dot dk

Ellen has been walking for a while now, but it happened so slowly that it’s hard to say when she really changed from an infant to a toddler. She’s been upright for months now, but before she was always holding the wall or a table, or a pant leg for stability.

Then she started taking a step or two to get from a wall to a table or a pant leg. And then she did that often enough that, very slowly, it mattered less and less how far the wall was from the table, and eventually, whether there was a destination at all.

But at this point she’s definitely a walker. She only crawls if she’s already sitting down and there’s only a short distance to traverse. That’s not to say that she walks confidently, or without mishaps. Door jambs are treacherous. She’s keen to their trickery, but they vary in high and width, and so they’re still a threat.

This stage of life is pretty tough in terms of falls. But walking is her default method of locomotion, and she’s constantly working at improving it.

Most of these were taken two weeks ago when we visited Kaspar, Hanne, and Storm in Århus. Storm, who is two months younger than Ellen, isn’t quit walking yet, but it’s probably a good thing. He’s like the Energizer bunny, and doesn’t seem to have any respect for things like hesitation or caution. He’ll be all over the place when he figures out how, and I’m sure Hanne and Kaspar will miss the days of crawling

I’m not sure how it happened, but somehow a year has passed since Ellen came along. It went by quickly, and it seems like she’s been with us all along.

She’s not walking yet. She’s pretty confident standing though, and this weekend Frits coaxed her into taking a step or two. It won’t be long, but so far she doesn’t really seem to think it’s an option anyway.

The way that she’s changed the most though, is her comprehension. She catches on to things that she wouldn’t have figured out before. She’s not solving equations or anything, but you can show her something and she’ll try it herself. (more…)

I really like the fact that we named her Ellen, but most of the time it seems a bit too grown-up. But that’s ok — that’s what nick-names are for. But for some reason (probably because she changes so fast)  no single nickname seems to stick. So here’s a list, in no particular order.

• • Little girl
  • The Frog
  • Tater-tot
  • Destructo-bot
  • Cabbage head
  • Potato-person

There may be, somewhere in the world, a father that thinks his daughter is cuter than mine.

But he is clearly insane. Unlike me. Who is not.

Ellen is ten and a half months old now, and ever since she was born I’ve been telling Lisbeth, “I think this is it — maximum cuteness” and “She just can’t get cuter. It’s just not possible” and “I don’t think I can take much more of this.”

But then she goes right on getting cuter. So much so that when I look at pictures of her from three or six months ago I think, “Well sure, she was sort of cute, I guess… but look at her now!”

But, like house prices, Ellen’s cuteness cannot go up and up indefinitely. No. It must peak at some point, and then go down. It just must. It defies the laws of the universe, this.

Not that I’m complaining, especially since she has a personality to match her cuteness. In fact, there may be, somewhere in the world, a father that thinks his daughter is more charming than mine… poor fool.

Ellen’s preferences continue to emerge, and one thing that’s clear is that she has no interest in crawling. She takes real offense when I put her into the crawling position. She drops down to her stomach, starts whining, and looks to Lisbeth for sympathy.  “Look mom! Look at what dad did to me!”

Walking, on the other hand — now that’s interesting. If you hold her hands and walk her around the room, she makes her happy noises and looks up at you as if to say, “Look! I’m walking!”

Apparently not all babies crawl before they walk. Lisbeth never did. Maybe Ellen won’t either, but that doesn’t mean that I’m going to stop trying.

The highlight of this vacation has definitely been introducing Ellen to all the family members that she hasn’t yet met, like her great grandparents. Connie organized a get-together this weekend so we’d have everyone in the same place, which is where many of these pictures are from.

It’s  a good thing that she’s pretty flexible about who holds her, because she’s been passed around a lot in the last three weeks, and it’s a good thing that she likes the spotlight, because she’s been the center of attention most of the time.

The downside, however, is that she’s gotten accustomed to the attention, and she thinks it’s incredibly dull to have only the stale affections of her parents. We’re expecting her to be pretty unhappy when we get back to Denmark later this week.

Before this trip, the only members of my family that had met Ellen were mom and dad because they visited us in Denmark in May. Before they left, mom lamented that Ellen wouldn’t remember her. Sure enough, Ellen had to warm up to her again, but it didn’t take long.