Time Flies When She is Walking

So much has been has been going on in our little Layla's life and time seems to slip away so quickly. Now that Layla has been walking exclusively for the past couple months (except for those moments when she is really tired and will bring back the crawl) we have been having so much fun.  I love that I can take her places and she can walk around instead of me having to hold her all the time or have her confined to the stroller.  She is loving the freedom and especially loves wandering around outside.  I can hardly remember what it was like when she was just crawling.  She just started this new thing that we call her funny walk, and it is hilarious. 

Layla's Funny Walk

Besides all the walking, she is starting to say words or portions of words besides mama and dada, and her repertoire of impersonations is expanding all the time.  She can now say her name, and the words more, bath, water (wawa), night night (nigh nigh), ball, baby, bye bye, and hi.  She pretty much impersonates anything she hears like the whale sound her computer makes, sirens, cars, airplanes, the vacuum and hair dryer and she has most of the animal sounds down like the snake, duck, monkey, sheep, cat, dog, and fish, among others, but I think my favorite is her jazz music.  She sounds just like Miles Davis.  =)

We have achieved success in the eating department too!  She acutally will eat some non pureed foods now.  So far she has warmed to eating freeze dried veggie sticks, puffed cereal bits, graham crackers, banana, oatmeal cookie, and rice, with the occasional bit of bread.  It isn't a lot, but at least she is eating real food finally!

Layla eating a veggie stick

I've been trying to expand my creativity and work more on my photography.  I recently started this "Photo a Day" challenge that I came across.  You don't win anything it is just something fun to participate in if one feels so inclined, so I started in March.  I don't have Layla in every shot, but I do put her in a few of them, since she is such a great model.  I've posted some here, but if you want to see the rest and continue to follow them for as long as I continue to do them, then check out the photo a day window on my photography blog HERE.

My Monkey is One Year Old!!!

I can't believe my baby girl is a year old already. It seems like just yesterday when I was rushing into the mancave with the stick that had two pink lines across it to tell Pete the amazing news.  It really just goes by so fast.  She is changing and learning more every day.  She is mastering walking and loves it!  She also loves to impersonate things.  She can do the cat, dog, whale, sheep, monkey, and she just learned duck on her birthday when we went to the park to feed the ducks.  She is really good at that one.  Sounds exactly like them. 

She also just learned what we call her jazz music sound.  She basically sounds like a trumpet, very Miles Davis like.  =) She also impersonates sounds she hears in songs or when she hears sirens go by.  She loves her sounds, not so much on the words yet, though.  She has "dada" down like nobody's business, and she is great with "mama" when she decides she wants to say it for me, which definitely isn't as often as I would like.  I was hoping she would be a talker like I was, but so far, not so much. 

She definitely is a whiner though.  For such an adorable little munchkin, man can she make some awful sounds.  She is rather demanding, and since she can't yet use her words to voice her needs, it is comes out as an awful whine.  Sometimes her whole body shakes she is so frustrated.  I guess she can't be all perfect, as much as I might think she is.

We took some shots on her birthday for her 12 month.  We had some good times with the birthday balloons and ribbon. This will be the last of the regular monthly photos I will be taking, but definitely not the last of the photos!!!  She is too cute not to capture all the time. 

Love that face!!!

New Things All the Time!!!

Poor little Layla bug had her first cold the other day. Ironically it was about a week after getting her flu shot. She was a little trooper though. Luckily the worst of it was pretty short lived. Her temperature spiked at just above 103, but we got it back down to normal by the next morning and she was feeling much better. She has a bit of a cough in the morning and her nose is still pretty runny, so I have been trying to teach her how to blow her nose, however, she just laughs at me then flails her head around in an attempt to avoid the inevitable nose wipe. And of course, once she was on the mend, I got sick. Gotta love this time of year. Although this is the first time I have been sick in over two and a half years, so that isn't too bad. Now let's just hope Pete doesn't get sick.

I took these pictures just before she came down with her cold. Just couldn't resist.

Looking adorable wearing Mommy's baby dress and shoes!

