Look Whooo's 13 Months Old??!

I fully intend on continuing these posts until about age 2. We were still in Galveston on the 10th (when she turned 13 months), and then time has just gotten away from me, or there was other stuff I wanted to do, so I'm finally doing it now!

Soooo...we officially have a toddler now! Not a baby. A toddler. A toddler who loves to open and close drawers and doors, chase Ninja around the house, and hauls booty across the kitchen when Ninja's wet cat food is down there (and yes, she has eaten some). Man....life was easier when I could put her in one spot and she couldn't move! :) Oh, and everyone always talks about the "terrible 2's," but are there "terrible 1's"?? Audrey has decided it's acceptable to scream at you when she's not getting her own way, or turn the tears on. Or both! Talk about having a will, and opinion, of her own! Not to make all this sound negative, though; she is still a sweet little girl and generally easy-going and happy....but she's not shy to let you know when she's not happy about not getting her own way.

Here's some proof :)

This month has been FULL of really watching her grow, learn, and develop all sorts of new skills and abilities. She is so smart! I know every mom thinks that about their baby, but yeah, she's a genius :) She definitely understands much of what we tell her.

Weight: 19lbs 7oz (found that out at the doctor today)

Length/head circ.: No idea

Teeth: I don't even know for sure. I think 7 total. 4 on top and 3 on bottom. No molars yet. I've heard those are rough.

Sleep: We are now down to 1 nap a day. Sad day for Mommy, lol (ha...j/k....kind of!). While on vacation I gave her 2 naps one time and she took a great morning nap about an hour and a half long, and her afternoon nap was about 30 minutes....and it took her 30 minutes to even fall asleep for it! The rest of the vacation we did 1 nap and she did fine. At home, she keeps pooping like an hour into the nap, so she's been only sleeping an hour to an hour and a half a day, but then sleeps about 13-13 1/2 hours at night to make up for it, so I'll take it!


Eating: She eats 3 good meals a day. I try and get her to eat whatever we're eating. Sometimes she does. Sometimes she doesn't. If we're fixing something I know she can't eat (like steak), I'll fix her some macaroni and cheese. She (knock on wood) doesn't seem like a very picky eater. I always give her a banana at breakfast and she'll eat a half to a whole banana, just depending on how hungry she is, and her mood. I usually rotate between also giving her a cereal bar (she LOVES these...apples and cinnamon are her favorite), toast with either cinnamon and sugar or jelly on it, or a waffle with some peanut butter and syrup. For lunch, sometimes cheese is her main protein, but this week she and I have split tuna salad (just tuna, mayo, and a hard-boiled egg mixed together). She doesn't really care for lunch meat. She usually gets some applesauce, too, and some sort of carb (her favorite lately is Ritz Bits with cheese...sometimes that's her main meal whether I want it to be or not!). Occasionally I'll make her a cheese quesadilla, and she'll usually eat half of that. Dinner: she's gotten much better about eating meat. She used to not eat it at all. Now she'll generally eat whatever we're having with dinner. She's eaten hamburger patty pieces with cheese melted on top, meatloaf, taco meat, shredded chicken, etc. She absolutely LOVES vegetables! Broccoli, green beans, and peas are her favorites. We gave her corn one time and she seriously loved that stuff, and then we saw it was on the no-no list given to us by the doctor b/c it was hard for their stomachs to digest. She also likes cauliflower. She's really a good eater! She's always more inclined to eat it if I'm eating it first :)

Clothes: 9-12m/12m in everything. Some of the 12m stuff she got for her birthday are already fitting snugly, so we have to get as much wear out of them as possible!

