Kat’s fascination with musical instruments continues apace: here she is playing with Zak’s new resonator guitar.

She also said her first sentence this week: on Wednesday, she stood at my knee, looked up and gesticulated with her arms and said quite clearly, “Baby up.”

And I said, “Do you want up?”

And she nodded her head vigorously, and after I picked her up and hugged her, she laughed with glee and clapped her hands. She was so proud of herself.

She is also learning to stand on her own, and can stand up from a squat without help or without holding on to anything, and can stand for about thirty seconds now.

Here you can see her dancing over the guitar. She loves to dance, and dances with music all of the time. She especially likes R&B and blues and will dance and clap her hands when we put music on. She also dances to Zak’s flute music.

Speaking of dances, Morganna’s senior prom was last night.

She dropped in at Salaam before going to the prom, and everyone thought that she and James looked so cute.

Here is a picture of the two of them–looking adorable.

Unfortunately, I didn’t get a picture of Morganna dancing with Leah, one of our bellydancers and Hilarie last night at Salaam before the prom. That was priceless. (Now you know why I love to work there so much–we have fun, even when we are slammed!)

A few months ago on his blog, Anthony Bourdain was musing with horrified dread on the subject of what he would feed his infant daughter when she started eating solid food.

A lot of foodie moms (myself included) posted with the hopefully helpful advice that babies and toddlers will eat what you feed them. That is to say, if they never get a taste of Chicken McNuggets in the the first place, they won’t insist on a diet that consists only of questionable chicken parts nuggetized and breaded with unknown substances and deep fried in half-degraded oil.

Watching Kat eat her own little bowl of Kiss Kiss Bang Bang Spaghetti the other day made me realize that I hadn’t really talked about how toddler’s tastes change and how to guide those tastes toward healthy, delicious food choices.

So far, Kat still tends to prefer flavorful, healthy foods, although she does love her ice cream, chocolate preferably. She doesn’t get much in the way of cookies or cake or candy, simply because we generally don’t keep such foods around our house. She still most often shares our meals with us, although there are some foods she doesn’t seem to like much. Cow milk, except in the form of cheese, preferably sharp cheddar, cream, ice cream or yogurt lassi, is on her “I don’t consume it” list. Meat is a sometimes food as well: some days she will refuse it, while at other meals, she cannot get enough of it. I have noticed that she tends to prefer chicken and pork to beef, but what she seems to prefer above all meat is eggs. (Kat really digs Cilantro Chicken Stir Fry–she eats that chicken so fast I can barely keep up with shredding it into little bites for her.)

She likes scrambled eggs so much that Zak has taken to calling her “The Oviraptor.” She can power through one to two extra large farm fresh eggs from pastured hens in record time, gobbling them up using both a spoon and a hand, if the spoon method is too slow. She likes the way I cook them best–well beaten with a tiny bit of cream, a sprinkle of herbs and slowly cooked with a bit of butter–all local. At the end, I add a sprinkle of shredded sharp cheddar and serve it forth to her great appreciation.

Fruits and vegetables are a seesaw ride. One day she cannot get enough of oranges and tangerines, then two days later, they are the untouchables of the citrus world. Apples are beyond great one minute, and the next, she is tossing them to the cats as outcast unclean. Asparagus is viewed with suspicion when sauteed in butter, but let it be cut up in a creamy pasta dish and it is better than good and is pounced upon and gobbled up. Tomatoes are almost always the best beloved, although now and again they are given a fierce toddler glare that eloquently says, “I don’t think so.”

Noodles of all types, both Western and Asian, are a great hit, as is anything over or in rice. Pasta, especially long thin noodles, have the extra bonus of providing dinner time entertainment to Mommy, Daddy, Big Sister and any of the assorted dinner guests who happen to sit down with us. Tomato based sauces made with my home-canned tomatoes are greatly favored, but she also likes vegetable pastas with creamy cheese sauces too. Asparagus and spinach are great in her book if noodles are involved, and peas taste better when mixed into macaroni and cheese, a dish which we have renamed “Cheez n’ Peaz.” Kat loves her Cheez ‘n’ Peaz, although in typical toddler fashion, while she may eat peas with gusto one day, she may pick them out of her bowl and set them aside the next day.

