I can't believe we're already over a month past Thea's first birthday! Lately I have been such a sap about the passing of time and watching my babies grow. I'm sure it has something to do with still being undecided if Thea will be our last, but gosh. Recently I was watching Elsie do laps on the driveway with her scooter, a tutu dress and sneakers on, just humming away with a smile on a her face, and huge lump caught in my throat. Plus I couldn't stop smiling at her. She is getting so big! I'm not the best at showing it all the time, but man I love these girls fiercely.
Ok, back on track. Thea is thirteen months old.
taking this month's photos was nearly impossible
At her post op appointment two days ago they measured her at 30 inches and 21 pounds, but she never actually stood on the scale on her own, was fully clothed, with a saggy wet diaper. And she screamed through the entire appointment so who the heck knows. On the bright side surgery went well and her head is healing great! Right now there is still more of a bald patch than I was hoping to see, but the surgeon said the hair follicles can go dormant for a while after surgery. Hope he is right. But it looks a lot better. Seriously the girl was a champ, never really needed any pain meds or acted like it bother her at all. The worst was following her around trying to keep her from hitting her head on crap.
Thea is wearing some 6-12 months clothes, but mostly 12-18 months. We've moved up to size four diapers, and while she is still in size three shoes, I think she'll be in fours in that department soon as well. They just don't slow down with the whole growing thing do they? Still rocking the same six teeth. I keep thinking some more have to be on the way, clearly I'm wrong.
Sleep, ha, girlfriend is still keeping me on my toes. Thea goes to bed between 7:45-8:15, and then wakes up somewhere between 3:30-6am. I never know when its going to be. If she wakes before 5:30, I can usually feed her and she'll go back to sleep until 7:30 or 8. If it is after 5:30 she generally yells at me for 30 minutes or so until I cave and go get her. For the most part she is still taking two naps a day, 90 minutes - 2 hours each, just depending on how early she was up for the day and what our day looks like. I'm still nursing Thea before each nap and bedtime. I'm about ready to cut her off, I just hate the thought of upsetting her. But I'm holding out hope that not nursing anymore might convince her to sleep until at least the 6 o'clock hour on a regular basis.
Thea has become so freaking picky over the last month. She is rarely willing to try anything she doesn't know that she likes. Vegetables are immediately refused. Most everything else is too, but she might poke at it a bit. How do they know?!?! A couple weeks ago I put some cut up grapes on her tray, and she sunk back in her chair and cried "owwwweeeee!" like I'd just punched her. Dramatic much? Some times we are offering foods that I'm pretty certain she'll like, but she just refuses to try it, so we stuff it in her mouth anyway. Probably a frowned upon tactic, but for the most part she realizes we are in fact offering something that tastes good. Except for the mashed potatoes last night. She cried about that one for a while. Whoops. Her favorite things are strawberries, blueberries, mac n cheese, bread, squeeze pouches and sweets. She is hit or miss on drinking whole milk. She never refuses it, just isn't always super excited about it.
We finally have a first real word! Even though I've been able to understand a few things for a while, last week Thea repeated bubble almost plain as day when we were blowing bubbles. I think she is just excited about her new found word as I am, if I say bubble she repeats it with such enthusiasm! She regularly wanders around saying 'weeee! bum bum bum.' What that means I have no idea, but that is what is sounds like. She has also start trying to say Elsie, which is flipping adorable. It comes out 'Ehh-eeee!'. She definitely says baby, dada, sometimes mama, and tries to say grammy (mammy), papa, waffle and book. She has gotten great and pointing then signing please when she really wants something. She also says oweee a lot. Sometimes in context, sometimes when she is just mad. Oh, she also tries to sing the Paw Patrol theme song. Nobody else would ever have a clue what she is doing, but I've heard her do it when I turned the show on for the big girls.
how she feels about pictures
Thea's attention span still sucks, but it is slowly growing for books. When I get her out of her crib she starts frantically pointing at her books saying 'buh buh!' and signing please. Moo Baa La La La remains a favorite, but lift the flaps and anything with animal sounds are also good. She can't sit through a story that doesn't have animals or actions. She loves signing songs too. She can kind of do the hand motions for Twinkle Twinkle Little Star and Itsy Bitsy Spider. We also have our own motions for Baa Baa Black Sheep that she does as well.
The little miss is really starting to figure out how to hold her own when it comes to her sisters. They have been really bad about taking stuff from her when she has something they want. They aren't always the nicest. So now she straight up teases them, fights back, and waits for the perfect opportunity to take their stuff. If Elsie has been sitting in her anywhere chair, and gets up to go do something, no matter what Thea runs over and climbs in it. She'll pick up toys, walk up to Ryann or Elsie and show it to them, then clutch it to her chest and run away. The biggest battle throughout the day is for my lap. Generally I end up with both Elsie and Thea crawling on me, neither wants to give up control!
I just can't get over how happy and fun Thea is. She is turning into a little person with the cutest little personality. I could watch her play for hours. She is a total disaster and into everything, but she is so flipping cute. When she is dumping everything from the kids' dishes cabinet on the floor, she'll take a cup over to the fridge, get up on her tippy toes and pretend she's filling it with water. She loves to drag clothes (clean or dirty) all over the place and tries to put them on. She lays her head on the floor and fake snores. She teases me with kisses, and then puckers up and smothers me in them. When she gives me a hug she lays in and pats the back of my shoulder. If she ever catches me laying on the floor she immediately climbs on my back. She loves the swimming pool and swinging.
Her dislikes include anything that might possibly keep her confined (the pack n play, aka baby jail, is just pure torture), putting pants on, being told no, and those little books with finger puppets that come through the middle. Those are apparently just plain terrifying.
And I have to throw in this story about our early mornings... A few weeks ago Thea woke up at 4:15am. I ignored her for a bit but she kept yelling so I went in and fed her, then laid her back down. She tried to fall asleep for a little while, but then she started crying again. After another 15 or 20 minutes or so I thought maybe she had pooped (regularly happens in the middle of the night, why?!?!), so I went back in her room. No poop, she I tried to nurse her a bit longer to lull her back to sleep. Laid her back down and she SCREAMED. She was absolutely pissed. After another 15 minutes I figured maybe I could just rock her for a while. When I picked her up she immediately stopped crying and started kissing my face over and over again. Of course I giggled and told her it was time for night night. So she laid her head on my should and started fake snoring. WHAT A PUNK. But pretty much the cutest little blond haired blue eyed punk so whatever. I tried to rock her but it never worked. She just kept kissing and hugging me then fake sleeping. My eyes were watering because I was trying so hard not to bust out laughing.
Sweet girl, I love you so very much. I can't wait to read this post when you turn into a raging threenager (not that I have one of those right now or anything) and I need to remember that you can be flipping adorable. :)
1 comment:
I would love to see an update on Ryann and Elsie.
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