A Few of Her Favorite Things

Sadie's favorite toys have changed over the last ten months.  Some favorites have stood the test of time.  Here's a new list, in no particular order, of Sadie's Favorite Things.

1.  Kitty- Kitty is still very near the top of the list.  For those of you who don't remember Kitty or who are new to the blog, I picked Kitty up during the middle of the Christmas madness at the Mt. Shasta Mall, when Paul had dropped Sadie and I off while he went to get the oil changed, a few days before Christmas.  Changing the oil took a bit longer then he expected and Sadie and I ended up being at the ball for more then an hour.  Towards the end of the hour she started to have a meltdown and I plucked Kitty out of a pile of super-sale stuffed animals at Old Navy.  Kitty was an instant hit, saving the day.  These days Kitty is Sadie's favorite wrestling partner.  Kitty spends most of her time in the play pen.  Each day, several times a day, Sadie will fuss to go in the play pen, so that she can body slam Kitty.  She thinks it's hilarious to sit in the middle of the play pen and repeatedly pick Kitty up above her head and then slam Kitty into the bottom of the play pen.  Kitty is a permanent friend on the sometimes fickle favorites list.  

2.  The Cruise and Crawl Gym-  Where else can Sadie practice standing (and in the beginning she practiced sitting by herself in front of it with a pile of pillows behind her) while also practicing punching a smiling orange monkey in the head?  She's even gotten pretty good at picking the balls up and putting them down the ramp, although she has yet to get them into the monkey's hand.  I've even seen the cats swiping balls out of the ball holder at the bottom of the gym and chasing them around the room.

3.  The Giant Tiger and Pooh Balloon-  After discovering how much Sadie loves balloons earlier this week I broke down and paid eight whole dollars (almost nine) for a giant baby Winnie the Pooh balloon.  Sadie held it in her hand as we walked around the supermarket shopping and has continued to play with it since we got home.  She gets a kick out of staring at it and giggling, yanking it up and down and dragging it around the room.  And the little smiley face weight on the bottom makes a great teething toy.

4.  The Singing Hallmark Bunny for 2009-  Sadie is going through a phase where she doesn't want to hold still to let us change her diaper or her clothes.  The Hallmark Bunny (who sings "I wanna hop, hop, I just got to hop...") is a lifesaver.  I can put it next to her head and turn it on and she'll lay, transfixed, as long as the music is playing.  The second the music stops she starts to scramble, so the diaper changer needs to be ready to push the music button again if they aren't done changing her.  The Hallmark Bunny is a little disappointed that Sadie thinks that body slamming the bunny is the way to get it to play music, but I imagine that she'll learn over the course of the next few months that she just needs to press the button.

5.  Bouncy Balls-  Sadie can play roll back for a few minutes at a time, but for the most part she just throws her bouncy ball and watches it bounce off the furniture.  It usually bounces back to her so that she can throw it again.

6.  The Noah's Ark Toy-  The Noah's Ark Toy plays music and makes animal sounds. There are two levels of animals with different shaped feet, so that if the right animal is in the right spot, it will make that animal's noise.  Sadie loves this toy and one of her favorite activities is making sure that none of the animals are on the ark.  She rips them off the ark and scatters them around the room.  The moment I put them back in there spots she races over the re-clutter the room.

7.  The Pop Up Animals-  Sadie still doesn't use the Pop Up Animals in the traditional way.  I think most babies like seeing the Pop Up Animals pop up, out of their boxes.  Sadie likes putting the animals back in their boxes.  She doesn't even need to waste her time putting them away one at a time anymore.  She's realized that if they're out and she flips the top over onto the ground they will all close.  Problem solved.