Here we are. Your first birthday has come...and gone...and while I know time will keep rolling on, I am amazed at where we are today.
I knew my life would change when a baby arrived in it. I knew your Daddy and I would change on the inside and outside.
But I truly had no idea.
That I would be overwhelmed by joy. Surrounded by laughter and smiles. Find that the life of being a Mommy wasn't all I had dreamed of. That it was more beautiful, more delightful, more of what I was made for, more fun, than I ever thought possible. This is the kind of gift you are.
It is now three weeks past your first birthday, and you are on the verge of thirteen months already. You are changing and learning so quickly, it's hard to keep track of what happened when.
Your biggest development since your eleven month post is communication.
You reach or point throughout the day, at an object of desire, or a direction you want to go (or us to take you). You reach often for people, and the outdoors. When we're eating, you will point at what you want, and shake your head with a puckered forehead, "No, no, no," for what you don't want.
You know a handful of signs, but you use them in conjunction with words. It's like you grasped a certain concept, then use all means of communication available to you, to get it.
For example, water. Your Aunt Mercy taught you the sign for water (a "w" sign with the fingers, that is tapped against the chin). I don't teach you signs; I always speak to you. So when I offer you water, I always say, "Water!" You now say, "Wa!" and wave your hand next to your face at the same time. You will now ask for "wa" when you are thirsty, either at the table, or when you are playing.
You have been learning about one word per week. Whatever the word of the week is, you say all day long, as many times as possible, practicing it. In doing so, you also abandon the use of previously acquired words. I rarely hear you say "Wow! Oh Wow!" now, which makes me sad.
Three weeks ago was "Up," which sounds like "bup! bup!" You crawl to someone's ankles and say, "bup!" until they pick you up. Of course we always pick you up, because you're talking! Asking very clearly! And your squishy cheeks and adorable voice are irresistable.
Two weeks ago was, "Hi!" which sounds like "eye!" You even change the pitch and tone of your voice in a cheerful lilt as you say the word slowly. It's the kind of, "Hi!" you'd hear from a good friend who is so happy to see you. You stopped saying "up", and use "hi" for the same method now. I find it impossible to ignore you, and am compelled to pick you up when you come over to me, looking up at me with a beautiful smile, saying cheerily, "Hi!!!!"
This week is water, or "wa," and a couple days ago, "nursing", which sounds like "neh." I would like for you to tell me when you want to nurse, using your words, rather than yanking my blouse down, exposing my breast, and latching on, which you are capable of doing in about two seconds if I'm holding you on my hip. I'm also not the kind of person to refer to nursing my baby, as "boobies" or even, "milk" (since milk can come from a cup as well). When you first started trying to say "nursing," you were saying something like "shish," but in a couple days that transitioned to "nih" or "nuh" which seems to be sticking (for now).
Your words, (at least the ones that we can understand, and that you use frequently in appropriate context), include:
Momma "ma ma",
Daddy "Da dee"
Uh-Oh "uh oh!" or "oh oh!"
Ow "owww" (
book "buh",
bath "baa",
no "no no no no" (I have to get this one on video some time, as you are extremely expressive with your face when you say this word and it is all we can do not to laugh out loud),
Bob "bah" (a friend at church),
shoe "shooo!",
quiche (sheesh...at least you said it the night we were eating it!),
thank you "ache ooo!"
dog "dah"
hot "ott"
Water "wa"
Up "bup"
Hi "iiii"
Nursing "nuh" or "nah nee"
bye bye "bah bye",
night night, "nah nah".
You can also make a lot of sounds, like cars "vrooming" when you play with your cars, and some animal sounds like horse "eeeee eeeeeh!!!!" very high pitched, and wolf "aaah ooooh!!!" In fact, if you hear anyone say the word, "horse", even in passing, you whinny "eeeeee!!!!"
You have "talked" on the photo to several people recently, keeping up what seems to be your end of the conversation. You can be very chatty, and babble on and on with all sorts of very interesting sounds that we can't quite piece into words yet.
You are still crawling, very fast, and very well. You pull up to standing on EVERYTHING, everywhere you can, and easily walk along walls or anything else that helps you keep your balance.
For your first birthday, your Grandmama and Grandpapa bought you a musical push car. You spent thirty minutes or more that afternoon, after all the party guests had gone home, pushing it around the backyard. Prior to that day, you were completely disinterested in walking. But now! You can walk behind a push toy, and often try to turn an object like a chair, bench, or small table INTO a push toy, then get frustrated when it doesn't work well. Your Daddy has a giant yoga ball he uses as a computer chair, and today you were walking around the room pushing it. It could hardly be said to be supporting you, but since you believed it was supporting you, you walked! Perhaps by fourteen months, you will be taking steps unassisted. I am not in a hurry for you to walk, as I know you will get there in your own time.