That toddler tendency to eat a food one moment and refuse it the next is probably one of the must frustrating aspects to feeding a child of Kat’s age. Some kids grow out of it by three, others continue in this irritating and confounding behavior until they are eight or nine years old. I think that the best way to deal with it is to not make a fuss about it, and if a kid doesn’t eat one thing, offer something else–within reason–and then offer the once offensive food again in a day or so. Be laid back about it, though, because in my experience, the more attention paid to the behavior by a parent, whether positive, in the form of offering a dizzying array of food choices all of which the child may refuse just for the pleasure of feeling their own personal power, or negative, in the form of berating, cajoling, coercing or otherwise making a divisive issue of food, the more likely the child is to continue in the behavior, because they are rewarded by this attention.

When Kat refuses to eat something, I just shrug and offer something else. If she doesn’t eat that, I figure she probably isn’t really hungry. Most kids will not starve themselves, so I don’t worry–I just keep an eye on what she eats over a period of days, instead of looking at what she is eating or not eating this minute. When I look at it that way, I find that she does eat a varied, nutritive diet, it just may not seem so at every meal when she pulls the bizzaro toddler trick of only eating one specific food for a meal or two.

That is my best advice to parents–take the long view when it comes to what your kids eat. Pay attention to the big trends, not the momentary whims. I find that Kat’s appetite fluctuates depending on her growth patterns, her physical activity levels and her, uh, digestive status. (In other words, if she hasn’t had a bowel movement in several days, it stands to reason that she might not eat much. Little bellies can only hold so much, and sometimes room needs to be made before a meal can go down.)

And when the momentary whims get you down, try and shrug your shoulders and ignore them. Feed them a varied diet in as calm and matter-of-fact way possible, and while you are at it, let them taste what you are eating, even if you think it is too spicy and they won’t like it. (Within reason–no steak tartare or raw fish for babies, please!) They may surprise you and love it–Kat still adores all sorts of curries, and as you can see the allium-laden Kiss Kiss Bang Bang really was a big hit with my little highchair dweller.

Let toddlers see you and other adults and kids enjoying food, making appreciative noises and sounds. Let them experience laughter and conversation at the table, maybe even a tiny drop of wine from your fingertip, and offer a lick of garlic butter from your spoon. Start them on the sensual pleasures of food early and you will eventually have a life-long food lover on your hands.

In other words, make food fun, not a fight, not just for your kids’ sake, but for your own as well.

We picked up Kat’s quilt from the woman who does the professional long-arm quilting (machine quilting on a large machine that allows easy, free-motion designs full of simple or complex curves and whorls) in Nelsonville on Wednesday.

As you can see, Kat loves it, and has been cuddling it at least a little bit every day.

She has been developing by leaps and bounds all week. She has been bouncing up and down, holding on to furniture or our hands, working on standing up. She doesn’t do the “bear walk” where she gets up on hands and feet, and then climbs upward. She squats and in a very controlled fashion, pushes upward until she is standing.

And yesterday–she did it without holding on to anything. She just popped up for a few seconds, and then, instead of falling down, she eased herself down using her leg muscles. She is so close to walking!

And then, last night, the nightmare–I was at work, expediting and cooking during a huge rush, my mind racing with a bunch of split second details, running back and forth between dupes (the papers orders are written on) and the line, the oven, the rice cooker, the bread griddle–when Zak called.

And in measured, very even, and to my ears, hideously SLOW (when your mind races as fast as mine does during a rush, everything that has no urgency to it is slow) words, told me that Kat had fallen off the bed onto her head. He was just outside the door with the baby monitor when it happened, and she wasn’t knocked out, and she was acting fine, but he didn’t really know what to do.

