1 YEAR OLD

We are amazed every day at how our lives have changed, as Jared says you have no idea until you have one how much they will change your life. We both agree that our love for her is so strong and so special that it has deepened and changed our love for one another. We are also amazed at how much she is changing, every day we laugh or marvel at something new.

Her biggest thing is talking, she is VERY verbal---Jared can't imagine where she gets it from. He can already tell he's in trouble with two of us in the house, with the two of us girls and the two girl dogs he is feeling a bit outnumbered! She started with saying Daddy then it progressed to doggie, duckie (this has since been absent for a while but it was clear at the time my speech therapist friend said that is very normal), mommy (finally), then STOP which she heard because we are always telling dogs to stop and she DOES use it correctly, unfortunately. She also says bye-bye and she is starting to say tickle (though it is not consistent yet so I wouldn't count it) it is so funny and sounds more like "toockle-toockle".

She is a very independant little thing. She doesnt want to be held and coddled, she would rather be put down and run around. You can also see her independance when trying ot feed her, she will take the stuff off of the spoon and eat it herself alot of the times and not want to be fed. Her favorite foods are fruit, she especially loves kiwi and now clementines.

She is walking now, she has been taking steps for some time but she now uses it as her rpimary form of transportation. She was doing about 15 steps up until the weekend before her birthday and then it just seemed to all fall into place and she started walking from room to room and didnt stop. She will still crawl when she falls and is a bit wobbley but its pretty amazing to see her go!

Shaking her head 'no-no' is a new thing with her too, she has been doing it for a while but now she does it consistently with intent. If I tell her no not to mess with the plant for instance, she will look at me and shake her head. Now if she is full and doesnt want to eat anymore she will do it--which is a welcome change from just spitting it back out when she was full, which was her old habit. Her newfound but not welcome habit is to try and pick your nose, she has long been fascinated with teeth but she has now figured out her finger is just right size that she can try to hurry and stick it up your nose! Her other new less than pleasant habit is a screeching thing she does when she's happy, or not, the intonation tells you which it is.

She is still a very happy easygoing kid but her attitude is starting to surface just a bit. She lets you know what she wants and what she DOESNT want! As she gets better at expressing herself and we can tell what she wants more hopefuly this will diminish as right now it seems more a frustration thing than anything but we continue to discourage it.

The nickname of the moment from Dad is honey bear and mom calls her her 'lovebug'. That's about all for now.

11 Months

11 Months came with alot of developments for little Ms. Lillian, also known as: Lilly Lou, Big Lil, Big squirrel, Lilly Billy, among others.

She is starting to take steps, just a few in between objects maybe the most would be 4-5. She is starting to cruise whenever possible.

She has also developed a love for pointing at everything, clapping, waving bye-bye, and blowing kisses.

We are unsure as to whether her words are truly 'words' or just really good babble. Her favorite is still dadadada and any derivitve thereof. She also says mamama but only when she is upset, hurt, hungry, or just in general need of something. She is also in love with her doggies and 'talks' to them and about them all the time. She will point and babble at them when she is mad if they knock her down or something and she uses correct intonations and wags her finger back and forth as if she is telling them off--it is very cute.

A big change in her little life is her daycare. Before she went to a center daycare called Appletree Christian Learning Center which was very nice, clean, educational etc However, she was not sleeping because there was always so much going on, they had a crib room that was glass so she could still see and here what was going on out in the other room which resulted in about 45 minutes worth of naps all day. This was clearly not enough naps for her and she was grumpy at night. We did our research and interviews and settled on a small home daycare with one provider whom she could bond with and a room where she could nap separately from all the other older kids. The ladies name is Sharon and she is a Godsend. Her prices are very low, she "does it for the kids and doesnt need alot of money". She loves kids, has pictures of her daycare kids on her walls and is just as nice as can be. Her husband is also there during day because he works 3rd shift and all kids they watch call them "grandpa and grandma" they also dont seem to loose anyone as there is a 12 year old in their care that they have had his whole life and a teenage girl who comes to help on days when their is no school.

In the food arena Lillian has decided she is done with babyfood so she is almsot exclusively on table food. She does pretty well. When she decides something doesnt feel right in her mouth or that she is full she still has a bad habit of spitting it out--with force!

All in all she is getting to be such a big girl and is so much fun. We cant imagine our lives without her and still cant recall what it is we did before she was around.

Halloween

We had a nice time picking out pumpkins the weekend before Halloween. We were going to go to the zoo boo at Binder Park Zoo where kids dress up, see animals, and get candy but it was a cold and rainy weekend and didnt sound very appealing to either of us. So, we went to pumpkin Gene's, a local farmer who has for the past 50 years grown an enormous amount of pumpkins for the area. He currently has 50 acres, everything around his house is orange, he and his wife get very into it, dressing in orange, they have an orange cadillac, orange motorcycle etc. Since this was their 50 year anniversary they were offering a free orange cook book that had the history of their farm and the gourds in it and of course a million ways to cook...you guessed it pumpkin. It was actually very interesting. Pumpkin Gene even gave Lillian a free 'first halloween pumpkin', evidentially it is a tradition.

