Kinsey's World: Practing New Skills & Playing with Old Toys

Kinsey's getting really good at climbing on all kinds of things these days. This week for the first time, she got onto a dining room chair and sat at the table. You could tell from the look on her face that she was pretty proud of herself for it too! She was up on her knees on the chair and I saw her make a move like she was thinking about climbing from the chair to the table, but she changed her mind quickly. Then she sat down on her butt on the chair and acted like she was waiting for dinner.

Now that she's done it once, she wants to do it all the time. She walks around the table and pushes the chairs back so there's room for her to climb on them. Today I took some video of her, but she didn't successfully make it onto the chair. Close, but not quite.

I also took some video of her getting up from the floor - well, sort of. I missed the actual part where she went from the floor to standing, but here you can see what that results in and how she then walks across the floor on hands and knees until she gets close enough to something that she can grab to stand up straight.

On Monday we were at a friend's house with a bunch of other kids and it was fun to see how well Kinsey plays with other kids now that she can get around so much better on her own. She's been scooting for a long time now, but the ability to crawl and stand up on her own give her so much more mobility so when the other kids relocate from one toy or area to another, she can follow. She was having a ton of fun.

Today we were at another friend's house and Kinsey was playing with her two boys (who's she never played with before). Not long after we got there the older boy, who is about 6, came over to me and said he saw something white on Kinsey's head near her ear. I had to think for a minute what he was talking about - he was asking about her hearing aid. It was the first time I've had to explain to another child what that was and why. He asked me a bunch of questions about it (wanting to know why she needed it and why her ears don't work like ours) and then he was satisfied. It was really cute. I love how children are so open to differences and feel comfortable asking questions. Fortunately we've only had a handful of experiences with children who notice Kinsey is a little different and seem bothered by it. We don't generally run into adults who respond improperly either, but it does happen sometimes.

Anyway, this week Kinsey got into her closet and pulled out some old toys that were supposed to be going to consignment, but she really enjoyed playing with them, so I guess we're going to keep them a while longer. One of them was the Ball Pop toy that Aunt Cheri bought for Kinsey's 1st birthday. She always thought it was interesting, but wasn't able to do anything with it on her own. I've pulled it out on occasion between then and now to see if she could do it, but she never seemed to get much better at it. Until now - she was having a great time grabbing the balls and putting them back in the shoot (even though you're just supposed to let them roll down, she had to put them directly in). She even did a great job pushing the button to make it work - mostly with a little help, but she did it totally on her own a few times too (which she refused to do when I got the video camera out, of course). Here's the video.

This week we also hired a new sitter to watch Kinsey. I started looking for someone for when my dad is traveling or not able to watch Kinsey for some other reason - Like when he tries to kill himself by flipping the tractor into a ditch and breaking several ribs and vertebrae - yes, that really happened recently, but don't worry, he's fine and will heal in time. But in the meanwhile, he can't really watch Kinsey for a while because he can't pick her up. So, I searched the world over, asking people we knew who also helped search and finally found someone on Care.com. Her name is Bambi and she's an older lady with grown kids and she's been a full-time Nanny for 35 years. She came over to meet us on Wednesday then came back on Thursday night to watch Kinsey while we went to a concert (while my dad was here too for backup since she doesn't know Kinsey that well yet). Kinsey loves her already - she went right to her when she came in on Thursday after only meeting her once. We are only using her occasionally as needed, so hopefully she won't find a full-time gig and be unavailable. I have to be extremely comfortable with someone to leave Kinsey with them (it took me months to leave the house while Kinsey's nanny Kelley was with her forever ago).

Finally, last weekend we went to Cheyenne Frontier Days. Here are some pictures: