Do the Crab

I am grizzly, hear me roar

There is a lot to be said about Old Bay seasoning. The zesty taste that just screams Baltimore and I think a little bit slipped through the umbilical cord when Maja was pregnant. We’ve brought in Stella’s sand toys for the winter and amongst them is a crab. Maja showed Stella what the crab does and when I came home today, Stella had a new greeting for me. Sitting on mommy’s lap, she raised both hands open and closed her fists, crab style. Next we’ll teach her the sideways crab shuffle.

Stella has become Holly’s Bain. She terrorizes her every second she can. Stella chases, pets, sometimes in her over exuberant arm movements hits and the biggest new thing is stepping on her. Even when you are holding her back telling her no, Stella sticks her leg out as far as she can, just trying to get a toe on poor Holly. Any dog in their right mind in this kind of situation would distance themselves. It could be the mother instinct, it could be a bit of masochism, or just plain craziness but Holly always wants to be around. And thus the constant shuffle routine of running around, chasing and Holly moving to a new spot only to move 30 seconds later.

I must admit that Stella is not a total terror to Holly. She likes to and tries to pet her as often as possible in a loving way and she loves giving Holly treats.

Mafioso Stella with her "stogie"

Yesterday during this game, Holly perched herself as high as she could on the couch, on top of the arm, on top of the cushions. When Stella came her way, she even unsuccessfully tried to run across the unstable, cushioned back of the couch. Stella found this hilarious and tried to climb after her. And this is when dad’s foresight paid off. A while back I purchased a foam pipe insulator and put it on the hard windowsill. Maja said it was ugly, didn’t they have other colors? I, well, I don’t see it. So as Stella was chasing after holly, she slipped and hit the cushioning with only a startled gasp, no harm done.

Stella hasn’t limited herself to climbing couches though. A new pastime is to climb daddy. Taking both hands, she “walks” up Daddy until she is standing on his shoulders, Queen of the hill.

If she isn’t climbing things, she’s dumping things out. No matter what it is, and what it is in, it’s gotta come out; a bag of pasta, clips, lunch, anything. If we’re lucky we can coax her to playing the “put it back in” game but as soon as the last piece is in, flop it’s out again.
Stella watches like a hawk and is starting to mimic what we do. The other day while sitting on mommy’s lap, she grabbed the knife and fork and tried to cut the bread on the plate. She’ll grab a knife or spoon and try and get the jam out of the jar and loves eating with a fork. She does sometimes regress to her doggy roots and pull the bowl or plate up to her face to suck down a piece of meat or bread.

fun on the teeter totter

She has become a big help taking off her coat. She’ll try to undo the zipper herself and when open, she grabs both sides and tries to yank pulling both sides at the same time. After coming in from outside we can ask her to take her shoes to the shoe rack and she’ll run over and place them next to daddy and mommy’s shoes. Stella wants to put her “house shoes” (grippy socks) on but she hasn’t figured out quite how that works yet but she’ll extend her foot to you to put them on. She loves her new once piece pajama’s from grandma and will try and put her feet in her self. The other night she was so tired that she grabbed her pajamas and tried to put them on herself. When mommy laid her on the bed to wash and get dressed she lay there like a lump on a log and promptly wanted to lie down in her bed. She didn’t even want to look at a book.

One of Stella’s favorite books is “five little monkey’s jumping on the bed” She laughs when their jumping on the bed, she says “ow” and grabs her head when they fall off and bump their head and she wags her finger in disapproval when the doctor says “no more monkey’s jumping on the bed”. Last week she took the story to heart. Stella decided it was time for one of her tornado storms. Not on the ground as usual but on the bed. Daddy warned that it wasn’t a good idea but she was having too good a time. Daddy caught her as she started to slip off. Daddy warned again. The tornado increased in fury until in the blink of an eye she was on the floor. Luckily she sort of rolled off the bed, only lightly bumped her head and had a good scare. Needless to say, she hasn’t done this since but I think this is only because she is having too much fun running back and forth giving her parents other things to have ulcers over.

Winter is fast approaching and to help combat the influx of mud and dirt, we bought a red matte for inside the front door. Stella was drawn to it like a magnet. Bringing her toys, sitting on it, lying on it and running from the kitchen to the matt, back to the kitchen for a bite to eat and back to the matte. This is one of her favorite new places to play now.

Stella and her red carpet

The friendship with Hannah is cemented. They are practically twins. Last Saturday we took a short walk with Hannah and her mom. The two were like tweedle dee and tweedle dum. If one ran, the other ran, one would laugh, the other would laugh. Stella sat down on the curb; Hannah plopped down right next to her. And in one instance they even fell, as if on cue, Hannah tripped, two seconds later…Stella tripped.

The two are inseparable. When we walk by their house, Stella runs over to the gate and starts shaking it furiously, wanting in. When it is time to part, she will nicely shake Hannah’s hand goodbye but then put on a horrendous fit when we turn to go.

Stella has also become fond of her bike trailer. Today Maja wanted to take Holly and Stella for a walk. Stella ran over to the bike shed and wouldn’t budge, insisting on going for a bike ride. She’s a sly little one too. In the shed we have a box with what is supposed to be Stella’s Christmas present. Apparently as Maja was putting the bike and trailer away, Stella grabbed a piece of the present (a little house) and carried it inside. Maja didn’t even notice until she had locked everything up and was inside. Guess we’ll have to become a little bit more shrewd with our hiding spots.