So Anna is just amazing us everyday now. There is something new that she learns every single day. Half of it, I have no idea where it came from or how she knows it! Jeremy told her to "lie down and close your eyes Anna" and she laid down and put her hands over her eyes! Last week Jer asked her "what's a cat say" and she says "mooooow" so cute!
Of course that also means the time has come for us to be extra careful about everything we say and do, and that isn't going to let up for a loooong time. The luxury of having a baby who doesn't know what is going on is over. She sees everything and she hears everything. And all those things that you think there is no way she would understand? Well, she does somehow. Even if she doesn't, she will do whatever she can to be like mommy and daddy.
For anyone keeping score (OK, for my own personal record keeping), Anna knows the folowing words (at 16 1/2 months):
Mama
Dada
"moooo" (for cow)
Eye
Hat
Hot
Hi
Bye
Meow (cat)
Quack Quack (duck)
No
Fishy
Thank You
This
Shoe
I'll have to come back and edit when I think of more . Beyond that, she knows a ton of words, she can point to any body part that you ask of her as well as tons of things around the house. She is such a smarty pants. It is so amazing to see her grow and change. I know a lot of this knowledge is coming from her grandmothers which is great. And actually Jeremy works with her a lot always pointing out things and having her repeat it. As soon as she gets some more consonant sounds down, it will be full steam ahead and I know right around the corner she will be talking non-stop!
There is still a lot of grunting and pointing going on, and she has full conversations in her own language. Jeremy calls is Annaese Here is a little example!
Thursday, October 28, 2010
Sunday, October 3, 2010
Back in the swing of things
Well, where to begin? Not even sure where I left off. There are several reasons I have seemingly abandoned this blog over the past 6 months. The biggest is time of course, with a toddler (yes, she is a toddler now!) around, there is never much extra time.
The other is that I really have been avoiding publicly addressing several of the outstanding issues I have brought up in the past on this site, for a variety of reasons. However, this is my blog, my space to do what I want with and I really don't want to hide facts in case the wrong person happens to see this. If they do, they will know the truth and is that really so bad??? Of course, I am still a smart girl :) I will never reveal the whole truth until I know it is OK for everyone to see.
So, let's start with the easy ones! SLEEP, well, Anna is finally sleeping through the night on a regular basis! hooray! This started around her first birthday I would say, maybe a little after. I think that a lot of her issues really did stem from us, as I said before, but I wouldn't change anything we did. I just can't be mad about us loving her too much, you know? If she cries, she wants to be held by the only people she knows and trusts, how can you deny that?
The truth is, we did try the cry-it-out method and it just seemed too cruel. I actually was OK with it, I didn't break down and cry listening to her scream out or anything, but it just didn't work. At the end of the 2 weeks, when she was supposed to be a great sleeper, she wasn't.
Around this same time I happened across the Twitter profile of the parents of a little girl named Layla Grace Marsh. You may have heard of her, I know her parents profile on Twitter and Facebook had a significant following. Little Layla was 2 years old and in the final stages of succumbing to cancer when I caught up with her story. It still brings tears to my eyes just thinking about that time period, I would sit at my computer and just cry and cry reading their daily updates on her condition. Her parents were so honest and forthcoming about everything they were going through that it made childhood cancer real to me for the first time. Hell, it made any cancer real to me - I've been a huge activist for Breast Cancer awareness for a long time and nothing has ever affected me like Layla Grace did.
If you are interested, I strongly suggest reading that family's story on their site. It is extremely well written and easy to relate to. Unfortunately little Layla has passed on now and I can go back to not thinking about nasty things like babies dying for no good reason, but during that time, I welcomed any chance to cuddle and cradle my healthy little blessing - no matter what time of night, no matter how many times a night. No lack of sleep was going to let me forget how blessed we are that Anna's waking up every few hours is really the only problem we have had. at all. ever.
But eventually we did bring it up with her doctor, at her 1-year check up and she suggested that we don't cuddle her to sleep anymore, when it is bed time, she gets put in bed, that's it. We tried it, skeptical, thinking that she would just pop right back up and start wailing if we did that.....but she didn't. She was tired and she just rolled onto her side and went to sleep! She still wakes up maybe once or twice a night when she loses her binky (that is a whole other battle). And usually we can just pop it back in and everyone goes right back to sleep.
