Finding Vanilla Octopus: Stealing Hearts at Seven Months

Wednesday, October 30, 2013

Stealing Hearts at Seven Months

Against all odds, I snuck in a photo shoot today, between the play date festivities of the morning and the abject exhaustion that hit much later in the afternoon. I didn't have any of the usual things ready: couldn't find the curtains I use as a backdrop, Pooh was in the basement, Tigger was in the car, Piglet is... well, who knows where. I figured that the most important element was right there with me, however, and in a pretty great mood after nodding off during a long stroller walk with her father.

I threw over-analysis of the situation to the wind and seized the opportunity, which was rather freeing. No more worries about where next to look for the missing drapes, what outfit I should dress her in, or how to arrange her stuffed animal friends. Just Mia, a nearby toy, and buckets of all-natural cuteness.

As you can see, she's pretty well mastered sitting up now. (Crawling still resembles a tedious, inefficient drag along the floor, but we're slowing making progress on that.)

I really didn't have to do much, initially, to get her smiling. I made use of silly faces and noises, to great effect.

When she got a mite distracted by the toy, I let her do her thing for a bit.

Smiles and all.

I now know that this will be her last series of "month" pictures sans her two front teeth, though you can just barely see the tips of them now, especially in this picture.

That was also the last picture inspired by sheer happiness. Mia was growing tired of the game, though Abby helped extend it a bit by acting silly, out-of-frame, for her little sister's benefit.