Month 10

It's the end of 2011 and my baby is already 11 months old!  It's been a whirlwind of a year, I can't believe how fast it flew by!  Little Miss Kya is a ball full of energy!  She is crawling like a pro now, especially when she's going after Fudge.  She pulls up on e.v.e.r.y.t.h.i.n.g.....which is fun :-/.  Yesterday she fell while pulling up on the coffee table and cut the corner of her eye, poor baby!  The coffee table will be making its exit from the family room tomorrow when daddy is home.  I think we're going to have to move around a lot of things tomorrow.  Kya loves to push the buttons on her daddy's surround sound, oops! 
She's become quite the little parrot.  She says "uh oh" which is pretty darn cute.  Last weekend her Great Aunt Tammy taught her to say "go, go, go."  Unfortunately she's also learned to repeat "no, no" back at me when I say it to her.  Too bad she doesn't understand what it means yet!  She also says, "nana" and knows where the bananas are in the kitchen.  My smart girl knows the sign for more and will do it when she wants some more food or milk. 
Kya is very inquisitive.  She studies her environment, especially when there are a lot of new people around.  If you try to teach her a new word she'll watch you and usually she'll at least try to repeat what you're saying.
This week I started the process of weaning her.  It's very bittersweet.  I am really proud that I've been able to nurse her for so long.  I never thought we'd make it this far!  Breastfeeding has really been a blessing for my family.  It's been a really special time for Kya and me and it has saved us so much money.  I am so grateful that I have been able to do it.  But it's time for us to be done.  Kya has been doing great drinking out of bottles and sippy cups lately so I know she won't have a problem with that.  So far she really doesn't like the taste of cow's milk.  Yesterday she actually drank some of it when I gave it to her with her dinner.  We'll get there, it may just take a while.
Christmas was really fun this year.  Kya was much more interested in the gifts under the tree than the tree itsself.  When we opened presents she of course loved the bows and boxes more than the toys she got!  She especially liked the potato masher I got.  We had two weekends worth of Christmas with all of her grandparents and many of her great grandparents as well.  What a blessing it was to have Kya in our family for Christmas this year :-)

Month 9

Talk about a crazy month. I think Kya changed the most during her 9th month than any month yet. My little bundle of energy weighed in at 17 lbs 8 oz at her well visit. She was at the 25th percentile across the board for height, weight, and head circumference.  She's not nearly as chunky now that she's finally gotten a little longer.  My baby girl has a full head of hair now too!

Kya is becoming a big girl before my eyes and its freaking me out! We have a rainforest toy (given to us by our good friends the Peteries) that she loves to pull herself to standing on. A few days ago she even walked back and forth on it too!  9 months also marked the start of crawling. At first she did an army crawl, just using her arms and pulling herself. Then she started using her legs a little bit in a modified army crawl. Occasionally now she'll crawl on all fours, but typically she just does her funny little army crawl. She loves to wave and sometimes even says “hi da” or “hi dada” to Scottie. She loves to talk about her daddy.

We spent over a week away from home celebrating my dad's 50th birthday and thanksgiving. While we were away, Kya started clapping and talking more. We call her Aunt Kylie “Aunt “KooKoo.” Kya has started saying “caca,” which we think is her trying to say “kookoo.” We all think hilarious, but Kylie doesn't particularly like being called poop so we'll continue saying “kookoo” in hopes that eventually the'll stop calling her “caca.”

8 months flew by!

Well she's growing fast!  During the 8th month Kya has become much more talkative. She said dada first, ugh. It was very cute though. Mama followed a few weeks later although she usually only says it when she's hungry.  My big girl is eating all kinds of finger foods; bananas, chicken, cheese, eggs, and her favorite puffs.  She loves to roll, scoot, and turn. Still no crawling yet, though.  She loves yo stand up and is trying to pull up on things.  The cutest thing she does as of late is play peekaboo.  She pulls her taggy blankets up over her face and waits for us to say “where's Kya?” then the pulls it down and laughs when we say “peek!”  I can't believe that my baby girl will be 9 months soon! She's getting so big :'(

7 months

Wow, I can't believe she's over half a year old.  Kya turned 7 months last Sunday (the same day as her Aunt's 22nd).  Things are certainly changing!  My big girl can sit up by herself.  She rolls around like a maniac and has even started sleeping on her stomach.  Of course now that she can roll in her crib she winds up with her legs caught and wakes herself up more frequently.  Unfortunately getting bigger has also come with sleeping less at night.  I'm not really sure if she's teething (haven't seen any teeth or swollen gums yet) or if she's just more active or something but she wakes up several times a night now.  My fantastic husband has been helping me get her back to sleep sometimes, which is great.  He seems to be better at getting her back to sleep than I am.  Usually with me she wants to nurse even if it's just for comfort.  She loves to be outside, especially now that she's big enough to sit up in her stroller.  We try to go on an evening walk a few times a week.  Kya sits up in the seat and Fudge rides in the basket below.  What a diva dog!  My 7 month old has also started jabbering "babas" and "lalas."  We still haven't heard a "mama" or "dada" yet so the competition is still on ;-).  I need to take some 7 month pictures but unfortunately my camera isn't working so well.  Hopefully I can get it fixed soon and document my baby girl at 7 months!

