-She's officially an army crawler! On 6/12 we saw true crawling where she was moving forward and lifting up her knees, but since then she has chosen to get around primarily using her arms and pulling herself. We could tell she was getting close while were were in Iowa, and when we returned she really took off. I am still not used to it and have to do double takes when I set her somewhere and a few minutes look over and she is not there! She is always babbling, clicking, or squealing/talking while she pulls herself along, so it is entertaining to watch. She's making lots of new discoveries now that she is more mobile (kitchen cabinets, under the bathroom sink, the AC vent returns, cords, things like that)...
-She has 3 very deliberate signs-more, all done, and please (a new one this month). Those three come in handy quite often!
-When asked how old she is, Annie will hold up one pointer finger! She also gives high fives.
-Right around her first birthday, she started pointing and "grunting" to get to something or someone she wanted. She has a certain sound she makes and she's pretty persistent with it, too. It's an "uhhh-uhh-uhh!" while pointing as in "I want that!" and "Take me there! And be quick about it!".
-With all her grunting, she is also pretty verbal for a 1 yr old I think. She can say mama, dada, bubba, dog, nana (for banana), uh-oh, hi, bye, no (nononono), ball (bah), awe, eyes, nose...when she fusses to be held, I ask her to say "up" and she gets close with her own version which is "bup". We were at Lowe Mill one night sitting on a blanket outside and she saw the moon on her own and pointed to it (and grunted, like I could give her the moon of course) . I started saying moon to her and she would try to say it back with "mmmm!!" A long time later when Steven was around (so he could see) I asked her, "Where's the moon?" and she searched up in the sky til she found it and pointed and said "mmm!" with a big grin! So smart!:) The main word she is into right now is thank you! and she says it ALL the time. It amazes me that she knows when to say it-she's appropriate with it the majority of the time! She also says it when she is giving something to someone else, too, though, and will do this over and over and over. Sometimes I think I also hear her saying something like "here you go", but I can't be sure. Anyway, the "thank you" thing is pretty cute and sweet if I do say so myself. She nods her head yes now, and when I ask her a question like, "Do you want to eat?" she will nod her head yes in response.
-She knows 3 animal sounds, and when we ask her she can tell us what the duck, dog, and sheep "say".
-Some of her favorite things are to swim & take baths-the girl can do some serious splashing. We think it is funny that after all the wildness in the pool, if we lay her on her back in float position, she gets so calm and still that you'd think she was going to fall asleep! This reminds us of Fern our bunny...when we would lay him on his back in ouur arms he would get so calm and still, too! Weird! She loves to ride in her little push car on walks, swing, crawl thru her play tunnel, and look thru books. I can leave her in her bedroom in front of her bookshelf, and she will pull the books off the shelf and look through them for the longest time. It is the sweetest thing! I can see her looking at the pictures & working on turning the pages. She gets into the zone. She also loves music and will dance and dance when it comes on. She especially loves the Annie soundtrack and when the first song comes on she just starts to groove in her car seat in recognition. It is the cutest thing.
-Two days after her first bday she started pulling up and did so on the crib, the brick hearth, and on me. She's doing more and more of this, but she's still not super busy in this area yet. The morning of her 1 yr check-up she pulled up to her feet in the bathtub. Just this month she's started sitting up in her crib when she's not sleeping...I don't think it ever dawned on her before! She started in Iowa and now it's a regular thing. We've lowered her crib because of this.
-She is pretty opinionated and can throw some fits now. She does what we call the "straight baby fit" where she makes her body rigid and straight and cries in protest. She will also throw herself back sometimes which makes me nervous! She can also do a pretty good "limp" crying protest where she melts on the floor and makes it hard for us to pick her up. She is doing better in nursery, but still cries when I drop her off and then again when we pick her up she breaks down crying. She has struggled with the drop off time this week at VBS and begins crying when I go to the computer to check her in. :( Surly she'll get over this.
-Since last week was VBS and naps are hard to come by there, I decided to start dropping her morning nap. I remember starting this with Henry at 15 months, so she is not that much earlier, and she doesn't seem to need it as badly as he did, either. I knew she would need to be doing this soon anyway since I will be going back to teaching in the fall, so I wanted to get started. She's done surprisingly well. Usually she will fall asleep on the way home, though, for a few minutes and then I will lay her back down for a big nap (3 or so hrs) at home. She is doing super at night and sleeps a good 11-12 hours. She only gets paci at nap and night (and when sad in nursery!). She doesn't seem to miss it otherwise.
-She's a friendly girl and waves at everyone all the time. She also waves and says bye when we are exiting one room and going into the next and certainly when we leave somewhere for real. She picks up on those ques pretty quickly!
-Tooth #7 came in this month.
-She's getting SO blonde and her cheeks are so rosy all the time. I think she looks sunburned, but isn't. People always comment on her blonde hair and big blue eyes. Most people say she looks like her mama, and some say she looks a lot like her bubba. Steven has said from early on he thinks she looks like me and can see resemblances in my baby pictures, but I have a hard time seeing it myself and my mom doesn't really think so either. I think it is so interesting what people's thoughts are on both kids' looks.
-She's interacting more and more and will point to our eyes and say "eyes" and same with nose. She will also put her finger to her lips and say "shhhhh!" which is, oh, so precious. When I ask her to blow, she will blow air out of her nose. She is so proud and will help me blow her nose into a tissue, too.
-She is fully weaned! This is bitter sweet for me, but she has done great with it. I think I nursed her for the last time on 6/16. She hasn't loved milk, so it has been a little bit of a task to get her adjusted to that, but she has improved, and she guzzles water anytime. She drinks more than Henry did for sure. She has eaten her weight in blueberries this month since we went and picked them. She can down them. And she LOVES bananas! I give her one every morning and she is SO, SO excited about it each time. When she sees me getting it, she lovingly says "nana! nana!" and dances in my arms over it. When we were out of town for a week she didn't get one everyday like normal. Toward the end of the trip we ran into the grocery, and when she saw their big pile of bananas she went berserk! At first she started her usual happy response, but when she couldn't eat it right away, she got so upset and cried and threw fits. We had to let her start eating one as soon as we paid for it and she was basically done by the time we had got to the car! I guess she had gone through banana withdrawal! Steven thought it was funny one night when we were grilling squash on the grill and she looked and it and pointed and lovingly said, "nana!" If only we were that excited over such a food!:) She eats pretty much everything we do now, and I've tried peanut butter and eggs this month and she luckily had no reactions. Yay! She loves cheese and eats frozen peas just like her brother did, too.
-What a blessing you are to us, little Annie. You enrich our lives and make us thankful. We praise God for you each day. He knew what we needed before we even asked.
