Taylor Joy - Eleven Months

 Well hi there! I think I may have over did it on pictures this month. Partly because my model is so dang cute, and partly because I was trying out a new lens from my photographer Dad extraordinaire. Regardless, here is what Taylor Joy has been up to this month. 

 Baby Girl is getting so big! She is becoming more and more confident every day. Taylor is very comfortable standing/sitting up her on her knees. And as of yesterday, is starting to balance while standing up on her won without holding onto anything. 

She loves to play games and seems to understand more and more each day. Yesterday I noticed how much she LOVES trying to play with Emmerson's toys the second she leaves the room. It's like Taylor knows the second Em walks away, it's go time. She will sprint crawl across the floor to grab hold of all of the goodies that don't belong to her. Then she'll look over at me with the most satisfied face of accomplishment! That is, until Emmerson comes back and scolds her for touching her things. I foresee many years of this in our future. 

Taylor is also learning the meaning of "no." But she gets the cutest little smirk on her face when she knowingly disobeys the command. Taylor acts like her play pen is prison this month. She would much rather be roaming free. 

One of Taylor's favorite things is to raise her hands up in the air when you say, "How big is Taylor?" She responds with arms straight up in the air while all of the adults in the room say, "Sooooooooooooo big!" She is also starting to point at things. 

Taylor is almost eating formula exclusively now. I dropped down to three pump sessions early this month. (Morning, noon, and before bed) But when my noon session was producing little, I decided to drop that session too. It seemed that with each dropped session, my remaining sessions produced less and less. Now I am down to a morning session every other day which means... formula is our new BFF. It is always a little disappointing to end our breast milk routine... but it is also a huge relief to have as much milk as we need readily available. 

In addition to formula, this girl is eating everything now! She loves scrambled eggs, quesadillas, all fruit, avocado, pasta, sandwich meats, cheese, and little bits of whatever we're eating. 

And I guess, in a nutshell, that's what our Tay Tay has been up to. She's also a great camera assistant as you can see. I simply can't believe our girl will be one in less than a month now! Waaaaa! Look at how she's grown this year... it's gone much too fast!

Emmerson Grace 11 Months

Well, here we are, just a few weeks shy of her first birthday. I really can not believe it. I look at all of these pictures of her and see how much she's changed in the last 11 months and my heart aches. 

Today was a hot day and Emmerson woke up from her afternoon nap sweaty and crying. I had put her down in just her diaper. I jumped out of the shower and hurried to scoop her up and rock with her. I was also just half-dressed and so there we were, skin-to-skin rocking in her chair. It took me right back to the first moment they handed her to me in the hospital. Warm, wet, and whimpering with a sweet little cry. Every bit of that experience flooded back to my memory and it made my eyes instantly fill with tears. She is just too precious for words. I find myself always wondering why God blessed us with this little one. She was our very welcomed surprise and I simply can not imagine our lives without her now. 

This month has brought more changes than any of the months prior. Emme is definitely growing out of the baby phase. (Waaaa!) She is so independent now and always on the go, which is why this was the first month I couldn't get her to sit on her gray and white quilt for her pictures. She is too quick! 

I think her looks have changed a lot too this month. She has filled out a bit and her hair has grown in quite a lot. She absolutely refuses to wear headbands or bows now, so I have to put her hair in this funny little pony-tail to keep it out of her eyes. I use teeny-tiny rubber bands but she even seems to be able to pull them out from time to time. Did I mention she's determined and oh, so stubborn? When she's not happy with something, she'll let you know. Like tonight, we went for a walk on the beach as a family. Donovan eventually got tired of walking, so he jumped into the front part of her jogging stroller.  Emme was not having it. Apparently, he was blocking her view because she was using all of her strength to try to push him off with her feet. He kept staying, "Stop it Emme." And that seemed to make her even more mad. So she started to grunt and groan as she kicked him. We had to laugh. She has so much personality and she's not even one! 

