11 month old developments

HAPPY 1ST BIRTHDAY BELLA!!!! AUG. 20, 2007

I just don't know where the time has gone since last August. It just seems like the fast forward button was on
along and now she's one! It's been a wonderful year, watching
Bella grow into the little lady that she is. We wonder where she has been all along. We just can't picture her not in our lives. She's been a great baby and, if God promised us 10 more like her, we'd sign on the dotted line! haha..okay, maybe not 10!

DEVELOPMENTS: Over the past month, Bella learned how to blow kisses, give kisses (open-mouthed too!) and shake her No!haha. It's too cute. She also started to stand on her own and loves to hug her stuffed animals and pat them on their backs, like mommy does when she burps Bella. It's so adorable to see.

Bella also took her FIRST STEP on Aug. 5 and weighed in at 17 # 13.5 oz and was 29 3/8 inches long. It's almost time for a convertible car seat. As the days went on she'd stand for longer periods and now (Aug. 22) I think she can stand for about 30 seconds..at least I think. She's also trying to get up into a standing position when she's bent over touching the floor with her hands.


Also, yesterday at the doctors office (Aug. 21) she took FOUR STEPS! She also now weighs a whopping 18# 2 oz.! She's only in the 10th percentile, but has maintained this all along. She's in the 55 th % for her length which is 19 inches. In regards to teeth, Bella has been getting one right after another this past month and these teeth
hurt her. She has three on the bottom and like 4 on top! I've lost
count!haha.

B/c of the pain, she's been getting up in the middle of the morning AGAIN and it was wearing me out AGAIN. I started to nurse her a couple of nights during this phase and then decided that I had to stop nursing her like that before she makes another habit out of it. So, instead, I would walk around with her and let her suck on an ice cube that I put in this meshy thing or something hard and it seemed to help. Then she'd take the pacifier and fall to sleep. Sometimes it took me over an hour to get her back to sleep. This was probably within the last couple of weeks and now she's starting to get back into her 5am wake up call, but go back to sleep afterwards. Before she would stay up.

SLEEPING: Bella will sleep usually from around 7-715pm until 5am (ish). Because she has been teething, she's been off with her normal routine. I think she's getting back to normal now though. However, now she'll go back to sleep after she wakes up around 5am for another 1.5 hrs or so. I'm loving that! So, b/c of this, she's getting herself into a different schedule in regards to napping and eating. It's all good though =-) Also, she still only naps in her car seat for her two naps. We've tried the crib, to no avail. She gets livid! We have to get her to nap in the crib soon though b/c she's going to be in a convertible car seat soon.


EATING: Bella nurses 4 times a day now, but for the last couple of nights during my bed time feeding, I'll only nurse for about 20 mins and then give her about 4-5 oz of Organic Vit. D Milk. Yep, the weaning process has begun. It's a bit sad, but exciting too. She loves the milk, but prefers it warm and in a bottle. She'll take it from a sippy cold, but will only take a few sips. I tried to doctor the cold milk with some chocolate syrup and she took it from a sippy too! Bella still eats her organic yogurt, but also eats what we eat. We found out today that she likes asparagus, but doesn't like hard boiled eggs. Maybe we'll try some scrambled egg next time. The sky is the limit now in regards to food for Bella!


MOMMY AND DADDY:
Kieran and I are doing well and loving our little Bella. Bella says "da da" when he comes home from work and definitely recognizes him as daddy! It's cute! We are also loving our time here in beautiful Colorado and take full advantage of the mountains, when we can. We are definitely lucky to be out here living our dream of being out west again! We've been enjoying having visitors over the last couple of weeks. Kieran's mom, step-dad, brother and a friend were visiting a couple of weeks ago and then my parents came last week. We were supposed to have a little 1st birthday party for Bella, but it was rained out. Instead, we had a little celebration at our house and also went out to eat on her birthday with my parents. We're going to reschedule her party for Sept. 7.

Otherwise, all is well out here in the west. We'll probably be going back home around the end of October for hopefully a Penn State get-together! For anyone of you who want to come and visit, the door is always open =-)

Love,
The Lasaters