Happy 11 Months Old Peanut

Dear Baby Girl,

I am not going to be able to call you that for much longer. I really can't believe that this time next month I am going to be writing your one year post. I think back to this time last year and I can't believe how far we have come. You made it here nice and healthy and you have continued to be a healthy little girl and you really have no idea how happy that makes me.

That being said...ahem...you are quite the...opinionated little girl. You are loud and boisterous and confident and strong and quite frankly, hysterical. You are still my little ray of sunshine because 99% of the time you are the happiest little girl I have ever come across. People always say to me, "Is she always this happy?" And I answer, "Yes. Except for when she isn't." A few examples of when you aren't? When you are crawling towards the kitchen and I blatantly shut the baby gates on you. That makes you quite pissed. When your brother shuts his door and doesn't let you into his room to play with him. When you feel as though you need something and I am not moving quite fast enough to satisfy you. And dear lord if you're hungry...you are simply unpleasant to be around if you are hungry.

Speaking of hunger...I am very proud to say that you are still being breast fed. You mostly just nurse first thing in the morning, before your naps and before bed. And except for the first morning nursing session I am constantly amused at how you deal with your own personal moral dilemma. The dilemma being that you really want to nurse, but you also don't want to miss one thing going on while you are nursing. So this usually results in you nursing while wiggling around and putting your butt up in the air, and banging on my face and my chest with your hands and generally just wiggling around like a little monkey while trying to keep yourself latched on. It is quite amusing. I am more done with pumping than you will probably ever understand until you have a child of your own, but I have committed to keeping it up until you are a year old. I don't plan on cutting you off the boob cold turkey at a year, but the pumping? Yeah that is done. I doubt you'll be too upset though because according to your daycare, you no longer want the bottle. You drink what little breast milk you drink during the day in your sippy cup, and even that is a sparse amount (they tell me maybe 4 ounces a day).

You are far more interested in eating "big people food." Also you want to do it yourself. You are pretty much done with the pureed food (thank you for that) and just want to eat finger foods. Some of your favorite foods right now are: Turkey meatballs from Trader Joes, teriyaki flavored tofu, a mixture of peas, corn, black beans and kidney beans, you love all deli meat, fish (talapia seems to be your favorite), broccoli, mandarin oranges, apple sauce, pasta with tomato sauce, sourdough bread, sweet potatoes...I could go on. Have I mentioned that you're a good eater? I love that about you.

You are crawling as fast as I can walk and pulling yourself up to standing on everything. You are just starting to hold on while standing and "transfer" from the couch to the ottoman but you mostly still just sit back down and crawl where you want to go and then stand back up. You sign "all done" and "milk" and just clap ridiculously when you want more. You make sounds that sound like a few words but I would hesitate to label them as actual words at this point. But you "say" bye bye, mamamama, Gigi, all done and up. This has been the month of the teeth, god help us all. You now have the two teeth on the bottom, and on the top you have three of your top four with the final one about to poke through at any time. You pretty much scream during the night when a tooth is about to pop through and I can't say as though I blame you; looks awfully uncomfortable. You usually only take one nap per day, which I find quite annoying, but that also depends on what time you get up in the morning.

A daycare day goes like this: I wake you up at 6:00am to nurse and then put you back to bed while I get in the shower and get ready for work. You get up anywhere between 7:00 and 8:00am usually. We leave to go to daycare at 8:15am and I pick you up sometime before 5:00pm. When we get home first thing you do is nurse and then off to play until dinner time. At dinner time you sit with the family and eat while we eat. Then we do a quick bath, jammies and a little play time before around 7:45pm when we do our night time routine which involves darkness, your lovey ("Kitty"), and nursing. Then I put you in your crib and you fart around in there for a while before you go to sleep.

Weekends are similar except for the getting you up at 6:00am to nurse. That just happens whenever you feel like it and if it is before 7:00am I put you back to bed but if it's after that you just come to bed with Mommy and hang out. Your brother joins us (or will be there first sometimes) and our usual routine is for the three of us to hang out in Mommy's bed until around 8:30 or 9:00am. I think that might be my most favorite part of the entire week; when all three of us just get to relax and roll around in bed. It's fantastic. Then we just enjoy our day. You eat when we eat with a few snacks of nursing here and there but basically have left the world of "babyhood" and entered into just joining the family with what we have to do.

Let's look at your month in pictures. The weather finally got nice these past couple of weeks and you have been outside for the first time since you could move around on your own. It has been interesting to see you crawl around in the dirt and grass and get filthy but enjoy exploring this new part of your world. This was your first taste of crawling on the grass...

And then when it really warmed up, you got to experience your back yard for the first time this year. You hung out on the patio (didn't have any desire to be on the grass) while your brother played with a friend on his play structure.
Here is a shot of you plotting your destruction, and also deciding whether or not it is worth it to scream at me to see if I will let you in behind the gates...
You experienced your first St. Patrick's Day this year and both you and your brother wore green. And as per usual, trying to get a shot of both of you was most difficult and we had to choose this unfortunate shot with your brother looking like he is smelling bad cheese because you were screaming in all the other shots because I hadn't given you something to hold in your hand. Silly Mommy.
It was also your Gigi's birthday this week and while your brother was being a punk and refused to take a shot with his beloved Gigi, you were all too willing to be the "good child" and pose with the birthday girl.
And oh dear...how long did I commit to taking these monthly bean bag shots? Just a year right? Cause it is getting to the point where it isn't so much fun to try and get a shot of you sitting still in a place that I deem appropriate for a picture. You laugh hysterically and arch your back to try and get off the bean bag...
You immediately roll over to get off that way...
You just blatantly get off the shot and crawl over to me with the camera because apparently you think you could get a better shot if only I would just give you the camera so you can do it yourself...
And really, the only shot I can get of you on the damn bean bag is when I use my hand to hold you there and simultaneously tickle you to try and make you laugh. So here is your final 11 month old bean bag shot...
I love you my little Peanut. You continue to bring joy and light into my world and our home. I can't even imagine life without you and although I am sad to see your babyhood coming to an end, I am excited to see the little girl you are becoming.