11 Months

That's how old Sophia turned yesterday. And since I love to keep track of her developments and changes, here's another up-date:

- Sophia has started talking. She uses the sign for 'more', 'all-done' and 'eat' and understands 'milk' but never signs it. She says 'baby', 'bye-bye', 'Hase', 'Papa', and 'Mama'.
- Sophia sings and dances. It's so cute. When I put on music she starts wiggling her little body, or rock back and forth if she's in a crawling position. When we play the piano and I sing, she sings along with an 'aaahhh' sound. Last night she sung in the car like that.
- Sophia, when I'm not stressing over how much she eats or what she ends up not liking, is actually a curious eater. She will try most food, and even try it several times. Unfortunately she spits out a lot of what she puts into her mouth. However, she still seems to love tomatoes, broccoli, yogurt, nectarines, and onions. She's also become really efficient in feeding herself. The other day I gave her slices of banana. She couldn't get a bite off of the slice when she tried, and the slice was too big to put in as one. So, she put down the slice, poked it in the middle with her finger until it spread apart into 3 pieces. Then she ate the slice piece by piece. I was really impressed with her resourcefulness. She also managed to spread apart a rice dinner I made, searching and eating all the tiny (barely noticable) onion pieces in there.
- Sophia has 4 teeth now - two on top and two on the bottom.
- Sophia loves to walk if we hold both of her hands. She will pull herself up a lot and move around holding on to things, but she still gets really scared if you let go of her hands, and she hasn't really tried to stand or walk yet, except when she's in the bath tub.
- Sophia is supersocial. She really is. She is happy at home, but when other people come visit or we go somewhere, she's a whole new person. She just loves it!!! It seems to me like she can't get enough of seeing other people and especially other kids. She starts babbling and laughing and smiling and just gets soooo excited. Time for siblings??? Dunno...
- Sophia really loves animals. She gets all excited when she sees a dog or cat, or our bunny. She's gotten a lot better at patting our bunny softly. Yesterday she was patting her in a pretty gentle way, but eventually Killer kind of pawed her at the end, pushing her away. Sophia gave her one more pat, pulled out her arm and actually tried to close the cage. Smart girl.
- Sophia loves the water. She has for a long time, and she still does. I love to see how excited she always gets for her bath times, and how she plays in her little tub.
- Sophia doesn't like to be stopped in her tracks - therefore when she gets her diaper changes, dressed, or put in a high chair or car seat or down for a nap, she's not happy and will scream and kick.
- Sophia has gotten more cuddly again. She gives hugs, and hugs especially tightly when she realizes we're about to put her in her crib. It usually works and we'll sing her one more song, or say an extra long prayer.
- Sophia loves her daddy, and sometimes she'll wake up in the morning and say papa, wondering where he is. She gets superexcited when Henry comes home and wants him to hold her immediately.
- Sophia is more of a night owl, meaning the later the hour the more giggly she often gets. Also, fortunately she's not a morning baby waking up at some crazy early hour. She usually sleeps till 8am or later. Thank goodness...also, she now routinely sleeps 11.5 hours, going to bed by 8.30pm and wakes up once around 5pm or later for a feeding. We working on getting rid of that night feeding or pushing it forward more. We'll see. We're also working on getting her into bed earlier than 8.30pm.
- Sophia likes to try and feed herself with a spoon. She's done so successfully (though not correctly) a few times already.
- Sophia also likes to cuddle in bed and speak in a whisper voice in the mornings
- Sophia doesn't respect my privacy when I'm on the toilet. She also likes to play IN the toilet if we didn't make sure to put down the lid...
- Sophia hasn't had any illnesses since her ear infection a few months ago. So nice...
Really, we just love Sophia to pieces. She's so cute and happy and all in all truly uncomplicated that it's outrageous that I even get frustrated at all. I don't think we could have had a much less complicated baby than she is. Who else can go to an amusement park with their baby for 11 hours, and not even have a single problem all day - no crying, no fussing, no needing to be held or played with all day - just one contend, happy baby...no really, she's a real blessing and we're so lucky to have her with us! We love you Sophia!!!