Here’s a topic I’ve been meaning about since October. Oops. Both Anya and Sierra love to color. Anya started drawing some recognizable shapes (mainly happy faces) back in September that have since grown into “tadpole people” complete with arms, legs, hair, ears, hats, and whatever other feature tickles her fancy. She still scribbles plenty as well, but her scribbling most definitely means something to her. Sierra loves to draw, especially when she can make dots.
Filed under: Anya, photos — by Lauren on @ 10:37 pm
We took Anya to preview a gymnastics class that two of her friends are taking. She had a lot of fun and I think it will help improve her gross motor development (Anya, I love you, but holy moly girl, you trip over your own feet A LOT).
Filed under: family, photos — by Lauren on January 9th, 2010 @ 5:25 pm
Lex’s sister and her family came from Houston to visit us for a week and a half over the holidays. It was the first time they met Sierra, and it was our first time meeting their new(ish) baby. We managed to get one picture of all 7 kids where at least 6 of them were being cooperative:
Sierra turned one (ONE!!!) on December 6th. That’s right, one! I haven’t quite come to terms with it yet.
She had her 1-year well check on December 8th – 19 lbs, 6 oz, 28 1/2 inches long, and a head circumference of 18 1/2 inches. The nurse didn’t give me the percentiles, but I asked Dr. Internet, who said she’s in the 19th percentile for weight, 25th for height, and 81st for head circumference. That’s small for a baby of mine! (Well, small, except for her big head. Must be all that hair!) I was very surprised about that. She’s got tiny feet – barely a size 2 1/2 – just like me. She’s fitting nicely in her size 4 diapers and 9-12 months wardrobe. I hope she grows a bit soon; I have all these cute 12-18 months winter clothes from Anya, and I don’t want the cold weather to pass without her getting the chance to wear them! She had 7 teeth on her first birthday. Her 8th finally broke through the gums a few days later, and tonight I discovered that she’s cutting at least one, possibly two, molars.
The doctor said Sierra is in excellent health. He commented that her verbal skills seem advanced for her age, and then he asked if we felt she and Anya had different temperaments. I thought that was an odd question at first, until I said that Sierra is certainly, um, strong-willed. He said that he didn’t want to be the one to say it, but… Yeah. That’s definitely our Sierra. She’s had strong opinions about the world since birth (Pacifier? Bottle? I THINK NOT!) and she will make sure you know it.
Sierra is still not a big fan of eating much of the time. There are a few things she really likes (grapes, cheese, most proteins, pizza), but even then she often doesn’t eat much, and just because she ate something happily yesterday does not mean she isn’t going to throw it on the floor today (I am SO not a fan of that particular behavior, and UGH! She can be so obnoxious about it. Now she does it while yelling, “NO!”).
We introduced whole milk two weeks before her birthday, and she is learning to like it, though she’d rather drink water. I also began the weaning process by eliminating her morning nursing session. My hope is to have her down to twice a day (before bed and first thing in the morning) by the time she’s 14 months, but that would require her to sleep through the night on a regular basis. A girl can dream! Some nights we get a good stretch, maybe 11-5, and a few times she even slept through the night, but some nights remain difficult.
Since last month, Sierra completely mastered pulling up, getting back down again, pushing her toys around, and rescuing herself instead of getting stuck in a corner, plus she’s gotten much braver about standing independently. She’ll push herself up to standing on pretty much anything (toys, my leg, a laptop) except the floor, and she can hold it for at least 10-15 seconds. She even took her first steps on her birthday! I don’t expect she’ll be walking for at least another month or two, but she’s getting a little closer each day.