I at first told him to watch her, to check her pupils for dialation, to feed her and see if she is nauseous, watch for vomiting or extreme sleepiness, inconsolable crying. I got off the phone and went outside just to, well, calm down for a minute, because I could feel the panic rising in my throat, and the tears gathering, and Becky, one of our best waitresses, and Leah, the bellydancer, both of whom are moms themselves, saw my face, and asked what was wrong, so I told them, and Becky said, “Don’t be stubborn–go check on her, and if you have to take her to the hospital, go. We have two cooks besides you, and we will be fine.”

So–I went to jump in my car, but it was blocked in by two other cars–one of which was Leah’s, which was fine, because she could move it–and the other–belonged to another person who worked at Salaam who was not on shift, but was somewhere downtown doing something, and so wasn’t available to move the car for me.

So–I got pissed. And I cursed, not too loudly. Stacia, one of the other waitresses, let me borrow her car to get home, which I did, and I checked on Kat.

Looking at her, I figured it was just a bruise on her head and a scrape on her nose, but I didn’t want to take that risk. Zak and I decided to take her to the ER. So, I drove back to Salaam, dropped off Stacia’s car–God bless her–and told everyone what was up, and then Zak picked me up outside and off to the hospital we went.

And it turns out–we were there for about three hours, it being a Saturday night at the ER–that Kat was fine, just as I thought. And she did lots of standing–supported and unsupported, and laughing and smiling. She was good when the doctor examined her–she didn’t cry or freak out–and she did a lot of supported walking. And dancing. And jumping up and down.

We came home and she ate some pizza with us for dinner (there was no way I was going to cook, or Morganna was–she had to expedite after I left, and it was her first time!), and then refused to sleep. Until long after five in the morning, she refused to sleep. I think she got an adrenaline rush from the terror of falling on her face, and literally couldn’t sleep.

But, after eight hours of sleep–she woke up smiling and happy, and has been in a great mood all day.

She just has a red nose–she basically got a case of rug burn on it.

So, all is well. But it was really scary, as any parent can understand.

The whole incident also reminded me of why I love working with restaurant people–they are like your family, and when something bad happens, they are right there for you. Not every workplace is like that–not every restaurant–but most of them are. The best restaurant workers, both front and back of the house, have a genuine love of people–and it shows not only in their customer service, but in how they treat each other with respect and love, and will pitch in to help out when something goes awry.

Kat’s most favorite pastime these days, other than listening to, jamming to, dancing to, and singing to music, is drawing with crayons. She loves her colors, and the crayons are almost always scattered over the floor where she can get to them.

As you can see, she has another artistic kitten interested in crayons–Delia. Cordelia loves to help with artistic pursuits–her current favorite room in the house, other than any room where Kat is roaming, is my sewing room. There are so many things to help with in there–fabric, thread, embroidery floss, measuring tools, notepaper, transfer paper, batting–you name it, she is into it.

And, she loves crayons. She picks them up and carries them around in her mouth, sometimes running away with them. She jumps over the baby gate and carries them off for nefarious purposes, sending Zak and I dashing to rescue them, as several of them have already been lost to her ministrations. She bats them on the floor, she carries them, and she, like Kat, chews on them now and again.

And she loves to watch Kat draw, and help.

As you can see–she assists in pushing the crayon across the paper, and she also holds the wayward paper down so it cannot escape the artistic additions of Kat. Without Delia lounging across the paper, most certainly, Kat would never be able to draw.

She is getting better at making deliberate lines, now, in a fairly controlled fashion. Both Zak and I have seen her do it–she is also learning how to make circular shapes. Actually, they are ellipses, but they are drawn in imitation of the circles Zak, Morganna and I draw for her. She has also started playing two new games that involve crayons. She has an animals book that she loves (and that she can identify all the animals but the insects in it, if you ask, “Where is the rhino?” she will point to it unerringly, for example.) and Zak has taken to drawing crayon versions of the animals in that book and asking her to point to the photograph he is copying . She can pick them out perfectly, every time–this is this bunny, and that is that dog, and can go back and forth from photograph to crayon drawing.

