The First Week of November

Finley loves to 'read' her books. Here she is choosing the one she wants.

Then she settled down to read it. Sometimes she'll let me read the book to her, but sometimes she'll take the book and turn her back to me. She knows how she wants things done!

This week Finley started clapping. I've been trying to get her to clap for months and months so I was really excited with this development. Here's her wind-up for her clap...

...and the successful clap! If you ask her to clap for you, she is more than willing to comply. It's so darn cute!

I got her this little car toy and she loves it; however, she really only likes to ride on it backwards.

Finley has another tooth - this one is on the top and it looks like more are coming in. Waffles are one of Fin's favorite breakfast foods and this week I discovered that a frozen waffle was a great teething toy. She gnawed and gnawed on it!

It didn't seem fair that Andrew and I got to eat all of Finley's hard earned Halloween candy so I decided to share a bite of Butterfinger with her. She snatched it up and won't give it back to me! Here she is eating it...

...and the aftermath - chocolate face!

We went to Claire's birthday party (one of Finley's neighborhood besties) last weekend and Finley had her first swing experience. Our little daredevil loved it - and I loved how the wind made all her hair stand straight up! I think a swing maybe on her Christmas list now!

In other news this week, Finley still isn't walking but she has learned how to crawl backwards. Michael Jackson would be so proud because it looks a lot like moonwalking only with crawling. I'm going to try and get a video of it soon! Also we met with a physical therapist this week to see if there might be a medical reason why Fin isn't walking. Luckily the PT assured us that was not the case. It seems that Finley just doesn't have a need for walking yet - she can accomplish everything she wants to by crawling, backwards crawling, climbing and cruising. One of the things I've noticed with Finley is that it takes her a long time to do something (like clapping, for instance) but once she does it, she executes it perfectly (to go along with the clapping example, she never misses her hands like a lot of kids do). So I'm guessing when she feels she can walk without falling/tripping/etc., then she'll take off!

Our dog Rusty is the sweetest guy and so good with Finley. A lot of times Fin is a little too rough with him, so I'm always telling her to be gentle. This week she's started saying "gentle, gentle" when she pets him. Too precious! She also started saying "go, go, go" when she pushes her walker around. I love how verbal she's becoming!