So things are good on the sleep front. As for feeding, well, I made it to 9 months breastfeeding and I just had to give in. I wasn't able to pump enough milk to make it worth the effort, I was mixing more than half of her bottles with formula, so we did 3 months of formula, not that big of a deal (except now it has all been recalled....too bad it was already consumed!!!). And we are onto cow's milk. We are giving Anna Organic milk...at least until she can drink low-fat milk and we are all on the same gallon, but at least for now, while I am buying her separate milk anyway, I am giving her a good hormone free start.
And finally, the work situation. Well, I still have to choose those words carefully....maybe more than ever. And that time factor is kicking in so I will leave that until the next round :) Hopefully less than 6 months from now!
The other is that I really have been avoiding publicly addressing several of the outstanding issues I have brought up in the past on this site, for a variety of reasons. However, this is my blog, my space to do what I want with and I really don't want to hide facts in case the wrong person happens to see this. If they do, they will know the truth and is that really so bad??? Of course, I am still a smart girl :) I will never reveal the whole truth until I know it is OK for everyone to see.
So, let's start with the easy ones! SLEEP, well, Anna is finally sleeping through the night on a regular basis! hooray! This started around her first birthday I would say, maybe a little after. I think that a lot of her issues really did stem from us, as I said before, but I wouldn't change anything we did. I just can't be mad about us loving her too much, you know? If she cries, she wants to be held by the only people she knows and trusts, how can you deny that?
The truth is, we did try the cry-it-out method and it just seemed too cruel. I actually was OK with it, I didn't break down and cry listening to her scream out or anything, but it just didn't work. At the end of the 2 weeks, when she was supposed to be a great sleeper, she wasn't.
Around this same time I happened across the Twitter profile of the parents of a little girl named Layla Grace Marsh. You may have heard of her, I know her parents profile on Twitter and Facebook had a significant following. Little Layla was 2 years old and in the final stages of succumbing to cancer when I caught up with her story. It still brings tears to my eyes just thinking about that time period, I would sit at my computer and just cry and cry reading their daily updates on her condition. Her parents were so honest and forthcoming about everything they were going through that it made childhood cancer real to me for the first time. Hell, it made any cancer real to me - I've been a huge activist for Breast Cancer awareness for a long time and nothing has ever affected me like Layla Grace did.
If you are interested, I strongly suggest reading that family's story on their site. It is extremely well written and easy to relate to. Unfortunately little Layla has passed on now and I can go back to not thinking about nasty things like babies dying for no good reason, but during that time, I welcomed any chance to cuddle and cradle my healthy little blessing - no matter what time of night, no matter how many times a night. No lack of sleep was going to let me forget how blessed we are that Anna's waking up every few hours is really the only problem we have had. at all. ever.
But eventually we did bring it up with her doctor, at her 1-year check up and she suggested that we don't cuddle her to sleep anymore, when it is bed time, she gets put in bed, that's it. We tried it, skeptical, thinking that she would just pop right back up and start wailing if we did that.....but she didn't. She was tired and she just rolled onto her side and went to sleep! She still wakes up maybe once or twice a night when she loses her binky (that is a whole other battle). And usually we can just pop it back in and everyone goes right back to sleep.
So things are good on the sleep front. As for feeding, well, I made it to 9 months breastfeeding and I just had to give in. I wasn't able to pump enough milk to make it worth the effort, I was mixing more than half of her bottles with formula, so we did 3 months of formula, not that big of a deal (except now it has all been recalled....too bad it was already consumed!!!). And we are onto cow's milk. We are giving Anna Organic milk...at least until she can drink low-fat milk and we are all on the same gallon, but at least for now, while I am buying her separate milk anyway, I am giving her a good hormone free start.
And finally, the work situation. Well, I still have to choose those words carefully....maybe more than ever. And that time factor is kicking in so I will leave that until the next round :) Hopefully less than 6 months from now!
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