Say What You Mean To, Sa!: 1 Year Update

*She weighs 20 lbs and is 29 in long. That is the 35th percentile in weight and the 45th percentile in height. Her head is in the 49th percentile, so she's all in the same general range.

*She is still rocking her 9 month clothes, but her 12 month clothes have made her way into her drawer and closet. We are set on clothes for a while thanks to Leslie (we borrowed Anna’s old stuff) and a couple of other people that have given us clothes. We are so lucky!

*She is still in size 3 diapers and will be for quite a while.

*She is totally a cow’s milk girl! It only took about a week and a half of mixing them and then she was all milk! She is so great about transitions and just goes with the flow so easily. She had a couple of blowouts (sorry, just for me to remember for next time) while her stomach adjusted, but other than that, she did not even blink. She will grab that sippy cup and throw it back!

*She is still eating just as well, but her pieces can be a bit bigger. She has figured out how to bite her food and she is so proud of herself! We did slice her up a banana most mornings, but one time Ja just broke a banana in half to see what she would do. She picked up a half in each hand and went to town without a bit of trouble. She was shoving a bit more in her mouth than we would like, so now we just quarter it and put it on her tray and she is good to go! She still loves all the same food – we haven’t really found anything she truly won’t eat. Sometimes she goes to town on everything on her plate and other times she will be very compartmentalized and have to finish everything of one type before she moves on. It is so funny how she is turning into this little person!

*She finally started using sign language right around her first birthday. We have been using it forever, but I feel like she would just look at us and smirk and then grunt to get what she wanted. When she grunts, we ask her to say ‘more’ or give us the sign so that she’ll know what to do. After a couple of tries we give her what we know she wants. Then one day, we asked her to sign more and she did it perfectly. We got so excited! Then that same day, she said ‘more’. It was like it all clicked at the same time.

*She has said a few words so far: mama, dada, more, duck, Jack Jack, no, …

*She is doing one of my very favorite things right now: I will sit on the floor with her and she’ll crawl to her big stack of books. She’ll go through the stack pulling every book off until she gets to the one that she wants, usually ‘Duck and Goose Find a Pumpkin’, ‘Where is Baby’s Belly Button?’, or ‘Ten Little Ladybugs’, she’ll crawl over to me while sliding the book across the floor with one hand and then she’ll hand me the book. Then she’ll pull up on me and turn herself around to sit in my lap. She is getting pretty good at that part. Then we’ll read the book and when we are finished, I’ll ask her if she wants more, she’ll sign more, and then we’ll read it again. And again. And again! I absolutely love it. She hasn’t played with her toys a lot lately because she is all about some books!

*One of my favorite things she does when she is reading ‘Duck and Goose Find a Pumpkin’ is every time the answer to the question is ‘no’, she’ll shake her head no and say no. Most of the time she doesn’t want to know what the question is, she wants to turn the page so that you’ll say no and she can shake her head and say no. Awesomely precious.

*There was one afternoon when I needed to run errands after school. Since she was needing to get home to be put down for a nap, I usually ran errands after Ja was home and she was in bed for the night. That day, though, she seemed to be in a good mood, so we ran an errand, went by the park to swing, got home and she ate, and by 6:30 she was done. So I put her to bed and she slept hard until the next morning. So now I have found out that I can keep her up 2 or 3 days a week. There are some days when she falls asleep on the way home. I don’t mind letting her nap, but I just felt like getting her up from that late nap when she was sleeping so hard couldn’t be good for her sleep rhythms. So now we get a couple of nights a week when we get to read books and play for a few hours before bed, and a couple of nights where she naps when we get home and I get to get some things done. It’s the best of both worlds!

*Yesterday we were playing and she was crawling around and she crawled over to our bedroom door. It was closed, but she was in the little alcove in front of it. Then she sat back like she was trying to hide. So I scooted back so she couldn’t see me. I leaned forward and she saw me and CACKLED. Then I scooted back and after a few seconds she leaned forward so she could see me and she cackled again. We played this for about 5 minutes and she laughed every time. It was the first time we had really been able to play something other than with a toy. It was hilarious.

*She is starting to get braver and braver with her walking. She’ll let go and go from one thing to another very quickly. I think she is still a little ways off, but she’ll push the walker now and walk all the way across the den and living room to the kitchen.

*Her hair is getting long now and I don’t like it hanging straight down. It is pretty thin, so bows don’t stay very well, so I don’t want to send her to school with one and give them something else to keep up with (she takes her socks off the minute she gets there and then they have to go searching for them and lots of times find them on the teddy bears!). I had given her ‘palm hair’ like I used to wear, but it wasn’t as cute as I thought it could be. Then I thought about giving her pigtails. The cuteness level is out of control. She doesn’t mess with them and it is the perfect way to keep her hair under control! She has some curls in the back, but I’m not getting my hopes up that her hair is going to be curly because the top of her head is stick straight. We shall see!

*She LOVES playing in the bath. The getting out and being wet and cold part – not so much. A game she has started to play is the ‘bottom’ game. Ever since she started crawling around and moving around in the tub, we have sat her down when she has started to stand up and told her to ‘sit on her bottom’. After sitting her down and saying it for a while, she got to the point where you could just say ‘bottom’ and she’d sit down. Now she’ll hang on the edge of the tub while she is on her knees and almost lay herself down in the tub, then she’ll pop up like she is about to stand up. Then she’ll shake her head no and fling herself back down. Then she’ll look up at me with a huge smile on her face and do it again. She also loves to stand up on the edge and then let go and sit down in the water and make a big splash. What a mess!

*She loves to swing and go to the park to watch other kids. When we are in a restaurant she will break her neck to be able to see other kids and what they are doing.

*Ms. Val and Ms. Nita (her teachers) call her their 2 year old 1 year old! They are so impressed with how well she eats, drinks that milk, can sit in a chair like a big girl, and take care of herself and her toys!
Alright, that’s all the cute stuff I can remember right now. I’ll be sure to jot some more stuff down as it comes!