Sparrow Lorelei photo gallery

Walking, playgrounds and walks in the thirteenth month, 9 May - 9 June, 2010

The week after her first birthday, Sparrow started to walk. This meant our trips outside got to change a little, and I started visiting more playgrounds. I still did most of the walking for her, but she could start to engage with it herself too.

This photo is blurry, but that's because she's moving. This is the first day that she walked. She was only doing a couple of steps, maybe three or four, but it was a definite attempt to get somewhere before deciding this was way too slow and getting back down on her hands and knees to crawl. We're at Max Brenner's in Highpoint, having a cup of hot chocolate. The video of her (almost) first steps was taken here. We've just come from buying a new dryer. The old one decided not to blow hot air anymore. I wouldn't have minded it doing that in summer, but it's cold and damp enough now that we can't get the nappies that last five percent dry because the winter air has the same moisture content. So a new dryer it was. And after I'd finished yelling at the very stupid bad annoying salesmen trying to guilt-trip me into buying the dryer I'd said I didn't want because they didn't have the one that I did want, and after we'd found a NICE shop to go to instead and bought a good dryer there, we calmed down with a nice hot chocolate.

She explored all the way to the area outside the food court, pausing regularly to accept admiration from the other cafe patrons. I thought this made a good photograph composition. You can see the grip socks here, which I have a love-hate thing with. I tried as much as possible for her to have nothing on her feet while she was learning to walk, but May got colder, and colder... the ground was too cold for me most of the time so I knew it would be too cold for her too. Grip socks are the usual solution but I didn't find them terribly effective. They only grip if the baby hasn't pulled on them and twisted them around their foot to put the interesting bits on top.

At the playground at Newport lakes. A lot of the photos on this page I took just because they were pretty, or good composition, or an interesting balance of colours.

Sitting in the grass. I thought maybe she would enjoy trying to walk on the grass but not yet, still too soon. She was just happy to look around, watch people, ask for cuddles and do some general looming.

A family walk, it's sunny but cold and Sparrow is in a lot of layers. This duffle coat that Maggie got at a second hand baby market and brought over is easily a size too big. That means it just fits perfectly over all the other layers. Poor child can't possibly hurt herself if she falls over, she'll just bounce. She's also heavy enough now that we're choosing the stroller for some walks rather than the carrier. We need to work out how to get the carrier on with her on our backs.

The playground down between the Leisure Centre and the council estate. This is where/when the video of the snare-gong was taken.

She's so cute trying to work out how to get from the edge across all those woodchips to the play equipment.

Driving the "quadbike" with Daddy.

Another day, another walk.I liked the look of these grass heads, this kind of grass is planted so commonly in new house "modern" gardens at the moment. Sparrow seemed a little intrigued at first but quickly grew bored of these tickly things.

We walked up to the Vernon St shops in South Kingsville and back, finding new lillypilly trees and taste-testing a custard tart from the bakery on the way. As we headed back I figured that Sparrow needed to burn off energy as much as I did, so she might as well do some of the walking herself. She didn't go far, only from the stroller to this little fence and back again a couple of times, she's not really ready to walk somewhere yet. But it was fun to think that soon I won't have to push her the *entire* time, and that if she demands out of the stroller I can let her out and see what happens.

Our closest playground, the one behind the Maltese Community Centre just a couple of minutes away. Again, pictures taken mostly for interesting colour and composition.

A walk to the Second Avenue shops just for a little bit of difference. The people who shop there all rave about it. I didn't find it particularly great, but then I'm used to that lovely vege market on Swansea St in Perth (not to mention our home-grown vegies from the farm) which outdoes this one in quality substantially. My local shops at the Circle are better too, but they specialise differently so it's not an accurate comparison. I couldn't resist showing Sparrow all the cheese here though. Food should be real and present, fragrant and tangible.

Walking around Newport Lakes together. I spent a lot of time talking to Sparrow as we walked. I get quite quiet at home sometimes, tend to use a lot of non-verbal (or German) communications. But when we were out amongst the trees and lakes I talked and talked about all the curious things we were finding and how they all related - the birdsong, the rocks, the area of burnt reeds, the shade of the trees. And then we got to the stepping stones across the lake, and there were cygnets! That was fun to see. I thought cygnets came a couple of months later, so it was a surprise to find them.

One last playground. This one is another great one for a distraction on her grumpy days. It's at the Altona Gate shopping centre, downstairs in the food court. So if we're both having a not-so-great day I can come here and get some lunch and share it with her (though so far she mostly refuses my choices) and place her in here for a bit. There's always other kids here for her to watch and interact with, and while she's not instantly engaging with people she doesn't know, she loves watching what all the other kids are doing and occasionally trying it too. And we can come here even if it's bitterly cold or raining.