Bella Tricks!

My sassette is up to no good these days. Let's make a list:

1. She's teething. This comes with a running fever, loose stools, diaper rash, waterfalls of drool and, my personal favorite, the appearance of Bad Bella. Bad Bella screams, thrashes, and would stab your eye out if she could get 'hold of a knife.
   
2. She's not sleeping. I blame Bad Bella for this. My sweet girl used to nap for at least an hour in the morning and afternoon. Bad Bella has no interest in laughing and, in fact, laughs in your face if you try to put her down for a nap. The laugh is a precursor to the scream that would be a precursor to aforementioned knife.




3. She's sitting up! Okay, so Bad Bella has some issues, but she's ushered in a whole new era. Instead of being content to roll around on the floor, Bad Bella wants to sit! Now! Last night at 10 pm she was sitting up in the bed between Billy and I. I thought she'd pass out if it was low-key enough. Nope, she just made faces and laughed at us until Billy threw in the towel and rocked/forced her to sleep.
   
4. She plugs herself. The days of us having to hold or wedge the pacifier in her mouth are gone. Bad Bella lunges for the paci if it falls out of her mouth and works it around until she's completely plugged up. I can take it out of her mouth over and over ... and she'll pop it right back in. Now, by the 4th or 5th time she is ready to stab me, but her need to get the paci in place overrides any hostility.

My only concern with the sitting up stuff is that she won't stay on her belly long enough to crawl. I really want her to hit that milestone and not be one of those starlets that go from sitting to walking with no crawling inbetween. I think if she could figure out crawling, she'd enjoy being on the floor more ... but now that she's sitting, she really just wants to be doing that.

The best part of sitting, tho, is that she still gets so tickled by so many things. And in case you didn't know, when Bella gets tickled, she flails and jacks up her body ... which means she falls over if she's sitting. Luckily I'm still keeping her propped, but she's going to have to control herself before I give her the official milestone award.

Oh, another great thing about sitting? It wears down her batteries. After a full half-hour of sitting, she started getting cranky so I moved her pillows and laid her down. No more than five minutes later, she was gone. Bring it on, sitting up milestone!