Swimming

Emily had her last swimming lesson this morning. Greg and Emily have been going to Parent/Child swimming lessons for the past 2 months every Saturday morning. Emily takes half the class to get really into the water and then she loves enjoys the last 15 minutes and is ready to fall asleep for a good nap by the time she is dry and dressed. She does enjoy the water, but takes some time to get into the splashing each week. These pictures were of the various things the class did during their 30 minutes in the water. Emily knows how to jump in the water and can "swim" underwater for a foot or 2. They have toys that float to encourage the kids to reach like they do when they are swimming. Emily usually has a ball. If she has any of the other toys she can hold them too much and doesn't reach out for them. The ball isn't quite as easy to hold the whole time.

We are starting to see a newer side of Emily both at swimming and at daycare. It is the reserved side that takes some time to warm up around others and isn't fully herself in a crowd of people. At swimming she takes some time and her daycare teachers mentioned it to me this past week. If Emily takes a morning nap and doesn't go down in the early afternoon when most of the rest of her class does, she is one of the few, usually the only, baby still up. So she has the carpet to herself. That is when the teachers see the most crawling, trying new things, and the most chatting out of Emily. When everybody else is up, Emily just watches them, when they are asleep she is more active. Emily also speaks her mind when she wants or doesn't want something. Her daycare teachers were happy that she started crying and getting fussy when all of the other kids went to the table for lunch, but she was carried off for a diaper change first. I guess it is good developmentally that she sees herself as part of the group. She also doesn't like to have teachers that she doesn't know. Twice in the last week or 2 a floating teacher has been in her room when Greg has dropped her off. When the floater sits down to feed Emily her breakfast, she has thrown a big fit until one of her regular teachers comes over and feeds her instead. Emily has always been so easygoing and generally she still is, but every now and then, she really tells you what she wants!

Happy Girl

Just a few pictures of Emily from recent weeks. We haven't taken a lot of pictures recently. I guess we've been busy. Emily is doing good. She's a crawling machine right now and is less interested in trying to walk than she was before she figured out how to crawl. She knows that she can get things across the room and can crawl with a block in each hand if she needs to. One thing that we could tell was frustrating early on was that she couldn't move if she wanted to keep holding something, but she has figured that out now.

Emily loves to stand at our coffee table in our living room. The vantage point must be good from there. We bought a cheap set of rubber coasters for her to play with (our others are breakable, but she loved them). Emily loves to stand at the table and play with the coasters. If she's upset, she'll be happy when you stand her up there. If you take her away to do something else, she'll get upset. It's just a fun, fun place for a 1 year old. The second picture is of Emily in one of her favorite places to play.

The third picture was of Emily yesterday when she and I went out for a walk after work and school. It was such a beautiful day out. She couldn't figure out what the hat was on her head. She's used to pulling things off of her head when we play peek a boo or having a plastic block or cup balance on her head for a moment, but this wouldn't fall off and she couldn't yank it off too easily. She got used to it before too long. Hopefully she doesn't mind hats this summer when she really needs them to protect her from the sun.

The last picture is one of her new favorite sleep positions. It was dark in her room, but the flash made it look like daytime.

Crawling

It's official, ladies and gentlemen, we have a crawler! Our little girl can finally get around, she just doesn't fully realize that she is capable of it. She will easily crawl short distances to get a toy, but doesn't realize that she can crawl across the room when she wants Mommy. In very short time, I'm sure.

Sitting

We had a big milestone this weekend. Emily learned how to get herself to the sitting position from laying down. We could tell that she had figured it out on Friday night because she kept doing it when we played with her on the floor after dinner. When we woke up Saturday morning she was so happy in her crib, when I went in to get her she was sitting up! She was so proud of herself! I tried to go run and grab the camera, but she started screaming when I left so those shots didn't come out very good. We left the camera in her room and she did it again when she woke up after her afternoon nap. We'll see if this gets her closer to pulling up to standing.

She is very focused on trying to crawl now. When we sit her down on the floor she'll play for a few minutes and then get herself onto all fours. She isn't going forwards, yet, but can crawl backwards and sit up from crawling.

These pictures are of Emily sitting up in her crib after her afternoon nap yesterday and tonight with her "Fun to be 1" hat on. She doesn't know quite what to think of the hat, but at least doesn't scream when it is on.

Emily has gotten very good at clapping recently and if we say Yay, she'll clap her hands together. She also knows where her head is and loves to show you. You can ask her where her head is and she'll grab it. She also loves to grab it while eating dinner which can make for a messy head!

12 Month Stats

Emily had her 12 month check up last week. She weighs 19 pounds 5.6 oz and was 29 inches long. Her 9 month weight was 19 pounds 3.4 oz so she only gained 2 oz. The substitute doctor for her pediatrician wasn't thrilled with those ounces so we are going back in a month for a weight check. I have no idea what they will do if Emily hasn't gained anything. My best guess is that she had a cold and hadn't eaten well the day before or that morning and should have been a few ounces heavier.

There is still a little confusion as to why Emily doesn't pull up to stand up, but can do more advanced things like walking with support and standing for several seconds without any support. We have an appointment with Early Intervention to get an evaluation to see if she could benefit from some physical therapy to help her get moving. She'll figure it out on her own, but this could speed things up a bit. She has to qualify and both pediatricians (our regular who is on maternity leave and the sub) think Emily is borderline as far as qualifying. The appointment was scheduled for today, 3/11, but they had to cancel so now it isn't until the end of the month. With our luck, Emily will be pulling up and walking by the appointment! It can't hurt to get the evaluation and they often give the parents tips on things that we can do differently to help her develop in other ways and gain the skills that aren't quite there.

These are the last regularly scheduled pictures of Emily and Cleo the monkey. We'll try to take a picture of her with Cleo on each of her birthdays to watch her grow. Quite the change since the first one of her at 11 days old!

The Past Year...

A couple of weeks before Emily was born

A few days old in the NICU

1 Month Old

3 Months Old

6 Months Old

9 Months Old

10 Months Old

1 Year Old!

Emily's 1st Birthday Party!

Here is Emily's 1st Birthday Party!!! We had a bunch of other couples and families that we know come over for cake and ice cream. Emily got all dressed up in a cute little dress and had her very own cake. I made an applesauce cake for her with cool Whip on top. Emily was a little tentative at first, but then she got the hang out of what she was supposed to do with it and seemed to have fun. She is a pretty neat little cake eater and didn't cover herself either time she ate cake. The adults all had the cake in the picture and that was yummy, too. I think we've found a good cake place near us for all future cake needs.

Emily got a lot of neat loot at her party. It took us several days to open up all of the gifts. It's hard to believe that we have a 1 year old.