eleven months

I will constantly be amazed at how old she is, every single month and year to come. Eleven months old! Whoa baby!

Posing for pictures, she is such a ham. And such a personality! She is learning concepts and cause and effect. Today she picked up a bottle and tried to put the lid on it. If nana hands her a watch, she knows where the watch goes. She knows that the TV remote turns on the show, and will press buttons and look for changed on the TV. Handed the remote to nana and said "tee-vee?". Smartie pants.

Big mover. No independent steps yet, but she can pull to stand, walk along the couch, walk all the way around the coffee table and can walk across the room pushing her walker. Super cute! If she needs to get somewhere quickly, watch out- she will just crawl across the floor. Dirt, mud, food, doesn't matter what's in the way- she will crawl right through it.

She likes to boogie. She has some favorite songs (every target commercial she will dance to), and her absolute favorite song is the Robin Thicke song. She will sway left and right, up and down, and did a new dance with auntie mere (via facetime) tonight that looked like a karate-chop. Not so sure about that one...

She eats mostly table foods, supervised, and chopped into little pieces. She can eat breads, sandwiches, chicken, veggies (as long as they are cooked and not hard/raw), cheese, etc. She got a little piece of brownie on my birthday, and just about tore across me to get the rest of the brownie. She liked the chocolate. She prefers to feed herself, little miss independent. And forget a spoon. Nope- she's not going to have that. Tonight she had oatmeal, but nope- wouldn't take a spoon! Had to eat it with her hands. Hot-mess.

Tooth count? Two bottom teeth. Top left tooth is in full, top right tooth is coming in, and second top left tooth is coming in. (Yep- I don't know the official names of all the teeth, don't sue me).

She has quite a little vocabulary: she can say Mama, dada, nana, mere-mere (she even sang the mere-mere song today, haha!), hey, bye bye, kitty, yum, eeee (please?), "tut-tut" (turtle), and has a cute babble stream, and has gotten to the point of repeating sounds that we make.

She is terrified of teddy-bears.

Milestones on her 11-month birthday:
- this morning, she reached and gave me a hug. Wrapped her arms around me, tucked her head in, and said "mm-mmm". Brings tears to my eyes. :)
- She blew nana a kiss this afternoon! Without prompting. She will sometimes wave bye-bye, and will more frequently give high-fives when asked. And it's almost like she knows what we are saying, because at appropriate times she will smack her hand to her face (thinking "oh gosh mommy!", or will laugh if there is a joke. Perfect timing!
- She drank from a straw today! I gave her a sippy cup with a straw, and she sipped water up and drank over half of the sippy-cup.
- She ate an entire squeeze-applesauce by herself. And then ate a cheese-stick. Still wanting more, I gave her an oatmeal and a spoon to play and learn. She dipped the spoon in the oatmeal, and let it drip... everywhere. Haha! But she did allow a few bites to be spoon-fed by mommy, and then felt the need to self-feed with her hand... oatmeal everywhere!!!!

She has a boyfriend! She loves playing with "baby-j" at school, and will smile if you talk about him. She picked my phone up and had typed in "josi" in the "to" line of a text, but I know that was a total fluke!

This month she had a little stomach bug. Poor baby missed two days of school and had some really rancid diarrhea (sorry, but it was nasty! Not that diarrhea is ever fun, but it was just disgusting.) One night she woke up screaming, and there was poo all over her crib, sheets, pjs, mattress, oh the nastiness of all nasty. She didn't have a fever, and got an a-okay checkup from the physician that day, we just had to concentrate on hydration.

Focused hard at the doctors office- paper rips! PS: Look at that hair!

Whoa!

Rip!!!!

Nap and snuggles.

Don't you just want to snuggle this sweet baby??

"Cleaning" auntie-mere's apartment... i.e. scattering everything on the floor! :)
(She's wearing an amber teething necklace. I'm not sure that it works, but she doesn't seem to cry and scream without reason as much as she did before. Now down't get me wrong, she does cry and scream, but it's usually because she is tired or wants something that she can't have- like the cat tail or mommy's dinner).