New Achievements of the month:
1. Can pick out a familiar object when named ("can you get your duck?" - she'll pick up the duck)
2. Can point to her hair and nose when asked
3. Signs!!!!! It took FOR.EVER. for her to get it, but she signs "all done" when she hears the microwave beep, the stove timer go off, and (my personal favorite) when she's done eating! I worked SOOOO hard on getting "all done" down because when she was done eating, she would just swipe her hands all over her tray and send food flying all over the kitchen floor. Now she'll look at me and sign "all done." Soooo much better! She also knows the sign for "microwave" b/c I taught it to her and apparently it was funny to her and it has stuck. I haven't worked on many other words b/c "all done" was the one I wanted to focus on. Now that she's got that one down, I'll try expanding her vocabulary.
4. Meaningfully says: "tweet tweet" (bird), "kitty," "hi," "bye," (sometimes these are just waves rather than the word, but she does know the words), "glasses," (as in eyeglasses), "washrag," "water," "duck", "cracker",  "diaper", "sticker," "computer" (lol....I bet this is not one of the first words from previous generations!) I think those are it.
5. Will mimic just about any word/sound that comes out of your mouth....watch your mouths in front of her! :)
6. Can stand while holding onto something (but can't pull to standing yet)
7. LOVES having someone sit and read to her. Sometimes you get to read the same book over and over. And over. And over. And over again.
8. Can actually "help" with certain tasks. I can give her a washrag after meal time and ask her to clean her face and she'll put the rag to her mouth. Is she cleaning it? No. But it's a start! Also, one day, I took a couple of hours to sort through her drawers and closet and put away all the clothes that are too small, or too summery. For most of it, she read books in her room, or just played in the pile of clothes, but at the end I was picking up all the empty hangers to hang up the new stuff we had, and she started handing me the hangers after she saw what I was doing! It was actually very helpful to me! Then she was sad when there were no more hangers to pick up and her helper job was all done :)

Likes:
1. Birds
2. Playing in the sand at the beach
3. Crawling in the ocean at the beach
4. Being held/carried
5. Going on long walks (yes, in her stroller!) and enjoying this beautiful weather!
6. Looking at pictures of people she knows
7. Reading (herself, or others reading to her) (oh, cute story, I LOVE when she "reads" to herself. She just looks at each page and talks softly to herself, sometimes laughing, and then flips the page. It's sooo cute!)
8. Clothes - whether she's on the couch with me while I'm folding clothes, sorting through some of her old clothes and pulling out the clothes that she can't wear anymore, or that aren't seasonally appropriate anymore, she's totally happy when surrounded by clothes

Dislikes:
1. NOT GETTING HER OWN WAY
That pretty much sums up everything she doesn't like :)

This girl seriously cracks me up. Of course, there are days that she drives me crazy, but she is so fun, and interactive. I love that I can explain stuff to her (simple things) and she understands. For instance, if she's fussing and looking at her water cup (if it's out of reach), I can say "do you want your water?" and she immediately stops fussing and either responds with a "ya" or a smile, or sometimes a happy-sounding grunt-like noise. So, she totally gets that I'm about to give her what she wants and stops fussing. It's just so fun for me to watch her learn! Babies really are like little sponges! Anyways, love our sweet girl! Can't wait to see what she learns by 14 months.

Galveston Vacation!

During the summer, Michel and I decided to take our first family vacation since Audrey was born. I LOVE going to the beach even though I'm a total weenie and don't like swimming in open water (hello, sharks!), and we needed to keep it affordable which meant we had to go somewhere that we could drive to. Galveston was pretty much our only option. I'll admit, at first I wasn't that excited. Everybody talks about Galveston being dirty, but honestly we have had such a great time here! Michel booked us a "room" at Holiday Inn Resort which really ended up being our own small apartment. We haven't had daily maid service like you get in a regular hotel, so we've had to wash and dry our towels as needed, but that hasn't been a big deal at all.

Anyways, we left on Sunday, October 5th. We stopped at a gas station a couple hours out of town to let Audrey out and give her a small snack, then back in the car for another couple hours to get to College Station and meet my cousin and his wife for lunch. We also asked if we could go back to their house so that Audrey had somewhere to crawl around and get some energy out.

Our first road trip "selfie"!

I was very impressed with Audrey. We've never done such a long car ride with her, and she did great! She took 2 naps - each one 30-40 minutes which is by no means what she normally does, but it was pretty good for the car. I put on FB that she was happy 80% of the time, slept about 10% of the time, and was slightly to moderately fussy 10% of the time. I'd call that a successful road trip!

Our hotel sat directly on the beach. There was a long pier that you walked down from the hotel to the beach. It was soooo nice! Apparently, I haven't spent enough time on the beach, and didn't realize when you go to the beach with a 1-year-old, half of the beach comes back in, and on, your swimsuits. Anyways, I have loved everything about our stay from our VIEW, to our condo itself, to all the activities that we've done. Better yet, Audrey has LOVED it, too!

