11 months

Caroline, I cannot believe that you will be turning ONE in just a month. My tiny baby is growing up to be a toddler soon. You are changing so much and you have learned so many things this month.

Caroline you are really working on your fine motor skills. You have started to wave good-bye, clap and point to things. You are also beginning to do some sign language. You sign more, all done, eat, milk and dog - I think. Sometimes it is hard to tell if you are signing on purpose. You love music and bounce up and down and clap when there is a good strong beat. We even started taking a music class and you love it.

You are also continuing to develop your gross motor skills. You can crawl very fast. You pull up on anything and barely hang on. This week for the first time I saw you let go for just about 2 seconds and stand unsupported. You will start standing for longer periods of time. You are starting to climb too and love to climb into Katherine's TV chair and your rocking snail. You are pretty fearless but luckily it does not occur to you often to try dangerous things. You also are able to climb an entire flight of stairs and to the top of a playground jungle gym.

You are very active on the changing table. You like to roll over and stand up. You also like to play with the picture that is hanging on the wall so I think I will have to take it down soon. The good thing is that you are now putting your arm through your sleeve when you are getting dressed. It is a lot easier when you are not as floppy as you used to be.

Your little stubborn will (or sin nature) is starting to show itself more. The other night when I was putting you to bed I nursed you and you looked at me the entire time rather than closing your eyes to relax. Then I was going to snuggle with you to help you relax and fall asleep. Rather than snuggling with me you put your arms out to the side, leaned back your head and leaned away from me. You stinker. So, I just put you in your bed to cry until you fell asleep. You even had your first time out this month. You consistently go to Hooligan's dog bowl. If there is water you splash and if there is food you eat it. You know you are not supposed to do it and you choose to explore anyway. Usually I just put the food away but yesterday it was obvious that you knew what you were doing so I put you in your crib for a minute.

You are a great eater. I can pretty much put anything on your high chair tray and you will immediately pick it up to put it in your mouth. You will pretty much eat any pureed food I offer as well. I am really enjoying the fact that you will eat anything. You also prefer to feed yourself rather than eat off a spoon and you have had several days where you have only eaten big people food. There are some nights when you eat more than Katherine does and you actually eat what is served for dinner. Some of the new foods that you tried this month are strawberries, fish, onion, tomato, blueberry, egg and peanut butter. I did not plan to introduce peanut butter this early but I was not paying attention and you grabbed your sister's sandwich off of a picnic blanket. At least I know you are not allergic.

You still nurse several times a day. It is very inconsistent how often and at what times but you do always nurse before nap and bedtime. It is possible though for other people to get you to sleep though it can be challenging. You were taking so few bottles that I actually sold my breast pump to a friend. I figured that in a month you will be able to drink milk anyway if I needed to give you a bottle and a friend who is about to have a baby was excited to buy it. I have no idea how long you will nurse. Part of me wants to nurse you a long time like I did your sister and another part of me is ready to be done with it.

You typically go to bed at about 7:30 though it is harder in the summer. When it is light so late we tend to all play later and then I realize you are exhausted. You usually sleep until about 6:30 or 7. Sometimes you wake up in the night but I usually just let you fuss for a few minutes and fall back asleep on your own. If you wake up after about 5 though you end up in our bed. Your morning nap is very inconsistent because we are usually on the go. Often you sleep in the car or not at all. You have a better afternoon nap.

This month you have had 4 new teeth erupt so now you have 6. The funny thing is that on top you did not get your middle two teeth but the ones next to those. If they continue to grow in without the middle ones soon showing up, it will look like you have fangs!


You are very vocal, just like your mom and your sister. It is fun to hear you exploring all the different sounds. In the car you will babble on and on. You love to laugh. The number one thing that gets you laughing - Katherine. Usually it is right as I am telling her to stop doing something that I think is too rough with you.

I pulled a lot of toys out of the garage that were a little ahead of you but now you are ready for. It was like Christmas. You were so excited to see all of your new toys.

