Likes: Waving, playing peek-a-boo, Cheerios, being passed between her parents
Dislikes: Being held by people other than her parents when mommy and daddy are in sight, having a toy (or choking hazard) taken away, teething
Marla is ready to graduate from infanthood to toddlerhood! Did this year go quickly or what?
Marla’s clapping abilities have evolved from just clapping for fun into being a big fan of “If You’re Happy and You Know it.” She especially loves saying “hooray” (or raaay) and putting her hands up in the air. We haven’t gotten to stomping our feet or anything else yet, but considering Marla’s seemingly always cool, calm, and happy disposition, she probably doesn’t need to sing “If You’re Happy and You Know it” all that often.
Another skill that Marla seems to have picked up this month is waving at other people, almost always accompanied with what sounds like “bye bye.” We think she is getting near to having a true first word, as she is making consistent sounds that bear resemblance to words like “Daddy, book, brother, and cheese.” Marla continues to be an expert peek-a-boo player, and even exclaims “a-boo” as she finds the person or stuffed animal she is looking for.
Marla has discovered she can climb up the stairs on her own in the past month. She hasn’t tried going down yet, but we had better teach her before she decides to try it herself.
At this point in the writeup, we would like to share something about our own parenting experience. As we expect pretty much everyone reading this to know, Johan was born in May of 2020, very much in the midst of the early part of the Covid-19 pandemic where no one knew a whole lot about this potentially deadly disease, and we had to navigate being parents for the first time mostly in the absence of community. To say that Marla’s first year and Johan’s first year are different would be an understatement, and not just because they are different people. Being able to have help at home, have Marla held by family and friends, have “firsts” in her first year such as her first Orioles game, first Hirsch family vacation, first Goodstein family reunion, first international trip, and more has given us the opportunity to experience the first year of parenthood in something akin to what we expected 2020 to be. Johan’s first year will be a memorable one too, as he is the child who made us parents. However, we’ve definitely compared 2025 to 2020 on various occasions and there are definitely advantages to welcoming a child into the world when there isn’t a global pandemic raging.
With that all being said, if we could easily fix some of the other problems in our broken world, we would do so right away. But please excuse us if we want to also take some time to watch our children grow. Marla won’t be a toddler forever, and Johan’s age appropriate 5.5 year old behavior does tire us out some days.