Another game she plays, which she initiated when we were drawing together Friday night after I came home from work, is she will pick up a crayon, and hold it up against some object in the room or on her person that matches that color. The first one she did was green–she was wearing rainbow leggings and she picked up the dark green crayon and held it against the light green stripe on her leggings. She nudged me to get me to look, and I said, “Yes! Green! They are both green.” Then, she picked up the light green crayon that exactly matched the stripe and held it against the stripe along with the dark green crayon. She understood that they were both green.

Then, she picked up the brown crayon and held it against the brown cover of a book, and the wood floor, both of which were–well, brown.

Then, she picked up an orange crayon, and pointed to the back wall of our living room, which is painted a russet-orange color. I affirmed it was orange, and then she put the crayon against the picture of a golden lion tamarin, a little fuzzy monkey which has orangish fur, and then put the crayon against my freshly hennaed hair. (By the way, if you ever want red hair, and you don’t want to use chemicals in your hair–which is a good choice, I think–go for body-art quality henna. Here is the best information on the web about using henna for hair, and it is also where I get my henna–the lady who runs the site, along with The Henna Page wrote her PhD dissertation on the history and use of henna in body art, cosmetics and medicine and the culture surrounding it. Catherine Cartwright Jones, the lady in question, also does some of the best henna art I have ever seen in my life.)

It was awesome. We now play the colors game regularly while we are drawing together.

Kat loves to not only hear her Daddy play Native American flute, she likes to imitate him. For months, she has been able to blow a clear note on a flute if it is held for her. Now, she can hold the flute herself, and when she is holding a small flute, she can reach down and even finger a different note–meaning she can cover the finger hole of a small flute with small holes!

This flute is too big for her to do that, but she really likes it because of the black cat block on it–and it has a really nice tone, and even though it is large, it doesn’t take a lot of breath to make a good clear note.

She had a great time playing flute with her Daddy Sunday morning, before we went out for a long walk–it was beautiful outside, sunny, warm, with flowers blooming. The restaurant was closed, so I was off work–it was perfect.

So out we went–with Kat dressed in her new spring colors gifted to her by Grandma Tessa. (Thank you, Grandma Tessa!)

Then, we came back home and grilled bratwursts for supper, which we ate with sauerkraut and asparagus. It was almost a traditional German supper, although the beer, instead of being a beverage, was cooked in the kraut.

Kat didn’t think much about the kraut, though, so instead, she got to eat leftovers from last night’s dinner–Keema Mattar Gobi, (Minced Spiced Lamb with Peas and Cauliflower–yes, a recipe will come along soon), served over rice. Sauerkraut is an acquired taste, I will admit. She didn’t care much for the asparagus, either, but it wasn’t the best I have ever had It was rather bland. We’ll see what she thinks of the local spears when they come in!

After supper, Kat got ready for bed in her new lilac-colored sleeper with the little bunnies and flowers sprinkled all over it, and I got out her crayons and paper for some quiet creative playtime. She loves her crayons. She has Daddy, Morganna and myself draw pictures for her, and then she practices copying our motions. She is getting the idea of circles pretty well now.

As you can see from the photograph, Kat has invented a novel place to store her crayons while she is using them.

She has discovered the wonder that is pockets, but unfortunately, any fold or opening in fabric or clothing is a pocket as far as she concerned. With a snap-front sleeper, she will cram so many crayons into the leg openings that she can no longer bend at the knee! Silly girl! But she is hilarious–she will take out a color, use it for a bit, and then tuck it away, then pick out a new color from her new hiding place, and work with it for a while, before repeating the entire process.

Right now she is dozing on my lap, while Morganna and I catch up on the latest Dr. Who and Torchwood episodes.

Look for some posts on reducing restaurant food waste as well as some more recipes in the coming week! I meant to write more this weekend, but the restaurant was so busy–we had record-smashing business on Friday and Saturday was quite busy, too–that I didn’t get a chance to get around to it!