final lap

Dear, sweet Emily.

Today your 11 month ‘birthday’ hit me like a ton of bricks and came out of nowhere.  I spent a disproportionate amount of the day tearing up as I looked through ‘old’ photos of you and then was pulled away by the sound of your chatting away with yourself on the floor.  Who knew that babies growing up held so much duality for Mamas.  I am SO proud of everything you’ve done and accomplished this past month, and I’m getting giddy at the thought of you walking and celebrating your birthday in a few short weeks.

As of late you’ve taken great enjoyment from surprising people when you respond to their ‘hi’s’ and bye-byes with words and gestures.  You say Mama with confidence now.  A couple of times I think you’ve said a few more words, but they’re not used with much regularity yet, so I don’t want to publicize and jinx it.  You understand many more words than you know; for instance when I say ‘where’s your (ok, the neighbour’s) puppy, Emily?’, you crane your head to look out the window or crawl up to the sliding door and bang on it, where the puppy always comes to visit you.  You get excited when I tell you it’s bath time and when we’re in the bathroom, you start throwing your bath toys over the edge into the bath as it fills up; what a help!

You love to point at everything, and find it hi-larious when we point back at you.   You also love to get into EVERYTHING and seem to have selective hearing because often you don’t seem to hear me when I say NO! and just continue on playing with what you shouldn’t.  Other times, you’ll stop and look at me, and then AVERT YOUR EYES while continuing to misbehave.  Oy vey we’ve got some fun times ahead of us don’t we!

I measured you on our scale the other day and it was just kissing the 20lb mark.  I have to say that I’m surprised at the way your weight gain has slowed down the past few months, although I guess with all of the movin’ you’ve been doing it’s not without cause.  You love to crawl and cruise and shake your booty to music, and are still not at the point of walking, but I think it’s an issue of confidence as you stand without holding on to anything while playing with toys and you’ll walk with us holding on to only one hand.   You also popped a new tooth through on Canada Day (have you reached any of your milestones on a day other than a holiday yet child?) and it was the first one that didn’t interrupt your sleep or disposition.

Some of your big new experiences this month were related to food.  First, we took you strawberry picking in June, and needless to say, you weren’t very helpful getting the berries in the basket!  I had dressed you in an outfit that I didn’t mind getting stained, but I forgot to dress myself that way, and had trouble getting you out of the field and onto the wagon without getting covered!  Ah, the wagon ride!  You were SO cute riding along and pointing at things.

We were leery of giving you strawberries before a year, but I didn’t want you to miss out on eating fresh Ontario strawberries, so we took a chance figuring you hadn’t had any food sensitivities so far!

On that same note, a couple of weeks ago you had your first taste of peanut butter when we had some asian noodle salad with peanut butter in the dressing and you gobbled it up!  Mama kept her eye on you the rest of the night, paranoid that you’d suddenly stop breathing, but you came out OK and seem to like peanut butter as much as your Daddy does!  I haven’t given you a PB sandwich yet, as I’m saving that one for your Daddy since he’s out of town.

We’ve moved a couple more of your baby toys to storage since you weren’t using them very much anymore and we need lots of open space to sell this place! 

You seem to have a way with people, and on MANY occasions strangers have wanted to hold you when you’ve given them one of your smiles and said ‘hiya’.  I’m still warming up to the idea, but it brings my mama heart joy whenever people say nice things about you.  I don’t blame them though, you are SERIOUSLY the cutest baby ever.  Not that I’m biased or anything.

Daddy, I don’t need your help!

I’m wracking my brain trying to think of anything new that you’ve done this month, and the only other thing that’s rising to the surface right now is a new quirk you have with eating (and playing with toys for that matter).  You want to share everything.  If you’re eating something, after a few bites you push it toward our mouths and try and feed it to us, mush and baby drool included.  On one occasion you even crawled up to me and shoved something in my mouth before I could catch you, and imagine my surprise that it wasn’t even food! (I think it was a piece of paper, that girl still loves to shred anything she can get her hands on!).

Your personality continues to shine through more and more, and your Dad and I are looking forward to seeing how you develop in the future.  Your little words, hugs and smiles mean the world to us.

Love, Mama