Abigail is remarkably like a puppy. She loves to chew on things, she’s not potty trained, she slobbers constantly, and she scampers around on all fours, carrying things in her mouth. She wasn’t quite sure why I was laughing this morning when she crawled toward me with an elephant stuffed animal (thanks, Rebecca!) dangling from her mouth by its ear. Watching that elephant flop and sway as Abi made her way toward me with a big-eyed, determined expression just got to me, though I see similar feats several times a day. The mouth is her preferred method of carrying medium-sized things. Small items go in her hand, and bigger ones she crawls over so they get stuck under her torso and she can drag them along with her. Once in awhile I’ll see her do all three.

The puppyishness of Abi has inspired a possible solution to her somewhat difficult eating habits. She has developed a sign to let me know when she is done eating: she slams both hands down as hard as she can onto the high chair tray. It’s hard to miss, but even harder to believe, since she generally keeps on eating steadily until I take her out of the chair. But if I ignore the sign, she just does it more and more vehemently between bites until I let her go. I think the issue is that Miss Wiggles gets tired of the chair before she gets full. I’ve noticed how much she delights in finding bits of food left under her high chair, so I’ve taken to leaving small bowls or trays of food there or in a little nook in her play area for her to snack on. Snack she does, but step one is dumping everything out onto the floor. The floor is clean enough that I don’t mind her eating off of it, but I do get tired of picking up little bits of dried fruit and cereal puffs. What I need, I’ve decided, is some sort of permanent bowl that she can’t pick up off the floor (stick it down with poster tape, perhaps?) and that I can refill with dry food periodically. A dog dish. That would be perfect.

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