11 Months

Adilyn, Sweet baby with those melt-my-heart eyes. You are growing and changing so fast. I just can't keep up! You are so full of energy, joy, and smiles. A generally happy baby. As your mobility increases, your desire to be on the go has also increased. You are a speedy crawler. You want to explore everything. You check everything out. Things are still going in the mouth but it is not always your immediate reaction.

You love outside and water. You know how to pat-a-cake, give kisses, clap, wave bye-bye, and blow raspberries. Your language skills blow me away. You understand more than we give you credit for. I've inconsistently attempted some sign language. With some encouragement, you will approximate signs for 'more' and 'water.'

You say 'a-oh' (your favorite word by far!), 'daddy' (your second favorite word), 'baby' (which usually sounds more like 'daddy'), 'bye-bye' (also sounds like 'daddy'), and 'momma' (usually when you are tired or with lots of prompts). You imitate or approximate so much of what we say like 'cheese, fish, woof (dog noise), and shoe.'

You have decided that mushed up baby food is just not as good as real grown up food. You have refused to eat anymore baby food and besides your three bottles a day, you are pretty much on all table food. You will eat anything we are eating that we try to give you. Your favorites are YoBaby yogurt, cheese, grapes, green beans (until today when you spit them out?!), pasta pick-ups, gold fish, and mashed potatoes. Once I think I've found a favorite food, (like the green beans) then you decide that you will not eat it. I think you like to change it up. You seem to get bored with the same ol' things. We gotta keep experimenting.

You love to be pushed or pulled in something. PaPa and Granna have a wagon that you LOVE. You would ride in that wagon all day long. You try to ride on Branson's mow mow (shhh, he doesn't know it) and love 'helping' momma transport the dirty clothes to the washing machine by riding in the basket. You just hold on and bob your head as if you were saying, 'go, go, faster, faster.'

You are still sleeping very well. You take 2 naps a day around 10:00 am and 3:00 pm. Each nap lasts an hour and a half or more. You put yourself to sleep, usually very easily with your duck or flower. You sleep from 7:30 pm to 6:30 am every night.

I keep expecting you to take off and walk any day now. You will stand up in the middle of the room. Just experimenting with that balance. You cruise around the living room with one hand on anything you can touch. You will walk across a room while holding our hands or hand. You crack us up when you 'gorilla crawl'. I guess if the floor is too cold on your knees, you get up on your hands and feet with your little bottom straight up in the air. So funny!

You are absolutely a ray of sunshine. I love love love the stage you are in right now. But you are changing and growing so fast, I know tomorrow will be a new and wonderful stage that I will also absolutely love. What a blessing you are to us. You make life so much fun, joyful and miraculous. You are so loved and adored, sweet girl.

Love,

Momma