11months, going on 16! (Don't freak out. The car was stopped. In park. Off. With the parking brake on. She had to snuggle in the front while we waited on auntie-mere to get off work!:) )

NINJA BABY! or flashdance?? Haha!

Nursing is still going well- She is taking in less milk than a few months ago because she is eating more food. A lot more food! I've made it 91% of the way (11/12 months so far), and I think we are going to make it until we can start introducing cow-milk.

Cadence was such a good baby this last weekend- we went to MEMPHIS to visit Auntie Mere. She laughed on the plane ride there, walked with mommy around the airport, was a "go anywhere, easy-going" baby! Ate on the go, snuggles with mom, nana and auntie mere. Slept... well, Thursday and Friday night she slept great. She fussed a little bit going down (okay, so she screamed. It's payback to auntie-mere's neighbors that are loud), but then slept all night. Saturday, she woke up at 4:30 am, and would fall asleep in your arms, but would NOT let you lay her down. She would wake up in an instant and scream. She does that occasionally. It's nice to know that she wants cuddles, but it is a bit exhausting. It's cute to come downstairs and see her asleep on the couch with daddy though :)

She didn't skip a beat- as soon as auntie-mere came to pick us up at the airport she smiled and reached out for her! Within minutes she was talking up a storm "mere-mere!!!"

So many people read this, and I'm so blessed to have so much love for our sweet little "princess". She sure is a diva and keeps us moving, but she also shows love and understands what family is all about.

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Ten months

Ten months old? No way. Really?

Lots of new things to explore! Crawling EVERYWHERE. fast. whoa she's fast. And she will giggle as she is crawling. Cutest thing ever. She loves doing new things and exploring new places. When she meets new people or sees new things, she has a very "solemn" look. But then she turns the charm on.

She is a pro at pulling up to stand, and has started pushing up on her hands on toys to stand. It has been reported that she will let go of her stability surface to clap or reach for things, but she is not cruising (walking along furniture) yet. I wouldn't be suprised if she started that tomorrow though. She is learning new things every day, simply amazing! She can crawl up on the bottom stoop step... and can crawl up a few steps. Baby proof everything!!!! Everywhere.

She is really good at listening to "no ma'am" ... unless she is crawling. If she's getting into something she's not supposed to, she will stop. If she's pulling something off the carpet that she shouldn't eat, she will usually stop. But crawling away from you? Nope- she will continue.

She loves sharing. Her food, her paci, her toys. Loves it. FaceTime or in real life. It's so cute!
She prefers to feed herself, she's little miss independent. Not sure where she got that trait from...

This is her last picture taken in the "baby" carseat, about 9.5 months old. She now has a big-kid carseat. It's a convertable, and will go from rear-facing to forward facing up to 100lbs. It's the "Graco SmartSeat". I did a lot of research and product testing (took her to the store and sat her in about 10 seats), and this is the one that worked the best. Great safety ratings! :)

ZzzzzzZzzzzzzZZzzzz. Such a rough life.

We decided to update her car seat because even though she is well under the weight limit for the baby carrier (she is 17lb and the limit was 30lb), the length was starting to get a little short. It was also extremely heavy to get her in and out of the car and switch the seat with her in it. Lots of back pain and grunts later, we decided to get the new carseat. (Of course we had to get two, one for Mom's car and one for Nana's car).

Big kid food! She gets lunch from the "menu" at school. Health options from the hospital, yumm!!! And juice! Yumm!

And did I meniton that she is teething? She has worn this lovely face seen above at home for the past week. Screaming for no reason. Simply pitiful. Tylenol, advil, and just about every teething method we have come up with.
- Frozen wash cloth: She looked at it like it was a scary animal. Wouldn't touch it. Didn't like the cold.
- cold teethers: work okay, but she doesn't really like the "squishiness"
- solid teethers: her fav. She will bite the crap out of them.
- Amber teething necklace: on order. This is a long stretch. There are people that swear by the amber properties of decreasing pain. I'm not sure I buy into it, but if it will potentially help ease some of her pain, I will try anything. I have ordered it, and she will supposidely need to wear it for a few days straight to get the benefits of the amber. Will keep you posted on this.


words: Mama, dada, bird, "girl"??, "go"??, byebye, ki-e (kitty), hey, and some random babbling. She will talk a lot, especially at home. :)


Sweet baby.
xoxo

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Nine Months

Already? My daughter is nine months old. In three months, she will be a year old. Holy cow. Our bitty baby is a little mover!

