Harper has been hitting the books pretty hard these days. She appreciates a good story almost as much as she enjoys soft, crinkley pages. Fuzzy Bee is the current favorite. She is reading about Fuzzy Bee's friends, Ladybug and Worm, in this photo. In addition to loving some quiet time with a book, she is also more and more vocal all the time. She likes talking to Mom and Dad all day long and you can really tell that she is expressing herself very clearly. Bored or sad talking is very different from happy "Good Morning" talking. She is always super happy, smily, and cute when she wakes up in the morning. She seems to really be happy just to see Mom and Dad's faces. Speaking of faces, Harper is also really into grabbing faces these days. She likes to reach for and grab onto lots of things, but seems especially happy to grab Mom's face or Dad's beard. If she is not playing with or reading a good book with her folks, Harper enjoys spending larger chunks of time in her new ExerSaucer (yet another hideous, giant, plastic piece of furniture that we tolerate because of the smiles on our girl's face when she plays in it).
Further proof of Harper's brilliance: according to the literature, babies should smile at their image in a mirror and respond to their name at four months, Harper has been enjoying her reflection for several weeks already and has recently started to respond to her own name too! Brilliant no doubt.