The new word is “hot” with an emphasis on the H and the T. Anything on the stove is “HoT!” and anything steaming or in a coffee cup (even if it’s cold) is “HoT!”. It’s adorable. Keana is also practicing walking by holding onto our hands and has a little route that she takes to practice. She starts in the living room, goes into the bedroom, to the bathroom doorway, then back out to the living room, and finally to the kitchen doorway- over and over and over. Eventually your back hurts from bending over to hold her tiny hands, so you have to stop, but she’d probably go on for a while on this route. She’s stood several times, on her own without any arm support, from a sitting/squatting position, and it won’t be long till she’s walking on her own. This excites us, saddens us, and scares us:-)

As for sleeping, well, I guess I just had to say it out loud (see last blog entry). While I was in Denver for work, Sarah pretty much reached her limit and decided it was time to try letting Keana “cry it out” again. (We had tried this a couple months ago and she cried for over an hour and we couldn’t take it.) After only one night of crying for about an hour, she is pretty much putting herself to sleep at 9 a.m., 2 p.m., and 7 p.m. The earlier times are naps that last an hour or two and when she goes down at 7 p.m., she sleeps till 6:30 a.m. or 7 a.m., only waking up slightly throughout the night and then putting herself back to sleep. She’s been on this schedule since 2/24 and it seems almost too good to be true. This has given Sarah more (predictable) time for herself throughout the day and has given us a bit of our night life back. (Well, at least a night life in our house where we can actually talk to each other or watch a movie without the baby vying for our attentions.)

We recently had a visit (Sat. 3/4) from Tia Lucy and Uncle Peter for Lucy’s 30th birthday. It was great to see both of them, especially since we hadn’t seen Lucy since the 4th of July (!) and Peter was just in Thailand for 6 months. Tia Iana was there too, but we’re fortunate to see her throughout the week. She often has quality Keana time while Sarah gets treatment for her neck/back/shoulder injury (yes, the same one she’s been dealing with for the last year that is currently a workman’s comp. case).

Thanks again for all your comments to these entries. Sarah and I love reading them together and I know Keana will enjoy them later!