Speaking of mobility...
She crawls. Everywhere. and is very curious. Of course she likes to play with her toys, and usually they roll away. So she chases them. It's so cute! She crawls well on the carpet, but not so well on the hard floor when she is wearing her pajamas- it's kind of like baby crawling on a treadmill. She just stays in the same place. Haha! She can make all kinds of transitions, from lying down to sititng up, from sitting to crawling, and she is trying to pull up to stand but can't quite figure out how to get her feet underneath her. In the middle of the floor, she will put her weight on her hands and feet and lift her butt up in the air.

The girl still has a paci addiction. Paci's are all over the house! We travel with a bag full of paci's.

Communication: She has recently become frustrated, especially in the evenings. She wants something, or someone, specific but is unable to let us know. So she screams until we guess (or find something else) what will make her happy. It could be food, milk, toys, no clue- we just guess until she's smiling again. She can (not always will, but she can) say dada, mama, hey, bye bye, kiy (like kitty without the t's), and she said BIRD for Nana.

She's specific when she's tired- she knows the routine and will start rubbing her eyes, especially when she is nursing. Once she's done nursing, we tell daddy "night night" and I take her upstairs, sing her goodnight song, and lay her down in the crib. No fussing, she may play for a minute or two but she goes right to sleep. Usually this happens around 7:30.

Sometimes she cries and you ask her what she wants, and if it's right she will shake her head yes. "Do you want dada?" shakes her head yes. It's so sweet.

She is a little stinker! JR went to leave the house one morning and he said "bye bye" to Cadence. She started crying. So he picked her up and gave her some kisses. She looked at me and grinned, as if she was saying "haha I got this!". Then, daddy puts her back in the exercauser and she starts crying again. So he has to leave for work with baby looking like this:

Crying as she watches him leave for work. After a minute she was back to playing, but what a terrible minute it was.

She has moved up to the little movers class at daycare (first day 7/8/13). Very different. She is in a class with children that wear shoes. They walk, and talk a lot. They eat real food. They are so much bigger than her. It scares me a little bit to think of her with those big kids (okay, they are not much older in the grand scheme of things, but they are milestones away from her). I'm afraid she will get trampled over.

She has quickly picked up big kid tasks though. She says "bye bye, hey, dada, momma, bababa, kiiiy" and will sometimes mimic sounds and babble randomly. She does this weird yoga-pose i mentioned earlier: butt straight up in the air, both feet on the floor and hands on the floor, like she's trying to push up to stand. Crazy! She will pull up on her knees, but doesn't bother standing because she sees something more interesting on the floor.

She throws her paci's out of the crib every morning if she's left in there too long. She said "mama!" one morning when I came in, looked at the paci's on the floor and chuckled as I walked to the bathroom. When I was out of sight she said... "mama??" ... as if she was saying "are you going to pick up these paci's?"

She can clap! If you ask her where patty-cake is, she will start clapping. Well, she does this pretty inconsistently- but she can clap.

She has a tooth coming in on the top- it hasn't cut yet, but it's definitely coming in (drool, loose stools, agitation, and little bump on the top gum).

No shots on her 9 month appointment, but she had to get blood drawn for a blood-check (everything was perfect!). The nurse explained what she was going to do and Cadence just looked at her like "neato!". Once she pricked her toe, Cadence looked at me and then had big crocodile tears (breaks my heart), and a sad "waaaaaaahhhh!" And she certainly has good blood flow because that little toe bled very well. After the band-aids were donned, she was allowed snuggles with mommy- which made it all better (for baby, and for momma). Then she was very interested in pulling off those band-aids.

weight: 16 lb, 6.5 0z (25%)
length: 26.75 (25%)
head: 48cm (95%)

Blood work looked great. No concerns from the doctor!

First table food- pasta, sauce & cheese. Ate the whole thing!