Love the naked baby pictures

Layla has a few new firsts in the last week. She is standing all by herself, and is quite good at it. She is very proud of herself when she does it too. It is adorable to see her put her hands in the air and flash those pearly whites! Speaking of, she now has her third tooth coming in and her fourth one isn't too far behind. It is driving me crazy because just after it broke through she started grinding her teeth. It is the most awful sound. Now that it is in a bit more, she isn't doing it as much, so hopefully once it is fully in she will stop that completely, otherwise I may go nuts.

She just started saying the word "hi". It is so funny the way she says it. She opens her mouth so wide and draws out the word so it is more of a "hhhiiiiiiii", which is so adorable. And if she sees the cat or if I ask her, "what does the kitty cat say?" she responds with, "Yeow". I love it! I am so proud of her! Besides the couple words, she loves to babble all the time. It is hilarious to listen to her.

9 Months Old!!!

Time is flying by these days. I hardly even remember September or October. So Layla is nine months old now and she got a clean bill of health from her check up. She is now 27 inches tall and 17 lbs. My little skinny mini is still wearing a lot of her 6 month clothes. Now her head, on the other hand, is definitely a Heikes dome. Where her other stats put her at the 25th percentile, her head is at the 75th!

She is crawling around everywhere now, getting into whatever she can, and pulling up on anything she can. Nothing compared to what it will be once she is walking, but still, she is keeping me on my toes for sure. She has started taking steps while holding on to things, so I am sure walking will come soon. When Daddy holds her hands and walks with her, she will just cruise! I can't believe how fast she is. She just needs to work on the balance a bit more.

Talking all the time, she has mastered pretty much all of her alphabet sounds, and puts them together to make some pretty hilarious conversation. Her favorite is still dada so she says that a lot or variations of it. She loves to make weird sounds like clicking her tongue, breathing heavy through her gums (which if any of you know me well, you know how much I love that) or popping her lips. It is too cute.

She is cutting her third tooth now on the top right. I'm excited, but I will be sad once it comes in because it will make her seem so much older. I love that giant, two teeth grin that she has. I don't know if it is from the teething or not, but she has had a few rough nights over the last few weeks. She will randomly wake up crying and not be able to sooth herself back to sleep. Our version of the cry-it-out method usually works pretty well, but sometimes she just needs mom to hold her.

So overall she is doing very well. She is very attached to mommy these days, which isn't surprising, but she loves to smile at people when we are out, as long as they don't get too close.

She is my happy little munchkin!

So Many Changes

Layla has had such an amazing week! She transitioned into sleeping on her own, and she continues to be such a great sleeper. Just last night she went eight and a half hours straight! Then, the best thing in the world happened on Thursday, she giggled for the first time! That is just about the best sound ever! She is also talking so much more in the last couple days and I can't get enough of listening to those coos, gurgles, and squeals. It is just unbelievable to watch how much she is growing and changing every day. She is getting too tall for a lot of her outfits now and she is over 10lbs, all of which is head and that adorable Buddha belly!

She is discovering her hands and feet and is even beginning to reach for things. She doesn't have the grabbing thing down quite yet, but if you put something small enough in her hand she will hold onto it. She has always been really alert and responsive, but now she will look in the direction of different sounds and voices, and can follow objects all around. I know it sounds like a little brag list, but I am just so proud of our little girl. It is amazing how the smallest things in life can bring so much joy. My favorite is in the morning when she wakes up, she just chills in her bassinet and when I peek over the side she turns and looks at me and immediately cracks the biggest smile ever. Melts my heart every time.

One thing that I think has made quite a difference this week is starting her on a different kind of formula to supplement with that is for gassy babies. She doesn't get as fussy as she had been on the previous formulas, so it makes for a happy mommy when she isn't in pain anymore. Now that she isn't hurting from the gas pains she is just the happiest, most adorable baby ever. She is my strong little munchkin too. We do still have to work those arms a bit though, but she isn't the biggest fan of being on her tummy so that part is going a bit slower. It is too bad too, because some of the cutest shots are on her tummy. We need to get her some mini barbells to shape those guns!