11 months & 1 day

Yesterday was Emelia's 11 month birthday, one month away from one year. I can't believe it. I am in denial pretty much right now. Some developments have been that she is getting more and more vocal, starting to put together more sounds and associate them with different things. She can point out so many objects now I can't even list them all. The hair is FINALLY starting to really come in now. OH and she discovered the stairs yesterday for the first time and decided to climb right up them in one nonstop shot. She can stand now when she wants to until she loses interest and balance, usually at the same time. Its only a matter of time before she is running around the house shouting at the top of her lungs and indulging us all in conversations about life.

Emelia the Wagoneer

Last night, Emelia "helped" Mark build her new wagon. By help I mean, try to eat all the tools, rip the instructions, shake wagon vigorously and overall get in the way. She had fun doing it, so thats all that matters really. Afterward, I took her for a quick roll around the house which she loved. She is getting to be such a little kid, just the way she moves and looks at us now, she's no longer a little baby :( Sometimes she bats our hands away when we try to help her or hand her something as if she's saying " I can do it on my own, jeez" and she's turning into a little Diva too at dinner time. Emmy prefers to feed herself now, the problem is she doesn't actually get the right amount of food in her mouth as much as on top of her head, her clothes and the floor haha. She is becoming independent for an older infant haha. When its dressing time, she usually yanks all the drawers open and throws whatever she doesn't want to wear on the floor and tries to eat the one thing that she is wearing. I have been trying to show her how to calmly open and close the drawers since she has pinched her fingers more then once with her aggressive opening and closing style. She's learning new things everyday, she's a crazy cute little sponge. Can't wait until she starts talking, she's going to be a ripper.

Let's Get Some Shoes

Today we took Emmy to Stride Rite to get her some official walkin' shoes. We ended up leaving with two pair haha. Got her some sweet red velcro shoes for the next size up as well as some she can wear now. She's pretty stylin' and enjoyed getting measured and picking out the shoes she liked. Big girl :(

5 mins to blog

Imagine an out of shape marathon runner breathing as fast as he can through a mouth full of water.....thats Emmy right now. One of her past times are gritting her two teeth against her gums and breathing through a mouthful of spit as fast as she can haha.

This morning I am proud to say she has mastered her straw sippy cup. She enjoyed some carrot juice with breakfast. Picking it up and drinking whenever she had the whim to do so. Emmy turns ten months in 4 days, its absolutely CRAZY. Seems like she was just a little tiny ball of jello who slept all day and was awake all night. She is still awake little amounts of time at night haha. She is officially older longer then it took me to make her inside.

Included with her old age she has acquired a bit of a diva persona. She has learned to have temper tantrums and if we are helping her do something and she doesn't approve she will push you away so she can do it herself. It should be interesting to see how she develops once she starts talking more. Her vocal still consists of 99% mumbles but knows who Dad Da and MomMomMomMom are which is super cute in the morning.

Her diet has been grown leaps and bounds. Her food resume now includes bits of fish, noodles, pesto, basically small pieces of almost anything we make for dinner and LOTS of baby rice and yogurt snacks. We have been steering clear of raspberries for a while because I think it causes a butt rash for her right now.

Emelia doesn't know it yet but I have been brainstorming ideas for her first birthday. If it were up to mark it would be motocross themed complimented by a petting zoo. I am thinking more coordinating cupcakes and disposable tableware. I am excited though to see her dive into a giant confection in honor of one year of amazing existence!

Emmy is faster then a geriatric with a walker!

Emelia got wayyyy too much for Christmas from everyone, which we are thankful for. She has been ripping around with a bunch of walking devices she was gifted. One resembles a walker and another resembles a shopping cart haha. I have been putting her through extensive training on the shopping cart-like one for our future escapades.

We had such a nice first Christmas with her and she seemed to enjoy it too. Emmy was very interactive while opening presents and seemed to be extra chipper for the most part. Her play area now looks like a daycare for 300 kids haha. Most of the xmas pictures are on her Flickr Photo Page Here. I posted a video below of her tearing it up with her radio flyer walker. We have an appointment next week for some shots and stats, check back for that!

Emelia went to the doctor yesterday to rule out an ear infection from the end of her cold she has been dealing with. While we were there, she weighed in at 16lbs and measured 26 inches long! Can't believe how much she has grown from that little 4 pound peanut we brought home. She is a bruiser now and is constantly running on beast mode. Amongst other new things she likes doing like crawling, climbing and feeding herself, screaming and yelling at the top of her lungs for fun is one of them. She is currently sitting in her johnny jump up on her tippy toes, yelling so loud, that my ear drums are thumping. Every once in a while she strings together some ma and da sounds but hasn't officially acknowledged us as with anything verbally recognizable yet.

She has been pulling herself up on everything from her toys, to the couch, to my leg. Thankfully she is starting to learn how to let herself back down without bellyflopping backwards on the floor. She is racking up a nice number of bumps on her big melon head from all her acrobatics. We had to lower her crib and pack n plays about two weeks ago since she enjoys standing in them now and screaming for us. Nighttime is also starting to become even more complicated because she puts on a production like we are closing her into a jail cell and stands in her crib clutching the rails and calling for us like she has been sentenced to Life in Crib. There still hasn't been a night that she has slept through and gets up a couple times each night. If we are lucky we will get a 5 hr interval.

We decorated for Christmas and she really likes looking at the stuff and grabbing at the lights. I have a little tree to put in her room yet, but need to find some time to do that and finish packing up all the clothes that don't fit and replacing them with some 9month stuff.

Her hair is FINALLY starting to come in and I'm hoping i will be able to put a barrette in it by her first birthday haha. I am thinking she is going to have hair like me, lightish and wavy. If so that will be about the only thing she has from me it seems. She is Mark through and through.

Being able to work from home and having her Grandmas watch her so close is so awesome. I get to see her so much more and she is really the greatest thing. So much work, but so much fun and my favorite thing right now is that she wants hugs ALL the time ahha. I am probably creating a "hold me" monster but who could say no haha.