Most all of the time she is happy as can be. She continues to be the easiest baby ever! She is content to sit back and observe everything around her. She plays independently in her play pen or sits in her crib "chatting" away until we come in to get her. She's happy to be held by anyone at anytime. 

The most difficult thing about her this month is changing her diaper! It's like trying to catch a crocodile! She just spins and spins until she can get away from you and then once you lose your grip, she crawls away as fast as she possibly can… nakie bum and all. It's pretty cute, unless you are in a real hurry, in which case, it's like a full blown work out just getting her into a clean diaper. 

 Emmerson is finally pulling herself up on everything. She's becoming more confident with walking around while holding onto things now, too. One of her favorite past times this month is pulling every book off of her shelves. It's a game to her. She pulls them off, I put them back on, and then off they go again. 

 She's become much more interested in books this month. She likes to turn all the pages herself and then point to everything in the pictures. She'll point and then look at me until I tell her what it is, and then she'll point at the next thing and repeat that for ever page. 

My favorite thing this month has been watching her actually start to play. She loves her little dollies! If I ask her, "Where's you baby?" She crawls over and pulls it out of her toy basket. Then she holds it, like in the picture above and rocks back and forth. She'll even give her dollies kisses. She holds it up to her face and says, "MMMMM-uh" and then she'll hold it up to me so I will kiss it too. It is THE sweetest thing ever! 

Emmerson has started to "say" a few other words. In addition to Ma Ma and Da Da, she has started to say "Uh oh!" every time she drops something. (Which is another favorite game of hers.) She sounds like she says "Hiiiii" and "Bu bu" which is her version of repeating "bye-bye." She also says "Ahhh Duh" which is her version of "all done" when she doesn't want any more food and she's trying to push the food away. Those are the few words we've been able to make out anyways. Most everything else is just her usual chatter and babbling. 

Emme is wearing all 12 month clothing and some 12-18 month clothes as well. She's in size 4 diapers. I completely stopped pumping this month so she has been on all formula for the past few weeks. She never seemed to notice a difference. She has just started to eat normal foods now and not just her usual baby food. Today at lunch she had a grilled cheese sandwich and fruit along with her brother. It's so nice to not have to whip up two separate things. She still sleeps like a rock star. 2 naps a day and at night from 7:30 - 6:30 pretty consistently. 

My Emmerson Grace, 

What a fun month it's been. Your personality is blossoming and I fall more and more in love with it and YOU every single day. I love that you have a strong stubborn side. (I wonder where you get that from.)  And I am so thankful that most all of the time you are so gentle and full of joy. Your silly giggles and great big, toothy smile fill our hearts! Watching you "play" with your dolls reminds me of how thankful I am to experience being a mommy to a little girl. I am so excited for all of the fun things we'll get to do together ahead. I love you my sweet girl, 

xoxo, 

Mommy 

Little man...

It's been a few weeks since I've posted an updated picture of our little guy... how can this be? Here are a few random pictures from the week: 

Here's Dono with Daddy doing some afternoon kitchen golfing. Dustin's determined to start him out young. Pretty good form, if I do say so myself. 

 And here's a few of Donovan smothering his doggie. He sure loves Molly. I just don't know if that affection is reciprocal... yet!

 Poor Molls.

 He's always after those ears. 

 Every Saturday morning, Daddy makes us some pancakes. It's his specialty. And now that D is old enough to partake in real food, he loves his pancakes almost as much as I do. 

 And guess what?! He's walking!!! Not a ton, yet. But a good 6 or 7 steps until he falls back down on his bum. In this picture he's so annoyed that I keep taking away his toys to get him to walk to me. Camera torture! 

 And last but not least, here's my naughty little guy making a mess in the kitchen. He has discovered the one random drawer where the child proof lock does not work. I can't tell you how many times I had to put the place mats back in the drawer today. Ha!

Oh, how I love my days spent with this little boy!

First haircut and some other random things, too...

Donovan's hair looked like this last week...