You love to be right with me. This is sweet and I love to snuggle but sometimes it makes it really hard to get anything done. The hardest is cooking. I can do a lot of things while holding you but cooking is a bit dangerous. This month you have started to enjoy being in the tower. This is a great thing that our friend Josh built for his kids but when they moved out of country we inherited. Now you can safely watch what I am doing.

Caroline, you continue to be such a joy. You are such a happy and fun baby. We can't believe you are almost 1!

Monthly Chair

I had so many cute pictures of Caroline this month in her chair as well as way too many pictures for her monthly update post that I decided to just post these photos. I love the monthly chair photo. It is always fun to see how she has changed. Today she was very laid back and actually took some good shots. She never squirmed too much and actually did not crinkle the paper up until the end.

I told her to kiss her puppy and so she did. Her version of a kiss is a wet, slobbery, open mouth kiss that really looks more like she is trying to eat the puppy.

Hide and Seek

It is so much fun that the girls are playing together more. I look forward to them enjoying one another more and more with each passing month, especially when Caroline learns to walk.

Katherine loves to hide. Her favorite place is under the cover of our couch. There is a perfect little space and if she scooches in just right you cannot see that she is there at all. In fact, one day she got up from her nap and hid without telling me she was awake so it kind of took me by surprise when she was not in her bed.

Caroline likes to try to find her. Of course we have to help but she thinks it is great fun.

Caroline, where is Katherine? Is she under the couch cover?

Peek-a-boo - there she is.

Visit with Sophia

This week my brother had training in town. We were very excited that he brought Sophia with him. Jaime had to stay home because she is about 34 weeks pregnant.

The girls had a ball. They are exactly a year apart and every time they get together they have more fun than the time before. They are at an age where the age gap seems to be narrowing. Physically they are the same size and as Sophia gets older they are able to interact, talk and play more.

Both days Nana and Pops brought Sophia to our house while Uncle Will was at work. We have a lot more toys and toddler friendly food. The main activities were painting, playing dress up and playing outside in the pool.

At the pool the favorite activity was dumping a bucket of water on your cousins head. Even Caroline played along. The funniest was when Sophia dumped water on her own head over and over but looked shocked every time.

Will was able to join us each evening for dinner. I wish we could have had more time with him but when your family lives out of state you are appreciative of any time spent together.

There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth

I have mentioned before that Katherine loves to play dress up. Basically from the moment she gets up until the moment she goes to bed she is wearing dress up clothes. Her new thing is to put on pieces of several outfits at one time. She often has layers of dress up clothes. We were lucky that we were given a huge box of dress up clothes from a friend in addition to several birthday presents and garage sale finds. She has plenty of dress up clothes and has no problem sharing with all of her friends. If you come to our house, you better be ready to dress up.

Every day most of the dress up clothes end up on the floor like in the photo above. This was taken tonight after 4 girls were here for the evening.

We have had to institute a few rules for dress up. The main two are that you must take off your dress up clothes when we eat with the exception of your tiara (it was our compromise) and you must take off your dress up clothes if mommy asks you to when we leave the house. Again, I usually still allow the tiara and sometimes jewelry.

Overall I think it is really cute and it is a lot of fun to see her using her imagination. She acts out all kinds of stories.

We have been having a little problem though. With all of those princess clothes on it is a lot harder to use the bathroom. Plus when you are having so much fun, who wants to take a break? So, Katherine has been having more accidents than usual. I am learning how to wash dress up clothes. So, today I told her that the next time she had an accident we were putting up the dress up box for a few days. Her reply was that she did not want me to do that. Well, when friends were over, she had an accident, right in front of the toilet. She did not allow herself enough time to take off her costume. So, I have put all of the clothes in a box in the garage. Since we had friends over, she does not realize this has been done yet. In the morning she will not be happy. I plan to keep them hidden until Sunday after church if she has remained accident free. I am hoping that this is a good motivator for her since it is one of her favorite things.