my baby is one year old!

baby is a whole year old!

i had really wanted to do a post at 11 months because i felt like baby had changed and grown up sooo much.  but things have been super busy and now the changes seem even more drastic because my baby turned into a kid!  here are some things my sweet girl has been up to these days.

she is not entertained by toys anymore.  they are boring and uncool.  books are the thing now and she loves turning the pages and then tossing it aside for a new book.  she also likes to eat books but i'm trying to break her of that habit.

she actually still likes to eat everything.  when is this oral stage supposed to end?  it does not matter how often i vaccum, sweep, or clean, she will find something she's not supposed to eat, and eat it.  bugs, old food, lint, dirt, hair, paper, you name it.  i have yet to find something she won't eat.  she scours the carpet for treasures and if there's nothing in the carpet to eat, she'll pick at it with her fingers and eat the carpet [lint] itself.  what to do with this child.  the other day she bit off some of the plastic wrapper on her puffs container (we've kept it as a toy) and then she swallowed it.  luckily i'm practically a trained professional in this area since a doctor i knew once told me that kids clean out their systems really well on their own.  i got her in a comfortable sitting position and soothed her as the dry heaving started.  and i continued to sooth her as the spitting up and [light] vomiting started.  and sure enough.  a tiny little piece of pink plastic came out!

see the pinchers?  she's trying to eat it again!

she loves to be upright and is walking like crazy.  three weeks ago she wouldn't really walk or move unless she was holding on with both hands.  then she realized that if she was only holding on with one hand, she could pull you wherever she wanted to go.  her favorite thing now is to walk up and down stairs.  the funniest part about it is that she walks up stairs just like an adult, alternating feet, one on each step.  but, even if she can't walk up them, baby loooves stairs.

baby started talking while we were at the beach.  her first word was "yes."  she just woke up one morning and decided she would start answering everyone's questions.  yes yes yes.  the next day (and ever since, really) it was "no."  i don't think her answers really mean anything quite yet ("baby, do you want more strawberries?" "no" and then she opens her mouth really big) but when she says "no" on her own it is almost always correct.  the most common situation is when she's in her highchair.  she'll pick up a piece of food, hold it over the edge of the chair, drop it, and then look at me and say a very distinct "no!" just like i say to her when she does something she's not supposed to do.  i try not to smile at it but it is kinda funny to hear a "no!" while i'm doing something and see the tell tale piece of food on the floor.  her "no" can not be mistaken for anything else, but the "yes" always varies.  sometimes she holds the "ssss" and sometimes it's short.  sometimes it sounds more like a "yeah" and sometimes it's a whisper.  anyways, it's really really cute so we're always trying to get her to say it.  common situation: "baby say yes." "no!"  "say yes."  "no!" and on and on.  we're having too much fun with it.  she also says hi, hello, bye, and uh oh.  she's repeated words too but i don't think that counts since it's just parroting.  i'm still getting used to all of this.  i didn't expect her to talk for a long time for some reason.

guilty

baby's sleep is still kinda all over the place but that's mostly just negligent parenting.  the only consistent thing is that she sleeps.  sometimes we put her to bed at 7:30pm, sometimes 10:30pm.  sometimes she'll wake up at 6am, sometimes as late at 11am.  today she woke up at 8:15 so really, it just varies.  a lot.  i'd say more often than not, baby wakes up once during the night, nurses, and goes back to sleep.  last night she didn't wake up at all.  on days where she wakes up early, she takes two naps, both normally between 2 and 2.5 hours long.  on days where she sleeps in i just give her one nap and she'll sleep for about 3 hours, give or take.  she still completely burrows her face in the crib bumpers.  how she hasn't suffocated yet is beyond me.

baby was not the easiest trip-mate when we went to atlanta/the beach two weeks ago.  she was a handful on the plane (not realizing why she couldn't get down and crawl everywhere), she was so busy and getting into ev-er-y-thing, and her sleep was terrible, especially at the beach.  i had to nurse her to sleep every time, give her a pacifier as well, gently place her in the pack-n-play, be super super quiet, and still prepare myself for her to wake up in 45 mins if it was nighttime or sleep less than 2 hours if it was naptime.  and then to put her back to sleep at night i would have to repeat that whole thing (which normally wouldn't work the second time) or just bring her to bed with me.  so she slept with me and my blogging sister every single night at the beach.  i am soooo glad she's back to sleeping great in her crib again!  the other thing was that nothing was childproofed... especially the sandy beach.  this kid ate a LOT of sand.  more than once i resorted to trapping her on the beach in a pack n play.  ;-)

i was so excited to teach baby sign language but she's just not into it.  she did all done for a few months and then stopped a few weeks ago on our trip.  she's only done it a handful of times since we got home.  i know she knows how but she prefers to just look at me like i'm some sort of idiot.  the new sign for "all done" is pulling at her bib while pushing on her tray.  not sure who's teaching who here.

baby's clothes now range from newborn to size 12-18 months.  it just depends on the brand, style, fit, etc of each piece of clothing.  i've finally started consistently putting her in shoes when we go out and she wears a size 2.  she's still wearing a size three diaper and probably will be for a loooong time.

7.19.11 - 1 year appointment

16 lbs 7.5 ounces  1%

29.5 inches  63%

hc 44.5 cm  25%

on her birthday, baby woke up a little after six (i blame the garage door because that's when honey left to go to work).  i nursed her and we played for a bit.  she seemed sooo tired during breakfast and wouldn't eat so i just cleaned her up and put her down for a nap... at 8 am!  officially the earliest nap she's ever had.  she practically jumped out of my arms into her crib.  she was exhausted and slept until 11:15.  i nursed her and we headed to the pool for a little while and hung out with some kids.  baby seemed a little bored in the baby pool and was showing much more interest in the big pool so we swam around in there until it was time to go home for lunch.  she was in a good mood but seemed exhausted again so i put her down for her nap at 2.  she was still sleeping at 6 when honey's family came over for her little birthday party!  she had so much fun eating cake and opening presents and hanging out.  it was a really great day.

baby girl i love you so much!