Sierra’s still our little chatterbox. She’s talking a lot now, and she also tries to repeat just about everything. Not all of it would be understandable to someone who doesn’t know her and some things are word attempts instead of real words – like yesterday, I realized she was trying to say balloon, only she pronounced it “boppy” – but she’s getting better and adding a word or two daily. Some of the things she says really clearly are ”Mommy, Daddy, up, doggie, more, baby, cheese, tickle, tushy, keys, hi, eat, happy, bye-bye, NO…” Less clear but still consistent are “bath, milk, Anya, sister, duck, woof woof, quack, one, want, all done, bubbles, pop, Dora, backpack, touch, peepee, hooray, boom boom, I love you, puzzle, catch…” She uses about 10-15 signs regularly as well, including “please” and “I love you” – two of my favorites – and picks new ones up quickly. ”More” is her catchall sign.
Other stuff – she’s a total snuggle bunny. Sierra crawls over to me and puts her head down on my lap or shoulder, and she gives big kisses, complete with a MWAAAAH sound effect. I LOVE that. Also, she can identify a bunch of body parts, including her toes, eyes, hair, nose, mouth, teeth, belly, and tush. When I read her one of her pre-bedtime books – Baby Faces – she will respond to certain pages with the same things that I do (so when I say the baby is hungry, she signs/says “eat”; when I say that baby is dirty, she says, “ewwww”; for that baby is crying, she goes “wah wah” and does a crying hand motion; etc.). She knows all the motions for “If You’re Happy and You Know It” and “Shake Your Sillies Out,” and she tries to do “Itsy Bitsy Spider.” She’s also developed a recent love for the “Happy Birthday” song.
Sierra loves putting objects into and taking them out of anything she can, dogs, coloring, toy cars, baby dolls, phones (especially Lex’s iPhone), playing with clothes (she puts them on her head, it’s so funny), and all things musical. She also loves anything she shouldn’t have or shouldn’t be doing. I’ve called her an imp in several posts already, but it’s so true:
That’s what I get for leaving the tissue box within reach:
Mini-Motzart:
The girl loves trouble. Luckily, we love her. How could we not?
Video time, hooray! Here’s a few, with clips from the last 5-6 weeks.
Sierra playing with her toy cookie jar. She’s about 11 1/2 months here:
Playing in the playroom. This was after her first birthday:
This one’s just a mix of clips from the last several weeks. She’s talking more (and more clearly) now, but of course never when I have the camera ready:
There is little I enjoy more than watching Anya and Sierra play together. They are such a riot together, making each other laugh and chasing each other around the room. Sierra idolizes Anya. She wants to copy so much of what Anya does, and she climbs all over her, giving her hugs. Anya, in turn, adores “her baby” and is usually a fabulous big sister. She informs me many times a day that she just gave Sierra a baby toy or is sharing her own toys with her, and she looks out for her, too. She’ll comfort her if she’s crying, often by singing “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star” in a comically loud voice, and she’ll tell me when Sierra has something she’s not supposed to have or is getting into trouble. The other day, while I was setting up their bath, Sierra escaped from the bathroom and was heading towards the stairs. I went to grab her, and I found Anya pinning her down, telling her no, baby, no stairs!
(Okay, so maybe the pinning her down was a little much, but the intention was good.)
I would love for this era of constant mutual adoration to never end, but I know as Sierra gets older there are going to be some squabbles. Tonight they actually had their first real fight over a toy. Usually either Anya wants something that Sierra has and takes it (despite my frequent reminders NOT to do that) without much protest from Sierra or Sierra tries to grab what Anya has and Anya moves away, complains until I remind her to give Sierra something else, or she lets her have a turn. Well, today Sierra wanted the pen to the Aquadoodle mat, Anya didn’t want to give it up, and Sierra wasn’t having that! Anya was yelling that Sierra should stop, and Sierra was shrieking and trying to get it from her. This problem was easily solved by my finding the second pen, but sigh. It starts.
Sierra turned 11 months old on November 6th. I had to take her to the doctor this past Monday (double ear infection, poor baby), so we got a bonus weigh-in – 19 lbs, 4 oz fully clothed. Dr. Internet says that’s actually only in the mid-20’s for percentile, which I found odd. She doesn’t seem tiny to me! She’s still in 9-12 months clothes, size 4 diapers, and size 2 shoes.