Sweet baby!

She loves sharing. She will share her toys (as seen above), and she will share her paci. Even on face time, she will reach forward and share her paci with the face on the screen. It's the sweetest thing ever!

Favorite Toys: Balls (they roll and she chases them), sophie (it's a fancy giraffe, although the first time she held it and she squeezed the squeak mechanism she dropped the toy and cried. Now she loves it), textures

Favorite foods: cinnamon applesauce, peaches, plums, bananas.
Not-so favorite foods: squash, zucchini, sweet potatoes (unless mixedwith cinnamon applesauce), carrots.

Sweetness!


xoxo

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Eight Months

June was a great month! We were able to spend a week on the beach with Nana & Grampy.

Baby bathtub with ocean water! What a great way to cool off! :)

"Mom, there is sand everywhere.... wait, I'm fascinated by the piece of fuzz on the blanket"

Oh, you want to take my picture? Let me strike my diva pose...

She left her sunglasses on - just long enough for a photo-op.


So eight months...
Mobility: She crawled on her eight month birthday! Since seven months she had mastered getting up on all fours and rocking forward/backward, but could not figure out how to shift her weight to either hand to crawl forwards. She would end up just rolling on her back. But on June 25, we were playing in her room after bathtime while daddy was cooking dinner. She started "patting" the floor, so I yelled for JR to come upstairs. When he walked through the threshold of the room, she crawled a foot forward to him! It was an amazing experience to be able to watch her crawl for the first time together. She can also go from lying down to sitting up- Auntie Mere went to go pick her up out of the pack n'play at the beach and *SURPRISE* cadence was sitting up waiting for her! The next night at home, after putting her to bed for the evening, JR checked the monitor and saw that she was sitting up with a paci in each hand, "walking" them across the front of the crib. I just knew that she would be pulling to stand at any moment- and HAD to go in there and lower her crib. 9pm - tools - get baby out of bed. I couldn't sleep without lowering the crib, don't judge! :)

Food: still the same at 7 months. I'm thinking about adding another meal during the day and feeding more "real" food in the evenings. Pumping/breastfeeding is still going well, but recently my production has decreased (I was home sick today so I'm hoping that my production will increase once i re-hydrate).

Favorite toys: teapot that maks noises, lily rabbit, ribbit, exercauser. She loves crawling for lint on the floor. She likes the cats, and likes to crawl towards them - but says "UGH" when they move away.

Her crib has at least five paci's, a toy and a big soft ball with tags all over it (from Grandma!). She will wake up and play with toys and pacis... sometimes it looks like she is organizing the paci's!

Sweet summertime:

I love how her smile lights up her face.
I love how her hair is growing in (no more-mullet), and it is red!
I love how she reaches out to touch your face, which is how she says "I love you".
I love how her little personality is showing - she fights sleep like her mommy, but sleeps well like her daddy. She rolls around like her mommy, but lets hope she doesn't steal the covers or "burrito" herself in the covers like her daddy.

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Update on the helmet

Cadence has been wearing the helmet for six weeks. We went back for our second scan, and things are looking great! She is filling out in the helmet, and it is doing everything that it is supposed to be doing! Growth has been facilitated where there was flatness, and has held steady the growth in other areas.

It is amazing to see the improvements! You may not be able to see it in these pictures, but in three-dimensions it makes a major difference.

BEFORE:

AT SIX WEEKS:

So he wants us to continue wearing and have a follow-up in three more weeks. He gave us the okay to take the helmet off when we are on the beach in a few weeks (we will obviously still wear the helmet inside the beach house, but take it off on the sand!!!) :)

I am so pleased with the progression and the shape of her little head (well, okay it's in the 98th percentile, so her BIG head). But when you take the helmet off, her head looks so tiny. I would do this again 100% with no hesitation: it has made such a large difference in her head shape and symmetry of her face/forehead/ears.

