The other night I felt Yannick's lower gums and I could feel that another premolar has come through! Then I checked the other side and yes, the other one is also almost through, I could feel some hard tips there too. It's astonishing how little trouble these ones were so far compared to the ones at the top which took three months of agony to make it out. Maybe the lower ones also moved up during that time and made things even worse.

This brings us to a total of twelve teeth, only eight more to go!

Right now Yannick is actually having a great time as my sister is over. She's been out with him to the playground every morning for about an hour or a little longer and when they come back he's all powered out and ready for his nap. It's good for him that there is another German speaker around, he's been a lot livelier and likes to 'talk' to her. There are still no real words but as he's signing loads he is communicating the most important things easily. He's also taken up walking practice again and manages to walk when held with just one hand. He also makes more attempts to get from one piece of furniture to another toddling rather than crawling. So we get the odd one to two unaided steps. However, most times when I am around he wants to go up on my arm. Sigh. But it's great to see some progress!!!

Gosh, where has the time gone? It's been three weeks since my last post.

If you looked through the photos that I managed to post in the meantime then you will have noticed already that Yannick got his first pair of shoes.

I had sworn to myself that I wouldn't buy him anything like that until he walked but the soft leather slippers he had proved themselves too vulnerable in the wet weather that we got about a couple of weeks ago. I didn't want to buy any proper shoes as I like to walk barefoot or in socks a lot myself (inside) and I think it's a good idea for children to feel the ground properly when learning to walk. However, even though Yannick doesn't walk unsupported yet, he loves to push anything that has wheels… Sigh.

Pushing the buggy over a wet field is not a good idea in socks or soft leather slippers. So Wednesday last week I had enough of that and decided to spend the apparently necessary £20 for a pair of cruising shoes. I went to Clarks as they have a good reputation and a big selection of children's shoes, and was pleasantly surprised by seeing the sale signs. I found a shop assistant to help and we were shown three pairs of shoes in Yannick's size. Yannick wasn't impressed by the (very nice) person helping us and started to cry (she was black - I know we urgently need to get to know more people of different skin colours), but we were able to select a pair and got it for only £10! Then the photo was taken (polaroid…!) and we were told to come back in six to eight weeks time.