This month Sierra mastered pulling up and cruising, and loves to grab onto anything and everything she can to stand. The only problem is that she hasn’t quite figured out how to sit down again, so if she feels like she can’t do it, she’ll yell until someone comes to rescue her. The same goes for her push toy – she loves to walk laps across the playroom, but only knows how to go forward, so I’ll hear her shrieking and discover her stuck in a corner. She doesn’t stand on her own yet. It seems like she’s fully capable of doing so, but as soon as she realizes that I’ve let go of her, she lunges for me or drops to her tush. The only place she’s brave enough to try is in the bathroom outside of the tub. I don’t know what it is about the tub, but it must inspire her, because that was the first place she pulled herself up successfully, and now when she’s standing looking into the tub, she’ll let go for a few seconds and then clap her hands to cheer herself on. Ugh, she likes to climb, too, but thankfully (for my nerves) she’s not very good at it yet. She’s constantly trying to get a leg up into the bathtub or onto her LeapFrog table, and last week she got three-quarters of the way up onto Anya’s table in her room. I caught her trying to do it again the next day:
She’s talking more now, though I doubt anyone other than me or Lex would understand her. At last, she calls me “Mama” or “Mommy” most of the time. Sierra’s working hard on saying Anya (sounds like “Ahdah,” but that’s an improvement over calling her “Dada”). Other words we hear her trying to say include all done, milk, doggie (still one of her favorites!), Daddy, baby, diaper, cracker, ducky, quack quack, woof woof, more, hi, water, apple, up… She tries to repeat back a lot of what is said to her, and even when she doesn’t get close, she’s still matching the number of syllables. She signs really well and clearly understands that she can use signing to communicate. Yesterday at lunch, she noticed the sandwich I had ready for her and decided she’d had enough time tossing her veggies on the floor; she wanted that sandwich and she wanted it RIGHT AWAY. She signed EAT EAT EAT, shrieked, and tried her hardest to grab the sandwich. It was kind of cool to see. I’ll have to try to get some video of her signing soon.
Sierra can correctly identify her head and nose, and sometimes her eyes, tongue, and belly. She does some of the hand-motions for “Itsy-Bitsy Spider” and still enjoys “Open, Shut Them” and “If You’re Happy and You Know It.” In general, she loves music and bops or claps along. She points up when asked where up is, and if you ask her to go shluffy/night-night/to sleep, she does this:
Dogs are a major obsession for Sierra. Friends of ours gave Anya a stuffed animal pug toy, and Sierra often requests (er, insists) that we take it with us whenever we leave the house. She cuddles with it and kisses it. I’d like to transition that love to a different toy because it’s not the most baby safe doll, and if she loves it that much, it would be nice to let her sleep with it. I found a Spot doll in her room and so far, she’s a big fan of that one, too. Any semi-realistic-looking dog gets her so excited, and if we happen to see a real one somewhere, it’s all I can do to keep her from jumping out of my arms. She even picks out the dog piece of one of our puzzles every single time, exclaiming, “Dawdie!” or “Dawgie!”
Imitation has become a big part of Sierra’s play. It makes it fun to play with her, because she studies what we do and then tries it out herself. If you blow on her face, she cracks up and then tries to blow on your face. The other day I was dropping some links into a slinky while sitting with her on the floor, and she then picked one up and did exactly the same thing. Even better, the next day she crawled over to the same toys and repeated the activity, only this time without watching me do it first. She likes to pretend to feed a doll or comb her own hair, but her favorite activity is to copy whatever Anya is doing.
I enjoy this age very much, not only because Sierra is learning a ton of new things each day, but also because her personality is really starting to emerge, and as she gains more skills and becomes more independent, I can see her as a person and not just a baby. She makes decisions and sets goals for herself, then takes steps to achieve those goals. Granted, her goals are things like “Get the Elmo doll that is on the other side of the room,” but you know what I mean. She thinks about things, remembers things… I wish I could hear what goes on in her mind.
