bailey update 11 and 12 months

11 months - 20 lbs. 5 oz.

12 months - 21 lbs. 14 oz. 30 inches

Hi Bailey,

Well you turned 11 and then 12 months. Time sure has gone by fast. You have changed so much in the last 2 months. It's amazing. You're suddenly becoming an actual little person, with opinions and everything. Well kind of...you're mostly still our baby.

signing dog.

I recently mentioned how you had picked up a couple of signs here and there. Shortly after that post, you started signing all kinds of stuff. I think it was like 4 or 5 new signs in one day. So crazy. Daddy and I were trying to figure out how many you know now, I think it's at least 2 dozen....possibly even more. I'm amazed at how quickly you keep learning more and more signs. It's so wonderful to be able to communicate with you. Although I will admit that sometimes it gets confusing. Some signs require a little more dexterity than you have at the moment, so several signs look the same. Sometimes it takes some guesswork but we can understand each other for the most part. I love that you can tell me when you want out of your crib (you sign "all done" when you're ready after naps), or when you're tired (you sign "sleep"), or hungry, or want milk, or want to read a book....to name a few. It's so cool! (Signs you know: dog, frog, monkey, bear, horse, duck, fish, giraffe, mom, dad, baby, car, bus, boat, milk, eat, cereal, cracker, water, ball, book, bath, socks, clothes, shoes, doll, all done, wash hands...)

signing and saying dad.

You have also started to communicate with words...you say "da" while you sign dog, "ba" when you sign ball, "buh" when you sign book, "sh" when you sign fish, and "sss" when you sign cereal. You say "da" for dad and "ma" mama. It's unbearably cute. It's also amazing how much you understand...in English and Spanish. I love that I can ask you for something and you know what to hand to me or what to do. Not that you do it everytime, but I know you know what I mean.

walking.

On another note, you have become a lot more mobile. You started taking a couple of steps around 11 months. You'd walk across the living room from couch to couch or from daddy to me. You kept getting better and better as weeks went by. And I guess I can say it now, you are a walker. The other day we were at my brother's house for the 4th and you walked across the entire backyard to me...on grass! It was awesome! You even went around some people and chairs. We were all amazed! Of course now that you can walk, you want to walk everywhere. You try to squirm out of my arms and even are reluctant to ride in the grocery cart (something you used to like). Although yesterday you rode in it just fine because I was feeding you strawberries the whole time.

lunchtime with food all over your face.

Speaking of strawberries, I think they are your favorite food at the moment. You absolutely love them. You would eat those for every meal if you could. And actually on some days, that's all I can get you to eat...that, cereal and crackers. You have definitely gotten pickier these days. You inspect everything that goes in your mouth and if you don't like it once it's in your mouth, you take it out and throw it on the floor. In fact, you throw stuff on the floor all the time. We're working on that. You have tried a bunch of different foods though...the most recent being corn, blueberries, whole wheat pasta,millet, brown rice, toast, and watermelon (from what I can remember). You've started trying more of what we eat too. It sure makes it easier when we go out to lunch. The three of us went out to lunch the other day, and you were actually content sitting in the high chair munching on some bread from my sandwich. It was fun.

not feeling so hot.

You had your first real sickness the day before your birthday...it lasted through your birthday unfortunately. You spiked a really high fever and eventually we realized you had roseola. We spent a few days at home while you got better. It was hard to keep you happy the whole time...we read lots of books and played with all of your toys. At one point I even tried turning on the KPBS children's channel for you to watch...you were not interested at all. You just don't seem to like television unless it's your "Signing Time" DVD's. The other day we had people over and the TV happened to be on most of the day, I don't think I saw you look at it once...even while the other kids were watching it.


Another thing...you don't seem to like sweets either. I made you a birthday cake and you would have nothing to do it with it. I don't know if it was because you weren't feeling well, but you spit it out and started crying. The next day at your birthday party, Daddy gave you some of that birthday cake and you spit that out too. It's funny because you absolutely love fruit and sweet veggies...I guess you're just not into the processed sugar stuff.


We flipped your carseat around to face forward a couple of weeks before your birthday. The first time you rode in it, you seemed to love it. We thought that was the end of your hatred for the car. You just don't seem to like it at all and get fussy after only having been in it for a couple of minutes most times. Unfortunately it didn't work and you still get very cranky. You're usually okay for a little while if you have a book or something to munch on....but that doesn't last long and eventually you start throwing everything we hand to you. We're hoping you outgrow this. Maybe you'll be more entertained when you're little brother or sister is sitting next to you. That should be interesting...

You're still napping quite well. It's gotten to where we can lay you down with your bottle at naptime and you just pass out right after it's gone. At bedtime, we read you a story while you drink your bottle and then put you down...that seems to work too. Of course there are those days when you're fussy and it takes a little more effort on our part, but that's not very common. Sometimes I can't believe how far we've come on this whole sleeping thing. I still remember those days when I thought you'd never nap.

cute birthday girl.

We had your first birthday party a couple of days ago. You had a great time even though you weren't feeling great. There was cake, a bouncy house and even pinatas! We had a Curious George theme since you love him so much. The cake was made of cupcakes in the shape of Curious George's face (made by grandma of course) and one of the pinatas was Curious George himself! Which actually proved to be a problem when it came time to hitting it. You had no problem when people were hitting the pinata shaped like a number one. In fact when I held you up to it for your turn, you hit it a little. When I put up to the Curious George pinata, you wouldn't hit it and instead you kissed it. And when people started hitting it, you totally flipped out. You started crying and I had to take you inside, away from the chaos. Mental note, next year we can only get inanimate object pinata. All in all though, the party was great fun.

touching Curious George.

Well baby, I can't believe you're already one whole year old. You've grown up so much in such a short time. It's been a whirlwind of a year and I've loved every minute of it. I can't wait to see what next year entails. I love you so much sweetie pie.


Love,
Mama