 I had been wanting to trim it for weeks now. But his Daddy didn't want me to cut it until he was one. Sorry Daddy, but this crazy haired boy was begging for a trim. I strapped him in his high chair, bribed him with some puffs, and snipped away all while he was crying his eyes out. We took a video but didn't get any pics of the barber shop scene. But here he is sporting his new do after we were through. 

 Handsome little man. 

 I loved this picture of him that I quickly snapped this morning. Of course he was making his way around the kitchen, banging each and every cabinet door repeatedly louder and louder. He cracks himself up when he does things like that. 

 His haircut came just in time for a little first birthday photo session we did today. My Mom and Dad came to lend me a hand, or four hands to be exact... we needed them all, let me tell you. But I think we have some pretty great contenders. More of those to come later...

On a side note: Today I had a visit from my friend Sara and her sweet little newborn Elisa Ruth. Cuddling a 6 pound baby made me realize all the more that my baby is SO big! He towered over Elisa. How does the year fly by that quickly?

Guess where we spent our NYE?

Donovan's first trip to Sea World!

 He loved every minute of it... and so did we. 

 And the best news of the day was that Santa was still in town. We thought we'd missed our chance to take D's picture with Santa this year. 

Happy belated New Year!

11 Months!

Donovan is 11 months old today! How can it be? His first birthday is right around the corner and I can hardly believe it. I have loved every minute of my vacation time over the past two weeks mostly because I have enjoyed spending so much of it playing with this little monkey. 

As in previous months, it wasn't easy getting great snapshots with the tie on today. I had to bribe Donovan with my cell phone. He's obsessed with phones and remote controls. Are your kids that way too? He has so many beautiful toys to play with from Christmas and yet his number one obsession will always be some sort of electronic device. A true boy I suppose. Also notice those two big teeth on the bottom of his mouth. There is a third which has accompanied them down there which now gives Dono 7 teeth in all and two more that I can see coming in on top. 

 What else is Donovan up to this month...? Well, he is most interested in whatever it is that you have, hold, or tell him that he can not have. In this picture, it was my camera. He is so determined and will stand on his tippy toes to reach for almost everything. 

 He's drooling like crazy (more teeth = more drool) and he loves to stick out his tongue at you and blow spit bubbles. His Grammie taught him that one. :)

 Here he is army crawling under his dresser to find a speck on the carpet that he could pick up and put in his mouth. This action always results in Mommy having to wrestle him to pry his little mouth open and retrieve his edible treasures. 

 Another favorite past time, pulling every book out of his bookshelves and tossing them on the floor. He could do this for hours. (Notice the cell phone is still in his death grip... SO determined, this one.) 

 He has become much more interested in his books this month. He especially loves the sensory books that he can touch and feel. This week I was reading this book about farm animals to him. I showed him how he could pet the different animals and feel their fur and it was like a lightbulb went off... he had the hugest smile and now it's all he wants to do. It is so interesting watching how much he changes developmentally each month. 

 He was getting so close to walking a few weeks ago. He was standing confidently and balancing but the week of his ear infection he seemed to revert a bit. He only wanted to be carried or crawl. He's back to standing this week but no new steps to report. 

 

Sleeping and eating is still right on track. 2 good naps each day and feedings every 4 hours with solids in between. He's eating lots of cheese and yogurt this month. 

No new words yet. His most frequently used word is still Mama or Mom Mom Mom. He makes lots and lots of different sounds but no other words that I can make out... yet. 

Oh, and one more thing that he started doing after our Santa Barbara trip. (I am almost positive he picked this up from his cousin Clare) All of the sudden in the middle of crawling, Donovan will lay down flat on the ground and be completely still. He waits for a few seconds and then pops back up, laughs, and claps for himself. Now it's become his favorite game. Every time we say "night, night Donovan," he'll stop what he's doing, lay down flat on the ground and be silent until he pops back up to proudly clap for himself. It cracks us up every time. 

 I am so in love with this baby boy. Speaking of which, how long are they officially called babies? He seems more and more like a big boy each day. It's so hard to believe!

 Almost a one year old, yikes!