Sierra is such a love. She gives hugs by laying her head on whatever part of you she can reach while saying, “Awwww” (and when she climbs up onto Anya to give her hugs, I all but melt into a puddle of mush). She also tries to give kisses by popping her lips, but more often than not she ends up spitting on the object of her affection. That said, she’s also got a major impish side. She loves to shake her head “no” when asked to do something. She tosses her food on the floor and then looks up with a grin to see what we’re going to do about it, or yanks out her hair bow and hands it to me with a giggle – and she kind of needs that bow:
One of her favorite games is to be chased, so she’ll make a beeline for an open door, and if no one comes after her, she stops in the doorway and calls to you until you go get her, at which point she cracks up and tries to crawl away as fast as she can.
I’d love to say she eats like a champ and sleeps through the night. I’d also love to win the lottery. A girl can dream. Her eating is getting better, but she’s not so into the veggies. She prefers cheese, grapes, and anything that’s a protein, but as for quantity, there are days when she eats two grapes and calls it a meal. On a good night, Sierra will go to bed around 7:30 and then wake up around 1 am to be fed and again at 5 am, at which point she usually ends up in our bed. There are many nights where she wakes up more often than this, though.
What would any update be without a video? Here’s Sierra not eating, “feeding” her baby doll, learning to walk with her walker toy (she’s much better at it now), and telling us how old she will soon be:
We went apple and pumpkin picking in the beginning of the month, but I forgot to post pictures back then. With Halloween a day and a half away, I figured I should get on that.
Filed under: Anya, photos — by Lauren on October 19th, 2009 @ 9:26 pm
Anya is three today. That’s right, I said three, as in THREE WHOLE YEARS. I am finding this very difficult to understand. How can it be three years already? She was just born, I swear.
Anya, my darling first born, you amaze me and challenge me every day. I watch you and marvel over how independent you are becoming. Putting on your own shoes, not just climbing into but also buckling the top of your car seat yourself, completing much of the potty process without help, walking upstairs to get something and coming back down again without someone going with you – these are not things you could do when you turned two.
Your love of learning anything and everything makes me glow with pride. You ask so many questions (“What does that street sign mean? What are those guys doing?”) and USUALLY you listen to the answer (but heaven help us if you ask a question and you don’t like the answer you were given!). The way you memorize your books, usually after one or two readings, astounds me, and I am thankful for the existence of the library, as there is no such thing as enough when it comes to your appetite for books. I’m so proud of you for learning to recognize, spell, and even type out your name! More words are going to come soon enough. For now, keep on having fun playing with rhymes and telling me and Daddy what letter words start with (“Hot dog starts with the letter H! Baby starts with the letter B!).
Your love affair with Dora started to cool off a bit as you approached this past summer and considered all the other characters life has to offer (but yay for still choosing a Dora cake for your birthday party). Monsters, Inc. was the first real movie you watched (“I want to watch Mike Wazowski today!”) and we had to watch a little bit of it every day for a while. You also fell in love with Murray from Sesame Street. Your current obsession is the Wiggles, and no matter how much we talk about trying something different before your nap, you refuse to watch anything else when you wake up, even though we only have ONE episode saved on TiVo and we don’t get the channel they are on anymore. You like princesses and love dressing up and pretending.
I wish I could live in your imaginary world with you sometimes, because when I hear you talking to your “friends” and going on pretend adventures with them, it sounds like so much fun. I enjoy those times when you can break away from books long enough to play with your real friends when we get together with them, too. Sometimes it’s hard for you to share, but you are trying to remember how to take turns, and I love how much you think and care about your friends (“Mommy, I wonder if Sophie will come to school today. We can play with the puzzles together.). You are a WONDERFUL big sister, Anya. I didn’t think I could love you any more than I already did until I saw how you interacted with Sierra, but oh, man. You talk to her, you bring her toys (and yes, sometimes you take toys away from her, too, but hey, you’re three, it happens), you sing “Twinkle, Twinkle” in the sweetest soprano voice ever when she cries in the car… There’s a reason why no one else can make her laugh like you do. I love that you still call her “my baby” when you talk about her. Please remember how much you love her now when you’re both teenagers!