Who wouldn't love this view??? This is from our bedroom

The layout worked out great b/c we brought Audrey's pack 'n play and put it in the bedroom during the day, and put it up in the living room at night and Michel and I just had to stay in the bedroom (you can go into the bathroom from the hall or the bedroom, so no matter where she was we could go to the bathroom without disturbing her).


The weather didn't cooperate very well with us on Monday. We didn't have much planned so we decided to give Audrey 2 naps that day rather than 1 (she's at a weird stage where she really needs 1 1/2 naps - one long nap and one is usually like 30 min, so we were planning on only giving her 1 nap most days). Anyways, we went out for breakfast and came back and gave Audrey a REALLY good nap. When she woke up we went to lunch. By the time lunch was over, the sky was dark and once in the car, we were pelted with torrential rain. We decided it was not a good day for a ferry ride (our original plan) and went back to the hotel. Not much to say about this. We read Audrey book. After book. After book. She's in a stage where she likes to read the same book over, and over, and over, or many books repetitively. I'm glad she likes to read, but I can only read "Are You a Cow?" so many times. Anyways, once she woke up from her 2nd nap the skies had cleared, and we decided to go for a walk on the beach. We discovered that Audrey LOVES birds, so being on the beach with tons of seagulls was right up her alley.

After our delicious breakfast out, before the storms rolled in...it was really windy as illustrated by my hair and Audrey's inability to open her eyes!

These weren't even the worst storm clouds

She's supposed to be giving a sad face b/c we're forced to stay inside

I'm not so good with the selfie...but I keep trying

On Tuesday, we went to Moody Gardens. They have an aquarium, rain forest, museum, 3-D movie theater, and an amusement park. We only paid to get into the aquarium and rain forest. Michel and I both agreed that the rain forest was our favorite part. Audrey definitely agreed! There were live tropical birds able to fly freely (no cages!) that she would always point to, excitedly saying, "tweet, tweet!" I have discovered she doesn't ever say the word "bird" even though we tell her that they're birds and then we always ask, "What does a bird say?" "Tweet, tweet." The "tweet tweet" part is what she really caught onto, so now birds are "tweet tweets" to Audrey :) The rain forest also had a butterfly garden with beautiful flowers and tons of butterflies! I tried getting one on my finger, but no luck :( I had one try to land on my shirt a couple times, but it never stayed. Audrey kept trying to "pet" butterflies, but when one did get close enough to touch her eyelids fluttered really hard when they were flapping their wings really hard, so she wasn't too sure about them up close.

The butterfly garden

This monkey was just out in the open! We were told to walk far away and slowly since we had the stroller - he associates it with having food in it!

A "tweet tweet" :)

We went to lunch and then back to the hotel to give Audrey a good nap. Luckily, she still sleeps fairly well away from home, but as I type this (on Thursday) I can say she's definitely missing some good sleep as she has been pretty fussy today which is TOTALLY not like her. Oh well. Anyways, after her nap we all changed and went down to the beach. We'd walked to the beach before, but not dressed to swim, or play in the sand, so this was Audrey's first time to really experience it.

She was very cautious when we first put her in the sand, like "What is this?" but after raking her hands through it a few times, she decided she could experience it better if she rubbed it in her hair and on her face!

This is a baby who is loving the beach!

We then ventured out into the water. We sat at the edge where the tide would come in enough to get us wet. Audrey LOVED it! At one point, a bigger wave came in, and pretty much submerged Audrey in the water (we picked her up right away - we were sitting right beside her), and as soon as she got the water out of her face, she just started laughing! It didn't phase her one bit! So we stayed in the water. She even started crawling out into the open sea to get a better experience. Again, we were right beside her, so she wasn't in danger :)

My child has no fear of water!

Chasing "tweet tweets" :)

I love writing in the sand!

The rest of this post doesn't include pictures, and I know I've gotten pretty wordy already! I'll sum up Wednesday and Thursday quickly (maybe, ha!). On Wednesday we got on the ferry to just experience a ferry ride, and it was so much fun! We took Audrey out and she was definitely more captivated with the "tweet tweets". We even saw at least 20 dolphins jumping in and out of the water, and she liked the birds more. LOL when one of the dolphins jumped up, I pointed to it in a really excited voice, and said, "look! There's a dolphin!" and she looked at me like "What's a dolphin?" and went back to pointing out birds :) We went to lunch again, and back to give Audrey a (horrible) nap. It was probably 30 minutes. Then we went to get ice cream because there's an ice cream shop that was listed on Trip Advisor as the "best ice cream." It was true. It was cold, creamy, and delicious. Audrey also LOVES ice cream, so Michel and I could not feed her fast enough! She was a satisfied little girl.