Yes people stare. Yes people ask questions. Yes, sometimes it can be frustrating when I just want to put a pretty bow in her hair and that big pink helmet has to go on instead- but it just makes me smile inside to know that I'm doing everything I can for my little sweet pea and what a good thing to brag about: I'm a P.T. and my baby has used two orthotic devices before her first birthday! It also makes those non-helmet moments extra special... the moment when she snuggles up her head against my skin or the moment when daddy comes and sneaks a kiss while we are waiting for the helmet to be clean and dry at night.

Love sweet pea (aka. stink-head). :)

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Seven months

Today my sweet angel is seven months old. Everyone tells you that time will fly by- but you don't realize that until time flies by!

Let's jump in to talking about my awesome baby. 

Mobility: she is so close to army-crawling and she just can't stand it. She can roll across the floor, scoot backwards (on her tummy and her belly- and her favorite is to scoot out of the diaper as you try to put it on, fun!). While on her belly, she can push up on her hands, or do a yoga "downward dog" pose. She pulls her little legs up underneath her and can somewhat scoot forward, but often ends up pushing so hard she rolls onto her back. And gets frustrated.

 

Sitting up independently sort of developed overnight. We were supposed to have pictures taken April 20, and ended up getting them taken May 1 due to rain. In that time, she practiced really hard her trunk strength and was able to be pictured all by herself sitting up! I can't wait to see the rest of the pictures. 

She can hold herself pretty well when you put your hands on her torso to stand. She puts good weight through her feet- and I believe (well, actually- I fear) she will be walking soon. 

Food: at school she gets 3 breast milk bottles 6oz each. She nurses before school and before bedtime (and I'm pumping 3-4 times/day getting somewhere between 16-22 oz). We still have a really good freezer supply - four gallon size ziplock bags full. 

She eats two "meals" a day - once at school and once at night. She loves apples and sweet potatoes with cinnamon, mango fruits and bananas. Doesn't care for squash or carrots. She likes feeding herself puffs or baby rice cakes. 

Sleep: she is so good! Bedtime around 8pm and wakes up between 6:30-7. She takes after her daddy and is a little hot box (I.e. she sweats) when she sleeps. 

(Fell asleep playing- hard core!)

Asleep with her eyes open- watching my every move as I blog away. (I promise I'm only telling the truth sweet pea, I want to remember everything you do!)

On that sweet note, she is also very particular about how she sleeps- she likes multiple paci's and toys in her crib. Paci's- if she wakes up in the night she will reach one and put it back in and go to sleep. Toys- keep her entertained when she wakes up in the morning. Otherwise she screams. 

And let me tell you. The child can scream. 

Water- she loves the water! She loves bath time, and we sing and play. Sometimes she is so dirty she has to be washed at Nana's house- in the kitchen sink!!! :)

Last weekend we went to Florida (will do a separate post), but she loved the pool! Can't wait to take her to the pool over Memorial Day weekend!

Helmet- next appointment is June 3, where he will rescan. It will be six weeks, so we are excited to see the progress. Hopefully we won't need it too much longer- but what a difference it has made!

Communication- we are working on sign language for "more", she has shown me a few times after a lot of patience. She has adapted a different way to tell me that she wants more: by hitting the tray of the high chair. Not very lady like, but hey she's communicating! She has said "dada" and "maaaaaaaamaaaaaa" (9 times out of ten the momma is associated with a screaming cry, so I'm not sure it counts). She babbles and giggles, which we have not been able to capture on video yet. 

I would like to teach her a few basics in sign language: more, please, thank you, diaper, food/hungry and milk. 

She still only has the two teeth which has not affected her nursing- she bit me three times, and (KNOCK ON WOOD) has not done it since. 

Toys are fun - she likes teethers, anything with a tag, tags and more tags, and crinkles. And tags. Satin toys and balls. Oh, and tags. 

Kitties are very intriguing for her. If they are close enough, she will touch them. We are working on gentle petting, because she instinctively does a forceful grab- which does not please the kitties. (Side note: I swear the other morning she said "itty!" when a cat jumped up on the couch. Nobody believes me, but I'm positive that's what she was saying!)

She is a hot mess! But I love her to pieces. 

And lastly, congrats to Auntie Mere on graduating from Pharmacy School. We must face time every week and visit as much as possible when you move to Memphis. We will miss you, but know you will be back soon!