Balloon Liberation Fighters Unite

Just a little storyboard I did up from our trip to Maitland over Easter. I saved it as quite small since it is HUMUNGOUS!

Well the big news in our house is that Harry is totally rashed up. She started showing signs of an allergic reaction on Easter Monday and it got progressively worse all week. At one stage I was worried it was chicken pox and since we had visited a friend in hospital thought it wise to have it checked out by a doctor who pronounced it 'viral'. Well it's not acting like a virus and on Saturday we went to the pharmacist to get some antihistamines and after sitting down with the pharmacist for about five minutes we tracked down the culprit. Uhhmmm... didn't I go to a doctor? Who just looked at it and pronounced it viral and wiped their hands clean? *sigh* It was nice to dicuss it with someone who could bother spending some time with you.

Anyway the poor child is covered from head to toe and everywher ein between by a histamine explosion. Her skin feels like a lizard skin, her drool pool area (just below her chin on her chest) is a disaster zone since she is also teething (Yes, again I hear you exclaim) and the drool makes it scratch like crazy. All over her face the rash is like a horrible bumpy facial scrub. However she is absolutely fine. If anything she is more than fine.

The past week has been so awesome and so horrid. Awesome in that Harry has been obviously going through a developmental milestone and possibly a growth spurt as well. I measured and weighed her today and she is definitely over 90cms but I'm not sure exactly and about 14kgs. But each day is a new adventure in the verbal wilderness. Not only does she say more words but she explains more and discusses more (ie: she won't shut up! it's great, really). Tonight she was in teh car with papa Jimbo and said very clearly "I want Nana". So cute! (Thought you might like that one Jan)

She's also coming out with some classic stuff. We were reading books before bed and James asked her "Where is the Green Sheep?" as in "Would you like to read the book 'Where is the Green Sheep?' ". However Harriet just heard the first question, picked up the book, showed it to James and said "Shhhhh" and did the sign for sleeping. And yes, all the parents out there are laughing. But for those who don't know, well at the end of the book you find that the green sheep is actually asleep. So why bother reading it? Harry just let us know straight up what the deal was with that sheep.

On the topic of books we got this book out of the library about a pig and a chicken who are friends and play with a balloon. The balloon flies away but they remain friends (it was the chicken's fault !). Harry lurves this book, mainly because when we were at a boat festival over Easter we had a balloon tied around her wrist but she pulled it off and it went flying away. This made the whole day incredibly tragic thereafter. In fact we were still talking about the balloon a week later, which is where the book comes in. After reading the book, Harry received a balloon from a local bakery. We went outside with it firmly tied around her wrist. But she kept protesting that she wanted it off her wrist and for it to fly away like in her book. We explained carefulyl that if we did that she couldn't get the balloon back. She persisted so we took the balloon off her wrist and let it float away. She was ecstatic! It really and truly was just what she was after! Harriet Dora - fighting for balloon freedom everywhere.

Ok, now on to more proud parent moments. I was playing with her in the playroom with the mirror which still has its cardboard casing around it (long story). Anyway, Harriet suddenyl just pointed out the letter 's' and said "sssss". I then said to her "Where is the 'd'? and of course sh epointed it out first thing. She did it for s, d, h, e, a, o, c and h. Not too sure what "Do Chase" means but she could spell it out in a spellathon.

And as for comprehension this one totally floored me last night. I was drawing her bath and she likes to stand on the side and play with the water gushing from the tap as it runs. She called me in to the bathroom and I asked what was wrong. She drew her hand out from under the water and said "Cold. More hot. Warm." As in 'it's too cold, and needs more hot to make it warm". I was so shocked! I guess I'll be getting much more used to things like that coming from her in the upcoming weeks but it's still a great novelty to hear them at the moment.

Today was a very difficult day. There was no day sleep. None. Combined with a week long issue of midnight wakings that involve getting up and playing and I think I'm beginning to see the end of my day sleep freedoms. *insert sobbing face here* That's ok. Tonight the upside was that she crashed within five minutes of putting her down for bed.

And as for the weekend, well nothing much happened. Except that we went for a walk down to a festival on the river on Sunday and I saw Darren Hanlon. *swoon* Ah hem. Yes, this blog is about Harriet. Which is why I insisted that she be in the photo too. I love her look, it's as if to say "Who the hell are you?". Ah yes, don't comment on how I look, it's a total shocker shot of me after a week of sleep deprivation.

And that Superman tshirt is now her new firm favourite. Her Grandpa and Nana gave it to her but Grandpa actually handed it over. So if you ask her who gave her the shirt she always says "Grandpa". And she leans over, looks down at the logo and says clear as day "Supergirl". Seriously, where did she learn that? She said it when we she received the shirt! But I had to hang it on the line inside out so that it could actually stay up and dry out today. So expect to see this shirt in most photos of Harry for the next week or two.