Some things don’t change, or at least, they haven’t changed yet. You still are one of the slowest eaters I have ever met, unless cake or candy is involved, of course. I don’t quite understand how you can make any meal last 90 minutes or more, or how you even have the patience to sit at the table that long. You also continue to wake up from naps as a total crank pot much of the time, and need a good thirty minutes to an hour to snap out of it. I hope we can figure out some way to improve your sleep situation soon – if you don’t nap, you get overtired and cranky by dinnertime, but if you do nap, you have a very hard time falling asleep at bedtime, and then you are tired the next day from having been up too late.
Keep the cuddles coming, please, please, please! I will never get tired of the unprompted “I love you, Mommy” and spontaneous hugs and kisses. I also love when you say “please” and “thank you” on your own, or when you ask me if I’m happy or sad. As always, yes, Anya, I am happy because I have my two girls, even if I’m angry about something else, even if it’s something one of those two girls did.
I only have one page left of your baby book to complete, the one for your third birthday, and then Daddy and I can add our letters to you for when you are grown up. How bittersweet. I say this to you all the time, and sooner rather than later I know you’ll start rolling your eyes at me, but no matter what, no matter how old you are, you’ll always be my baby. I love you, Anya. Happy third birthday, precious girl.
Sierra Claire turned 10 months old on October 6th! The scale reported she weighs approximately 19 lbs, so it’s probably a little more. We transitioned her to 9-12 months clothes recently. They’re a little big, but she needed winter clothes and it didn’t make sense to buy her new clothes in a 9 months size. The tooth count is still four. Number 5 and 6 have been visible under her gums for eons. What are they waiting for?
This was a big month for Sierra! She mastered crawling at around 9 1/2 months old and is now unstoppable. Nothing gives her more pleasure than to escape the room, especially if she thinks someone is chasing her. She’s such a little imp, and finds trouble wherever she can. Even though she still doesn’t put too many toys in her mouth, somehow she manages to find and try to eat every speck of dirt that is invisible to everyone else. She also likes to “walk” while someone holds her hands. Like many other new skills, Sierra pulled up to standing one day and then didn’t do it again for weeks. She finally pulled up again earlier this week. For some reason, outside the tub is the only place she can do it for now.
Our happy little imp:
Sierra’s communication skills have really started to explode. She has three definite words – Dada, all done, and her newest, doggie (sounds like dawdie) – and a whole bunch of others that she may or may not be saying or at least repeating; it’s so hard to tell for sure at this stage. Now she babbles “mamama” a whole lot more, and sometimes it seems like she says it specifically to call me. She signs more, eat, all done, and milk really well, and tries to sign apple, daddy, mommy, play, water… I’m sure I’m forgetting some. Sierra points to things that capture her attention, and can show you where the animal picture and frog decals are in her room. She also identifies her head by patting it, and is working on locating her tongue, belly, and toes. She now claps and raises her hands for hooray when we sing, “If You’re Happy and You Know It” and sometimes makes an “Itsy Bitsy Spider.” Music makes her so happy. She loves to dance!
One other cool thing from this month – Sierra has started to figure out what certain objects are for and how to imitate using them. If you hand her her shoes, she tries to put them on her feet. She will bring a comb or her bow up to her hair. I showed her how to use a toy spoon and bowl to “feed” a baby doll, and now she does the same. Hand her a phone, and she’ll “chat” away.
Here are some videos from the past month:
“Quacking” like a duck, making funny noises, and “So big!” again:
Early crawling, tearing up the play mat, eating, enjoying the escape:
