creature comforts

twelve to fifteen months is a rough patch in baby evolution, because it's the time when conventional wisdom dictates that parents should start taking away many of their favorite little things. this is probably much harder on the parents than the kids because you are supposed to get rid of just about every little trick you've developed to keep them quiet for five minutes. for example, no, ava doesn't really need to lounge in her bouncy chair to drink her bottle, but gosh, wasn't it nice when she was all nice and strapped firmly into place, so she didn't combine bottle drinking with walking practice?

speaking of bottles, the biggest challenge (for everyone as far as i can tell) is transitioning to the sippy cup. a couple of days after ava's first birthday I tried to make her quit the bottle cold turkey. when she got up in the morning, instead of a bottle i handed her the dreaded sippy cup. she screamed hysterically, took the sippy cup and threw it across the room. the scene ended with ava strapped into her bouncy chair, "watching television" while periodically screaming as i dribbled the milk into her mouth sip by painful sip. i opted to abandon this plan in favor of a more graduated approach to the issue. currently, we've reached a bizarre standoff in which she will drink juice from the cup, but not, god forbid, milk.

fortunately, no-one has suggested that it is time to retire the true love of Ava's life : her duck. i bought Ava mr. duck in june, in honor of her first word. her obsession with mr. duck has been growing slowly ever since. mr. duck mostly lives in Ava's crib, and is greeted each time she enters her crib with ecstatic squeals of delight, followed by kisses on the beak, and then a good squishing.


when I was a kid i had a similar obsession with a raggedy ann doll, which i eventually lost on a camping trip. i'm sure my whole family suffered through that loss. however, when ava manages to lose her duck, it will be an excellent moment for some ridiculous tall tale and an amazing super hero duck rescue because . . . i've got a spare mr. duck all ready to go.