As She Grows: August 2012

With just a few short months to go before she is the big 1 YEAR OLD, it is nice to take a breath and take a look at where Madeline is right now. Photos were particular difficult this month. The camera lens fell off the camera, the batteries died twice in two minutes, and Madeline was not wanting to sit still. You take what you can get!

Length

Birth: 20 inches

Now: around 27 inches

You haven’t gotten much taller in the last few months.

Weight

Birth: 7 pounds 13 ounces

Now: 25 pounds 1 ounces

Special talents

You are still very friendly. You love to smile at people and you try very hard to make them think you are the cutest baby ever by tilting your head to smile at them, waving “hello,” and showing off those chubby cheeks. Speaking of those cheeks of yours, they are a great storage device for food you want to save until later. Besides food, you love putting rocks, sand, and various plants inside of those things.

When you first wake up in the morning and right before it is time for you to sleep, you turn into what we like to call a “monster baby.” You yell, scream, laugh, crawl around non-stop, and even throw your toys around the room. You are quite adorable as a monster baby because you think everything is extremely funny (like knocking blocks over), but it is also difficult to de-monster you when it is time to go to sleep.

Sleep

Ahh, sleep. You’ve almost got a full night of sleep down. You go to bed around 7-8 at night, wake up between 4 and 5, eat a little bit, and are up for the day around 6. You still take several naps during the day for about an hour each.

Dislikes

Being held is not one of your top activities at the moment, unless you are tired or around people you don’t know. Once you warm up around people though, you love exploring. You also HATE being on your back when we are changing your diaper or putting clothes on you. Unless we give you a toy to distract you, there is no keeping you down.

Likes

You still love putting your hand all up in people’s faces and mouths and putting things on the floor or ground in your mouth. You love to crawl around and explore things, play peek-a-boo, and look at books. Other children fascinate you, particularly older ones. You love the two kids at your childcare, so you hope every kid you meet is as awesome as they are. Water is another favorite pastime, particularly when it is in a bathtub or pet bowl.

Foods

Finger foods are all the rage now, but you won’t necessarily eat today what you loved yesterday. You still love most kinds of fruit and bread. You had your very first Cincinnati chili---homemade, vegetarian 3-way. You liked it on Sunday, but not on Monday.

Words

You are talking so much these days—and some of those words actually make sense. You say “Hew-o” and wave to people. Beau (pronounced “bo”) is the name of your sitter’s cat, so now every cat and dog is “Beau;” and yes, you are already bi-lingual! There is also a book you love reading called Bubbles, Bubbles. When we read it, you repeat the words “bubba, bubba.”