Baby book...

We've been having some camera/battery issues lately, and so haven't been taking a lot of pictures. We've got it figured out now though, I think, so hopefully I'll remember to post more often!

We went to Block Island for the weekend with Mem, Grandpa, Meme, and Aunt Claire a week ago - and the only picture we took was on the ferry before we even left the dock to head over there!

While I was checking my email a few nights ago, Nora climbed into a box on the floor, took every single book off the shelf next to her, and proceeded to flip through them all. Notice she cleaned out the shelf of fluffy beach reads and chick lit, but left the shelf right below it, all social science books, alone.
Then she proceeded to perform all her tricks: clapping...
And sooooooo big!
While playing in the yard with Daddy last night, Nora climbed into her whale pool, fully dressed. It was cold, but she was having a great time splashing around!

Since my baby book for Nora was for her first year, I keep meaning to record a few things here for posterity, because otherwise I know I'll never remember when these happened.

• On June 6, Nora nursed for the last time. She'd been down to once a day for several weeks, and since I got pregnant again my milk supply had diminished greatly, but the morning of June 7 was the first time she refused to nurse at all. I was really sad, but I'm glad that she got to wean on her own terms, and also glad that I'll have a little break for a few months before the new little nugget comes along for it's own nursies!
• On June 7, she took her first steps! In the last two weeks she's kept up the routine of 3-4 steps at a time, particularly when encouraged. Yesterday morning she set a record of 12 steps across the kitchen, and in the evening she walked totally unprompted about 6 steps across the living room to get to her bike. She's still a very fast crawler, though, and uses that when she's tired, excited, or wants to get somewhere fast. But I think real walking in definitely in sight in the next few weeks.
• She started clapping about 2 weeks ago, and does it whenever she's proud of herself, whenever you say, "Yay!" and at the end of every song you sing with her.
• Speaking of singing, she knows and does the hand motions to The Itsy Bitsy Spider, Pat-a-Cake, and Ring Around the Yogi (a song we learned in yoga class this spring).
• She started pointing about a week ago, and points with her index finger isolated both at specific things in books and at things far away that she wants us to look at. And at herself in the mirror - and then she claps for herself! It's very cute.
• New spoken words: shoe, no (so far, just on the changing table, and then it's, "nooooooooonoooooooonooooooooooooonoooooooooooooo").
• New signs: dog/Mica, please (I think this is what she's doing - she doesn't quite get how it's supposed to go with another word, though, so she uses it by itself and it generally means "I want").