11 Months...30 Days to 1 Year

It was another month of many firsts for you, baby girl!  This last month, your personality has really started to take shape.  You are extremely curious and love to people watch.  Some of your favorite things that people do are drop things and fall.  You belly laugh hysterically when that happens.  You have also started playing such a fun game...the drop everything, watch it fall, and watch us pick it up game.  You have also started to clap and sign bye-bye this month.  You have started to sign bye-bye to anything that you are done with - dinner, a toy, pretty much anything that you don't want to do anymore, you wave bye-bye to.  One of Mommy's favorite stories from this month is that one evening I was praying with you about the urinary tract infections you have been having - you had numbers 2 and 3 this month :-(.  I was saying that when we resist the devil, that he has to flee from us, so in the Name of Jesus we say "bye bye" to the enemy and his plans to harm you.  You then started waving bye-bye.  It was so simply precious.  This month you have started to climb the stairs on your own.  Fortunately you do not do this consistently yet, but I'm sure it's just a matter of time.  You also insist on having a spoon in your hand every time that you eat.  You try to put pieces of food on the spoon then feed your self, or just wave it around as you eat.  You also hold it straight up in the air with one hand while you drink with the other.  You have started cruising along the furniture, so it's only a matter of time before you are taking those first steps.  We moved you from your infant bath in the big tub to just being in the big girl tub for your baths.  The first few nights you were not a huge fan of this, but now you love it - especially being able to scoot around and explore the whole bathtub.  You love music - whether it's on the tv, the radio, in movies - all kinds of music.  You have started to dance whenever you hear music, and sometimes you will clap.

 It warms Mommy and Daddy's hearts in church when you raise your hands and clap as we worship.  We so desire you to have a heart to openly worship Jesus.  You received a drum for Easter, it was your favorite toy!  You love to play with the mallets and bang on anything you can find.  You have definitely started communicating with us more this month.  You haven't quite caught onto the signs that we are teaching you (hungry, thirsty, all done) - but you have found ways and specific babble sounds to tell us you what you want sometimes.  It definitely helps to understand what you are wanting or needing!  You babble and talk all the time, and sing when songs are on.  One of your new favorite toys are straws.  You will hang on to straws that we knot up so you can chew on them for days.  You went swimming again this month, the first time since you were four months old.  You sort of liked it, but we took you right before nap time.  You also went to a baseball game for the first time this season (you went before when you were two months old).  You loved watching the people and playing with David's bubble gum.  We took you to your first kid's movie this month, The Lorax.  It was more because Mommy and Daddy wanted to go to a movie together - but you loved it (especially when they were singing).  Daddy also shared with you his love for basketball in new ways this month.  You experienced your first March Madness (and almost won the kid's pool of our family pick'em game, as well as the outright title in Mommy's work pool).  You also went to your first NBA game in Houston - we went to see the Rockets play the Suns.  You watched the game for a while, but you really loved watching all of the people around you.  You continue to amaze us with how much you learn and do every week.  We can't believe you are going to be one so soon!  Life was fun before you, but you find new ways to bring even more joy into our lives every day.  Thank you for being the sweet, precious girl that you are.  We love you so much!