Natalie is one year old! It has been so incredible to watch Natalie transform from a newborn into a toddler this past year. I can't believe how much she has changed and grown and learned! We love having her in our family.
So this post is super late, but the picture was only taken about a week late, and all the info is just from her twelfth month. December was a busy, busy month. We visited our families for the holidays and had a blast. We were with Jake's family for Natalie's first Christmas and my family for Natalie's first birthday. This post has a ton of pictures since we were with family and there were so many occasions. I would apologize, but I know the pictures are what most of you are here for anyway, so enjoy. As usual, the stats are below followed by the tidbits and then the photos.
STATS
Height: 32.75" (99%)
Weight: 27 lbs. 11 oz. (99%)
Head: 18.25" (84%)
We had to buy Natalie a new car seat. Around Thanksgiving I realized that Natalie has been too tall for her infant car seat since before she turned nine months old. We had been so focused on the weight capacity of her infant car seat, and I hadn't even checked the height capacity. Oops!
Her signs have totally taken off! She is learning them like crazy now! She still knows eat, more, all done, cracker, milk, down, and sing from last month. Now she can also do cheese, peaches, drink, cat, dog, hat, book, and bird. We're working on water, monkey, airplane, horse, dance, please, and thank you.
She is saying Dada now! She has been making those sounds for a long time, but she actually says it in reference to Jake now. It is super cute when I go to get her in the morning, and she asks to see Dada. It's sad, though, when she calls out for him while he's at work. She usually calls for him from the bottom of the stairs or by the front door a couple of times a day while he's gone. :(
She is making more animal sounds too! She still says "Aa-aa-aa" for monkeys (and any animal she doesn't know the sound for), but now she also makes elephant noises when she sees one. She can growl like a lion or a bear but won't unless prompted. She has also tried to woof, meow, and hoot when prompted. So fun!
She has started knocking on doors. It's really funny because I never tried to teach that to her. She just saw it in a book one time and started doing it. It's crazy how fast she catches onto things when she's interested.
She is still in the stranger danger phase, which made our holiday stays with family interesting. She got very overwhelmed when we visited my sister-in-law's parents' for our nephew's blessing - there were a lot of adults she didn't know and kids running around. She wanted to participate, but then she would realize she didn't know anyone and start crying. Poor thing. I think she still had fun trying to play with the big kids.
She was slow to warm up to our families, but by the end of each stay, I think she was doing well. Everyone got lots of wet Natalie kisses! She finally made friends with our 2.5-year-old niece after bonding during some impromptu dance parties - they were about the cutest girlies ever! Our niece had been a little resistant to Natalie, but after a couple of days (and a couple of dancing sessions!), she shared a toy with Natalie. We all told her she did a good job sharing, and she said, "I shared with my friend." She called Natalie her friend! We were all so excited and proud!
She got some stairs training on vacation. She can go up pretty well, but she was trying to walk down, which doesn't work. Now she can go down a few steps on her hands and knees by herself. We are still working with her because she needs a lot of coaching to do it the right way. She gets impatient about it.
Her naps were terrible while we were away. She dropped her second nap before we left, but she would only sleep for 30-45 minutes most days and still wouldn't go to sleep for a second nap. She did pretty well at night, though. She woke up and cried for 10-15 minutes the first few nights, then slept fine the rest of the time.
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| Shoulder deep in the diaper bag, just hoping to find some buried treasure. |
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| Our little Natella: Her first experience with Nutella. Delicious! |
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| Natalie bent this metal door pull on our cabinet. I think I'm raising Superwoman. |
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| Dancing in her penguin hat. |
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| Aunt Allie and Uncle Steve brought this for Natalie from China before she was born, and it finally fits! So cute! |
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| This is how she likes to sit in cart seats. Silly |
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| Making rolls with Grandma and Grandpa Adams. |
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| All the little girlies on their daddy's shoulders! Yay for cousins! |
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| Natalie loved carrying these big stuffed bears around at the Adams', and she loved sitting in Grandpa's recliner. |
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| Cousin bonding time. These girls love cell phones. |
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| Christmas Eve |
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| Opening Christmas presents |
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| Opening birthday presents |
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| Meeting the stuffed cat Grandma Stewart made for her. |
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Uncle Jason playing piano with Natalie on the same piano he taught me on.
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| Playing with Grandma Stewart |
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| Natalie sitting with Grandpa Stewart to see pictures of dogs on his tablet. |
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| The birthday girl's first taste of frosting! Mmmm! |
One year down! Now onto the challenges of year two! I'm not going to do monthly photos anymore. I think I'm going to do them every three or six months for a while now. I'll still try to post about Natalie's progress and what she's up to periodically. Currently she's starting to try to talk a lot more, so I'm excited to post about that soon. Oh, and I have a few videos from December that I will try to post soon as well. Look for those in the next couple of weeks!