On Halloween we took her to trick or treat at one house, our neighbor, then we spent rest night handing out candy. Cousins Darryn and Aylanna came over and helped too. Darryn decided that everyoen needed a hand full of candy instead of just one! Of course everyone loved the dogs being dressed up too, as bees. I tried to dress them as the same thing but I could not find a bee costume that was warm enough. Overall it was a very nice night, she was so tired by the end of it I had to take her in and feed her but then she wanted back outside but collapsed into sleep soon after being brought in, just a bit after her normal bed time.

10 Months

Well this has been a rough month for us all, noone more than Lillian. 4 days before turning 9 months old she came down with her first case of Roseola which as you may have read was unpleasant. Then for about a week she felt better and wouldnt you know it she caught something 'roseola like' again about 10 days before turning 10 months old. Poor sweetie. The two illnesses back to back like that really set her back in her eating schedule and temporarily stalled her walking progress. She was back to herself in time for her 'birthday'.

She had only just turned 9 months when she started walking aroudn furniture quiet well, then about a week after I got out one of the baby push carts (pictured) and we thought for sure she would only be able to take a few steps around the area rug in her room but despite having Roseola #1 she loved it and could keep it under control and walk all over the house even on the wood! The first night she kept using it to go back and forth to Jared and I and even when she was so tired she started falling down regularly she would grab handler herself, pull herself back up and continue on. Eventually I had to put a stop to it and take her to bed. The next morning she saw it and crawled right over to it and started again. Evidentially noone told her that 9month olds werent supposed to be walking around! This weekend just a day before turning 10 months she was using it to walk and always gets frustrated because she will get to a wall and just shake the handle pushing it back and forth trying to get it to go again. So, I took her outside and let her walk down the sidewalk. She walked 1/2 length of our block before i picked her up because she was slwoing down, she was so distracted by the falling leaves, it was a long distance that she went even with me stopping her, I was so surprised. She was tired after that!

On other fronts she has learned to clap and will do it somewhat on command, the command being "yeah", though she does it more for Daddy than anyone else. She is refusing baby food and when you try to feed her some to fill her up since she is still inefficient at 'big girl food' she will let you know how much she dislikes it by spitting it back out or blowing it all over you. We try telling her "No, No, not a nice girl, no thank you" but she only proceeds to smile.

She is fitting into size 1 clothes already, though most of them are long for her in the legs they fit her belly! She has recently hit a bit of a growth spurt, her arms dont look quiet as chubby as they had (with the rolls with creases in the middle of her arm).

She is also a big talker now. She says things with the right inflections, intonations, and emotions, it is all very cute. She babbles really complex words and while we are still not sure that she knwos what Dadda and doggie mean she gets them pretty right on. It should be any time now that she really gets to talking.

She still has 3 teeth, bottom two and the one to the side of it, the other side you can see the hole where something is tryign to poke through but it has been that way for a long time.

We enjoy her so much right now it is hard to believe. As everyone says we truly cant imagine our lives without her and Jared often comments on how 'lame' we were without her and how empty our lives were. He is such a great dad and truly wonderful with her. I cant think of a better dad around, it makes me appreciate him all the more.

I have inluded pics of her 'walking' (as promised above) she was sick at the time so note the sweaty hairdo and flushed face--poor dear. Also one of her in an asian outfit that my vietnamese friends sister made (who lives in vietnam), their children also wore it and it is so adorable. I really got soem good smiles on her that day, too many to post. Last but not least another of her favorite times, bath time! I am sure she will appreciate this photo later.

Doggies!

Lillian is such a dog girl, it is so funny. We tease that her first word will be dog. Actually, I am pretty sure her first word already is dog. She very consistently says adg doga dga dog when she sees or hears our dogs, we tell her 'doggies, good doggies' all the time. I need to get some pics of her with our dogs again and post them but these pics from yesterday are too cute! My friend is a huge dog lover and has a newfy, great dane, and a rescue mutt--in enter fiance with 2 labs so now they have 5 dogs! In addition to her 4 cats! YIKES.

Anyway, Lillian visited yesterday and was SO excited. My friend was so nervous to introduce them all and amazed when Lillian just yelled and waved and kept trying to crawl to them all, while crawling around and ignoring the cats. She has shown interest in cats (but they dont take as kindly to her grabs and licks) when we are at someones house with just cats but otherwise she could care less and wants the dogs, the bigger the better! This big guy, newfy is the calmest dog (lazy) I have ever met. I am pretty sure she or anyone else could jab him with a poker and he would be ok with it. She enjoyed using him for a romper room, she kept trying to kiss him and would get a mouth full of fuzzy newfy fur which was a bit gross! Anyway she had a blast and since my friend wants kids she is happy to see that babies and dogs can coincide and be ok and her animals all did great.

I have included some pics of her with our dogs. EVery morning when she wakes up she looks for them, it is so cute. She uses them as a jungle gym and grabs their collars to help herself up. Occasionally they forget she is underfoot and tumble her but for the most part they are great. A couple days ago one hurt her with their toenail, probably the first time they have truly hurt her and she was so mad she kept looking at the guilty party and screaming and crying and carryign on even after she was fine she woudl still do that when looking at Nala (the dog), Nala looked sullen and went upstairs and laid on her bed, as if she knew she was in trouble and we never said anything to her.