On Thursday, we spent the morning on the beach, came back, showered, ate lunch, and put Audrey to bed where she finally took a 2+ hour nap. It didn't really keep her from being a bit crabby, but we've been going and going and going every day since Sunday, so I assume she's just really tired. I'm hoping once we get home in her own bed she'll make up some good sleep (even though, for the most part, she's still sleeping fairly well...1-2 1/2 hours in the day, and 11-12 hours at night).

All in all, we have had a WONDERFUL time, and I would gladly come back again! We drive back tomorrow, so please pray for our safety, and that Audrey stays as happy on the way back as she did on the drive down here!

Happy 1st Birthday, Big Girl!!

On Saturday, September 13th, Michel and I hosted our first ever baby birthday party. To continue our owl theme from her nursery to the Look Whooo Is Getting Older posts that I've done since she was born, I chose to do a Look Whooo is 1 Year Old party. I ordered everything off of Etsy, printed it at Fed Ex Office, and then cut and mounted everything myself. Ummm....what was I thinking??? I started off doing a little bit at a time, so that I wouldn't be overwhelmed to do everything at the last minute, but as always, my natural procrastination set in, and here it was the day of the party and I was still scrambling to get little things taken care of. Luckily, my in-laws had come into town the night before, and were more than happy to come over at 9am on Saturday and watch Audrey so Michel could mow the lawn and I could take care of last-minute birthday to-dos. :) When it was all said and done, I thought it turned out really cute!

 This smash cake....oh. my. goodness. It caused me the biggest headache. Ever. I got it from Wal-mart. Need I say more? No, j/k, I do like Wal-Mart. Issues started when I placed the order. The baker was not on duty, so a guy who really didn't know what he was doing took my order. He didn't know how to put down the proper page number of the cake that I wanted, icing colors, etc., and assured me, "the baker would know." Yeah. Right. So I went back a couple days later when the baker was there to clarify everything that the baker didn't "just know." However, even after talking tot he baker, telling her that I wanted the cake to look exactly like the picture shown (a big 1 - not filled in) with the name "Audrey" inside of it, I wasn't thrilled when I saw what she had done, but it was OK. Oh, and I said that I would pick it up at 6pm the night before. When I got there (at 6:02), there was NOBODY in the bakery!!! I had to hunt down a manager, get them to page someone to the bakery, and that had me frustrated. Then as I was paying I noticed the sticker with the description on it said it was a white cake when I had ordered a chocolate cake. Urrrrgghhh....but anyways, if that was the only issue we had with the party I think we did pretty good!

As guests arrived, I asked them to each take a picture with the birthday girl so that we could remember everyone who came to celebrate our special day. We invited grandparents, aunts/uncles/cousins, a few of my friends that Audrey and I regularly do play dates with, and our small group. Unfortunately, illnesses had left many people unable to attend, but we still partied hard and had a great time!

Aunt Janette, Karys, and Audrey (Zane was one of the sick ones, and had to stay home with his dad...we missed them both!)

Nana and Granddaddy

Mommy and Daddy

Josh, Jax, and Jessica

Grandpa and Grandma

Erin, Eva Mae, and Richard

Once everyone arrived, we had pizza for lunch. Audrey ate almost an entire piece of pizza minus the crust. My girl can put away some food! After pizza we moved straight to presents. Since Audrey had opened presents that Michel and I gave her just a few days prior on her actual birthday, she was a total pro! For this birthday we could have gotten her tissue paper and she would have been happy, but she has loved all of her gifts!

After presents, we undressed the birthday girl to get ready for smash cake. I think she must have been too full from her pizza because she barely touched her cake...and I've given her cake before, and she scarfed it down! At her party...not so much, lol!

She was very cautious with her cake

All in all, we had a great party experience! Plus, after the party was over she took a 2+ hour nap! That's a sign that we were partying hard!

We love you, sweet girl!