13 Months

I promise I'm not trying to be one of those people, the "my kid is somthinmonths old" when they are 3 and a half, but 13 months just has more brevity than one year and one month. But such a month!

You're being so cute lately I can't stand it. Other people can't stand it. Strangers look at you and then at me, as if to say, Good lord woman, did you know this child is so cute? I'm going to have to lie down! And I look at them as if to say, Try being in the presence of this cuteness 24/7. I love my job, but the overtime? Whew!

Honestly, folks like to stop you in the grocery store all the time to chat.

"And what's your name, sweetie?"

And we both grin stupidly at you and then there is that weird pause during which I realize you aren't actually going to respond to this question so I pipe up.

"And how old is Miss Harlow?"

Again, your interpreter speaks up.

"What did you do with your shoe? Why is mommy carting you around all sockless like a hillbilly down from the cricks and hollers?"

I'm starting to feel like that mute interpreter in There Will be Blood, doing his best to keep the conversation going without Daniel Day Lewis strangling him with that mustache.

"Did mommy forget your bow?"

And my favorite:

"What big eyes you have, Miss Harlow."

All the better to see that you need to get your bow-lovin, shoe-elitist self out of the way, my pretty.

You've been a clingy monkey of late, no, clingy piglet as the sound you make when I try to put you on the ground sounds just like a squeally little pig (not unlike your early, early days when latching on sounded like piglets at the trough.) Sometimes you go to daddy, but usually you just throw up your arms like you're reffing the superbowl - your cue for me - and your little body is melded into mine. Sometimes it makes me groan and sigh as I heave you onto my hip and try to stir dinner with one hand or chop vegetables or online shop (a one handed feat in itself). But more often it makes me feel like I won the lottery. See, I totally have you pegged as a daddy's girl. You don't know it yet, but you have a seriously cool dad who who is just a puddle at your feet. He has way more patience than I. He planned your first tea party when you were in the womb. He builds you furniture and just laughs when you scream and wail (I would laugh but I'm usually trying to find a way to get the boob to you while you are strapped in your carseat). And one day the two of you are going to have tea parties in the mid-century modern tree house he built for you and drive to Bonaroo and be little hipsters together, and I will miss that ache in my low back as I bent over a a thousand times to scoop up my little ref.

But right now my back is seriously torn up.

So, to recap:

You can basically sprint as long as you are gripping someone's pinky. See torn up back, above.

All of a sudden you have a vocabulary. It's mostly Chinese with a few grunts and dog! thrown in for good measure, but you've got something to say, and the Chinese government is listening.

You are medaling in Nippolympics 08. Here's how this works. Left nipple stays on left boob. Same goes for right. It will not work any other way, so please, PLEASE, stop trying.