new things - more steps

Violet is changing so fast. I can almost see a difference from day to day. It just seemed like one day she started screaming loudly for fun, squealing about anything that peaks her interest...like a rack of stuffed animals on a store shelf. She is obsessed with putting things in things. Like, her bath toys for instance. She'll take the three little floaty toys and put them in the purple cup I use to rinse her hair out, dump them out, and put them all back in, repeatedly. I don't think (at least now!) that she could get sick of it. Those pop-together plastic toys that Grandma Jo got for her are fun too. I string a bunch of them together, and she likes to grab one off the end, one by one - and she seems so proud when she pulls them apart. She also took 7 steps today. She took 6 steps on her own a couple weeks ago and I thought for sure she'd be walking all over by now, but she really prefers to crawl around...its easier and much faster. Sounds like a mommy trait. Doing things the quicker way! Sometimes she gets into a "walking" mood. If we try get her up on her feet and she doesn't want to stand, she'll crumble to the floor and start crawling...but sometimes I guess she just feels like standing and walking...and she'll just take off until she reaches me or Dave and fall over and giggle. She still says 'Aabbuuhhh" for Abby. Its all she'll say if we ask her to repeat mama or dada...she'll blurt out "abuhh". Hhmm. How we rate?! hehe She'll be 11 months old next week. Wow. Violet's first Christmas is right around the corner! We'll be in Berwyn with Grandma Martha for the holidays.