The Green Fig Tree

Halloween and Other Things

Sophia was Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz for Halloween yesterday, and it was our first attempt at trick-or-treating (last year we just hung out with friends who also had babies too young to walk around the neighborhood).  We went around the block to our friends’ home to join in their large trick-or-treating party.  Sophia’s little red shoes were not very sturdy, so she went in her socks, with her shoes in her basket with “Toto” until we got there.  She knocked on their door to get candy, but was a bit overwhelmed by the mass of children who emerged.  When we went up to the next two houses, she started crying as we approached the door.  She did not master the phrase “trick-or-treat,” but she did manage to say thank you in sign language after she received a treat.  By the time we got to the fourth house, we had held back a bit to let the older kids go ahead of us, and she didn’t cry like she had before, but it was obvious she wasn’t sold on trick-or-treating, in spite of the treats now populating her basket with “Toto.”  We decided that four houses was enough for the first attempt, especially since the type of candy she can eat is minimal with so few teeth, and she enjoyed having a Twizzler red licorice.

The seventeenth month has brought more understandable chatting, more energetic dancing, more independent playing and more determined actions.  She loves going to school, and usually does not deign a good-bye to Andy or I, whoever happens to be dropping her off.  She has decided she will only eat crackers or bread, fruits and cheese, with a smattering of chicken nuggets.  I have a hard time even convincing her to eat tomatoes and avocado, which were once favorites.  She has learned that “uh oh” means trouble or something negative, and will shout it before she launches something across the room.  She can sing “A-B-C-B-E” of the Alphabet Song, though it is usually repeated a number of times until she claps her hands and yells “yay” (which ends every song).  She has discovered that the word “no” means something, and will tell it to the animals when they are being naughty, or Andy and I when she is being naughty.  She likes to watch football, and can recognize it on tv.  She likes to be in charge of things, and hates to hold hands in the parking lot.  She has gotten better about sitting in the cart at the grocery store, but still has to “help” by holding things and then putting them into the cart.  She is doing great in her big-girl bed, and still loves to take baths (or showers with us if time is short).  She attempts putting her clothes on, and can occasionally get a shirt on her head, but doesn’t classify tops and bottoms and will sometimes put shirts on her legs, or pants on her arms.  She has started calling the animals by their name instead of all the cats “kitty.”  She gets very upset when our one temperamental cat hisses at her (or the one at Grammie’s) and Andy imagines her thinking “why kitty hate me?” a la that silly American Airlines commercial.  She recently discovered a picture of Andy and I on a low bookshelf, which she drags around the house, pointing us out in the picture.  She has also gotten her own email address (thesophiacolvin@gmail.com) because she asks to check her “email” any time one of us is on the computer.

Below are a few pictures of her costume that Grammie made for her.  There are also pictures of her “helping” make biscuits, one of her being a tv-zombie to her all-time favorite movie “Oz” (which she requests to watch no less than three times a day, usually as soon as it goes off), putting on my shoes, taking pictures with the camera and her wearing her new coat and scarf cause it was a bit chilly this morning.