sign language--boon or bane?

i've been trying out sign language with maeve since she was 6 months old and only of late has she been able to sign back...which is supposed to be good! now she can tell me what she wants and neither will get frustrated. right? wrong! now that she CAN tell me what she wants, she does it ALL THE TIME, even if i don't really want to give her what she wants. in this case, milk. she signs for milk every hour and i'm practically dried up already! and in case i didn't understand her sign, Maeve punctuates it with "malk malk" and looks purposefully at me. i'm now trying to pretend i don't understand her sign, which defeats the whole purpose of me trying to teach her to sign to begin with. now to teach her delayed gratification.

One two and up we go!

classic case of climbing before you can walk! maeve has taken to climbing up anything that has an "up" to it. so far, she's scaled the staircase at her grandparents' (and very quickly too!) and today, she tried the ladder at home. the problem is my little climber does not allow me to support her in her endeavours, but beats my hands away, or growls at me. what's a mum to do? nothing is safe anymore! and because of her recent exploratory excursions, she refuses to sit in anything with a strap: high chair, car seat...so breakfast, lunch and dinner have been served on any willing lap. in a few days time, maeve will graduate to become a toddler. she already looks like one, with lengthening arms and legs, but every night as she sleeps, she transforms to that of a baby again, with little fingers in her mouth, as she sleeps cuddled in her winnie-the-pooh sleeping bag. if i could freeze the moment, that would be lovely.

At the Oscars

Our little actress has been hamming it up for her adoring fans (mummy and daddy, grandpa and grandma and auntie leia). Act 1 starts with cough and sneeze imitations, the prologue, Act 2 has the loud shouts of banana, umbrella, shower-wower, dog, bird etc etc, interspersed with winking eyes and hand gestures. Act 3 is the tragedy: the imitation of her cousin crying (unfortunately)ending with giggles. Act 4 is the imitation of sleep where the little ham puts her head on the floor and plays dead. i guess the seed doesn't fall far from the acting tree! she makes me not want to go to work. why teach drama when i have my mini-show at home every day! now to train her not to do her curtain calls at 5am when mummy really wants to be supportive, but can't muster opening the eyes. anyone wants to employ a really short actress?

And then I awoke....

...in the morning! i can't believe it! God is good. now that maeve is turning one, she has been sleeping longer stretches in the night and i've only woken up to nurse her when i see the sun rise. Of course my care group has been praying for almost a year for Maeve to sleep! my long-suffering prayer warriors!! for the first time ever since maeve was born, i actually slept long enough to dream. sure, many others who train their babies to sleep when they were 3 months have been sleeping blissfully, but i totally abandoned the sleep training, not in my personality, and chose to let her learn to sleep naturally. and she finally did it! we've also put her in a little sleeping bag so she can't kick the blanket off (and kick us for that matter)at night. HOWEVER, she has taken to sleeping on my face, cheek to cheek, all very sweet it looks, but not when she slam-dunks herself on me at 3am, grabbing fistfuls of my hair in her dreamy state and doing the occasional lick/suck on my cheek, forehead, nose...cherished love-bites from my little pumpkin.