big brother have this special ‘thing’ between the two of you where you touch your forefingers together and go “Teeeeet!” which never fails to set you off laughing.
  

So this is you at one-year-old, dear Grace. Love you to bits, baby girl. I know it’s cliche, but I really and truly mean this when I say “You will always be my baby”.