You have opened a few doors in the house already (the pantry especially), since the handles are lever handles and you are tall enough to reach them. Right now, you do it rarely, so we can still close doors to keep you out of areas, but in another month or two, we will need another solution!
Some days you still seem like a baby to me, and other days, you seem so grown up like a little boy.
If I could guess, I would say that some of your greatest emotional needs are attention, affection, comfort, and security. You are also intelligent and creative, loving to explore, invent new games, discover new toys, find out how things work, and mimic adult behavior (brushing teeth, brushing hair, cleaning things, etc.).
More and more, you want to feed yourself, and don't want us to be feeding you. You are very good at feeding yourself with your hands, and you really want to use a spoon, but it's a challenge for you still. You switch the spoon between hands frequently, and try all sorts of angles for holding it, but since you don't like us to help you hold it, you have a hard time finding a method that works.
You are eating pretty much anything we are eating, unless it is too hard for you to chew with just your two little teeth. I don't plan to feed you gluten, and I will keep you very low dairy as well. Otherwise, you eat pretty much anything. Fruits and vegetables are still your favorite foods, even though you now eat some breads and carbs. It is rare that you refuse to eat something I've put in front of you. Even if you do, it's just because you don't want that food right now, not because you won't eat it at all. So I stow it away, and chances are, you'll eat it later that day. You can drink water from a sippy cup, and that is the only fluid you have except my milk.
You are very confident about nursing when you want it. You pull on my shirt, as hard as you can. You usually can either pull it down far enough where you can latch on, or at least far enough where you can look inside my blouse and see my nipple. Then you giggle and smile, because you know milk is coming. You have this certain laugh you do when you see me and you're ready to nurse, and it cracks me up. If my blouse is too hard for you to pull on, you will fuss and start panting until I am ready for you to nurse. Now that you have learned to say "nursing", you will say "nuh" at the same time as you pull on my shirt. Sometimes I have been in public, where we can't nurse right then, and I have to hold my arm across my chest to keep you from exposing me. At home, we often nurse laying in the bed, and you seem to enjoy crawling in circles and doing yoga poses while latched on. I'm not sure why you can't nurse OR use me as a jungle gym, but you seem to like doing both at the same time. You sometimes pop off, sit up, look around, then decide you're not done yet, and literally dive toward me. Your head crashes against me and somehow in the middle of the dive/crash, you manage to latch on. You never miss.
You are sleeping almost completely through the night! Your bath and bedtime routine starts at 7:00 p.m., or 6:30 if you didn't take a good nap, and you are asleep in your crib between 7:30 and 8:15 p.m. If you haven't fallen asleep while nursing, I will put you in your crib wide awake, and you will cry less than five minutes, then figure out how to fall asleep on your own. You sleep from 8:00 pm to 5:00 or 6:00 a.m., nurse, then go back to sleep in your crib until 7:00 or 7:30 a.m. You used to come into bed with us at your 5/6 am waking, but you started getting restless, and having a hard time going back to sleep in our bed, so I started putting you back in your crib instead. It made me sad, because I loved having you sleep close to me for those last couple hours. But you sleep better in your crib now. When you wake at 7 or 7:30, you come into bed with me to nurse. You don't usually fall back asleep at that point, but we will nurse for 30-60 minutes, cuddling and nursing off and on, until you seem ready to get up for the day. I feel so blessed to have this time with you. Not to have to rush off to be anywhere, but just able to cuddle and be close to you.
I still carry you places in the baby carrier, like shopping at stores, or sometimes doing laundry or cooking or tidying up the house, when you seem fussy and want to be close to me. You still often fall asleep for your nap in the carrier, or on a walk in the stroller, or in the car. Your naps are all over the board right now, and you have a hard time sleeping longer than thirty minutes. Sometimes I can get you to go back to sleep for another thirty minutes, but not always. You seem fussy and grumpy when your naps are too short, but I haven't yet figured out how to help you nap longer.
I know you are a morning person because you start "talking" to me the minute you wake up. Sometimes you start talking to me at four or five a.m. when you wake up for to nurse, but I never talk back. I am a morning person too, but four a.m. is too early for me to be having a conversation with you.
Every night when I nurse you to sleep, I sing songs about Jesus, and pray over you. "May His face shine upon you and give you peace." I pray you will fall in love with Jesus at a young age, and serve Him with your whole life. I pray for protection as you sleep, that you would be comforted by the Holy Spirit, and surrounded by angels.
I kiss your sweet sleeping forehead, and squeeze you tight, and say "I love you; time to go night night."
I never thought I would be the Texas mom who takes annual bluebonnet portraits, but here I am. The bluebonnets erupt into bloom within a week or two of your birthday, so I can't help it. Your Grandmama came with me - to make you laugh. This is the joyful expression we see on your face all day long. Your Daddy and I couldn't ask for more beauty in our lives, than this.
