Lydia Log: Day 195

Jumping. Lydia's priorities in life have shifted from feeding to jumping. Jumping, endlessly, in her rain forest-themed "jumperoo" toy, which she never tires of. Each jump triggers the toy's jungle music and animal noises, which are now barely audible over the violent rattling of the plastic supports and the thumping of her tiny feet on the hardwood floor. We now have oodles of video footage of this - Lydia bouncing and bouncing and bouncing, with either a huge smile or a scowl of concentration on her reddening face, her arms outstretched and flapping for either balance or artistic impression. Occasionally she stops to examine the flopping plastic monkey or suck on the spotted bug attachment, but this is only temporary and immediately proceeded by several more minutes of jumping.

She no longer sleeps through the night - typically waking up between 1 and 2, and then again before 6 - I imagine to jump, or to feed so that she can replenish the calories she burned while jumping. When she wakes in the night, we often find her in some strange position - sometimes on her belly and/or with her legs hanging out through the bars on the crib. Dream jumping? When Lydia is held upright, her legs immediately begin to bend and kick - stretching to find a surface on which to jump. When laid on her back, this bending and kicking continues - pushing her backwards across the floor in some weird looking armless backstroke. We laugh. She laughs. We laugh harder, as does she.

Food wise - Lydia is supplementing her nursing with mushed veggies and fruit, and now egg yolk apparently. Her tastes are more exotic than some in her immediate family, with kiwi, mango and asparagus being her favourite meals. She will be introduced to meat soon, and I fear she will favour veal, ostrich or rhino steak to the chicken and pork that we can afford. My vision of a future Lydia is as a foodie and a restaurateur instead of the Olympic athlete I had originally envisioned (although I suppose she could always be both).

In short - the cuteness quotient in the household is still increasing, albeit at the expense of the sleeping and tranquility quotients. But is good, ya.