6 months

14.8 lb, 24.75" long, 16" head cir.

New things

Kya is growing so fast!  I can hardly keep up with her.  It seems like she's doing something new every day!  Lately she's been obsessed with sucking on her toes.  It's kind of gross but absolutely adorable at the same time.  She especially loves to do this while I'm changing her diaper.  Another great thing she does is put her arms around my neck when I carry her.  I love it!  Sometimes she pinches but I love her little baby snuggles.  She's becoming very good at grabbing for things too.  She's fascinated by cups and bottles and always reaches out for them when I'm taking a drink.  She LOVES to reach for my phone, oh geez!

I attempted to have her sleep unswaddled last night.  It didn't go so well.  She slept for about and hour and then was wide awake and wouldn't go back to sleep so I had to swaddle her.  Oh well.  I guess it's fine since it helps her to sleep so well and I know it's not stunting her growth because she uses her arms and hands so well.

Today I let her suck on one of the mesh feeder for the first time.  I stripped her down, plopped her in the highchair and gave it to her with some frozen peaches inside.  She really liked it!  She sat there quietly sucking on it for about 20 minutes.  Looks like mommy found a new way to keep baby entertained for a while!

I need to update more often!

     Blogging is such a great way to record small events that happen that I know I won't remember later.  I need to be more diligent in writing so that I can reread things later and remember.
     Kya Mae will be 6 months old next Thursday :-( .  She's growing up too fast!  The last time I posted she was just 2 months old.  I'm going to try and record things I remember in that time span.  Let's see...at 3 months old she started rolling over from her tummy to her back.  But, she has pretty much always hated being on her tummy.  After a while she stopped rolling and just buried her face and screamed.  At 4 months she really started packing on the chubs.  She went up from the 10% in weight to the 10-25%.  I have a feeling that she'll be up a little bit more at her 6 month appointment.  Everyone comments on her adorable rolls.  I moved her to her own room at 4.5 months.  It was a sad/scary experience.  The first night I didn't sleep at all....who knows how many times I got up to check on her.  The second night I was so exhausted that I slept the whole night.  Of course when I woke up and realized how long she'd been quiet I freaked out.  She was fine :-) . 
     She's such a fun baby.  As long as she's fed and rested she's pretty happy most of the time.  She laughs and coos and screams.  Recently she's been able to sit by herself a little bit.  She has also discovered the dog.  She LOVES to watch her.  I've found that if I put Kya on her belly and then call Fudge over to lay in front of her she will actually stay on her belly for a while.  Yesterday she started pushing her chest up really high and then burying her face while pulling her knees up under herself.  The crawling foundations are there!  Now she just needs to figure out how to coordinated them.  I'm not ready for her to crawl yet though...she's growing up too fast.
    We started solids at 5 months.  I was trying to put it off as long as possible but I got desperate for ideas on how to get her to sleep longer at night.  Of course the food made no difference, but oh well.  We started with rice cereal and now we're on sweet potatoes.  I was going to give her avacado yesterday but my avacados weren't ripe enough yet.  I'm attempting to make her baby food.  I decided to do this because I have the time, fresh food is better for her, and because it will save us a lot of money.  Now that I'm not working I feel like I need to contribute somehow.  I feel like breastfeeding and making baby food are two ways that I can save us a lot of money.  Nursing is still going really well.  I'm proud of how long I've been able to nurse and I'm glad that we'll still be able to do it for a while.  So far she doesn't have any teeth so we haven't had any problems yet.  Hopefully she won't be a biter and I can continue nursing until she's a year old.
     Being a mom is awesome.  It's something I've always wanted to do and it is so rewarding.  I LOVE that I get to stay home with Kya.  I try to savor all of the moments I get to experience with her and not take our time together for granted.  I know a lot of moms wish they could stay home with their kiddos.  I am so grateful that I have such a wonderful husband that works hard so that I can stay home with our baby girl.  There is nothing better in the world than walking into the nursery and seeing her smiling face in the mornings.  Kya is always happy when she wakes up.  She's the best!