catch up

so i was so excited at the beginning of the week that nissa had pooped twice solid- no more for the rest of the week. all runny and sticky. gross! i guess new poop isn't instant. . . i'm still hopeful.

upon further investigation i discovered nissa doesn't have one tooth, but two! two bottom teeth are there and equipped to chew on everything nissa can get in her mouth. rick's sofa cushions, aaron's leather couch, the wood coffee table at home, her own crib. nothing is safe any more. keep your hands away from the mouth!

nissa covers more chewing ground with her super speedy crawl. it's nothing fancy, but man does she go quick. plus, she's discovered a way to get from crawling to sitting. sanding to sitting too! i'm so proud. she has been able to hold herself up in a sitting position if we put her there, but now she can get there all on her own. now that she's got this skill down, i see her preferring to be in it to play with things and otherwise investigate.

the latest thing that bears investigation is the ball bopper. it's crazy! sure, it's a simple product, but it spews balls all over and gibson goes nuts over it and nissa just sits back and watches in amazement. it only took a couple of days for nissa to figure out how to hit the plunger to start the balls a-boppin'. i hope to catch the action on video, cuz i think it'll be priceless.

the definition of priceless is nissa's first words. adam's been practicing diligently to get nissa to say "dada" on purpose- referring to him. she's made the sound for a long time now (with mama, baba, shhhh, etc), but we need to work on getting her to employ those sounds. sure enough adam was practicing friday morning, pointing to himself "dada" pointing to nissa "nissa", back and forth several times and the last time he pointed to her, "nissa" he pointed to himself and paused and in a tiny whisper, "da da" came from nissa. i think that counts! a daddy's girl. i should have known. i just need to step up my practice. this whole "source of food" advantage will run out soon enough. . .

so last but not least, a side note. i was reading an article in the paper the other day about some homeless students who not only completed their high school educations, but did so with honors. it was really inspiring to hear about these students beating the odds, then kinda made me feel like a slacker. the most interesting aspect was that one of the students took the bus with me every morning! her and her girlfriend often took up several seats with their backpacks, much to my annoyance, until they departed at Lake View. knowing this individual's back story makes me proud to have "known" her and though i'll probably never see her again, i hope she keeps this strength and puts it to the best use of continuing to make her life wonderful.