Overalls / Gingham Bow / Basket / Rug / Monthly Milestone Cards c/o
I actually cannot believe that the next time I write this monthly update, Amalia will be a year old. I also can’t even think about writing that next update because it makes me so emotional! She’s growing up so quickly, I feel sometimes as if the last 11 months have flashed before my eyes.
Just yesterday I was holding a seven pound infant with no idea what to do, and today I feel confident as a mother to my happy, spunky little toddler.
Milestones this month
Standing on her own- Over the weekend she started this one which felt like one of our biggest milestones yet! She’s now done it four times and my heart stops every single time without fail.
She’ll either pull herself up on something and let go, or we’ll be holding her up to practice walking and she’ll just let go. She stands on her own in almost a squat position, and then sink to the floor when she realizes the gravity of the situation LOL.
I realize this means walking is around the corner and I’m excited and terrified at the same time. Other parents love to tell us how life is about to get so much harder when she walks. I clearly have no idea what I’m in for!
Pointing to things- She points where she wants to go which is cute, but my favorite thing she does now is point to the light or a tree when I say the word. It’s so cool to see her understanding what words mean. It’s as if I can see her brain working things out sometimes… And it makes me so proud of her.
Moving from one piece of furniture to another- She’s been doing this for a few weeks now where she’ll let go of the ottoman and reach for the couch or something similar.
First haircut- Her hair was OOC, so I brought her to a local kids hair place to get a trim. I asked the woman to just trim the back and around her ears but before I could even see what was going on, she cut off a bunch of the top of her hair! It was sad because now her signature pony tail is a lot shorter, but I have to admit it looks much cleaner.
Amalia definitely cried for the whole haircut, but I’m pretty sure every baby does for their first time so I have faith in our future hair adventures.
New words- Go is a current favorite and she says car (sounds more like cah with a Boston accent!) whenever she sees a car drive by. She says mwahh when she blows kisses and, of course, book is a favorite even though it sounds more like butt.
Drinking from a straw- We gave Amalia this sippy cup for water because our doctor mentioned that drinking from a straw is an important for her development, and she loves it. She drinks a lot more water with this cup for whatever reason, and it taught her how to drink from a regular straw.
First case of pink eye– Not much to say about pink eye except that it’s gross but it’s also a really quick and easy cure.
Weaning off of formula
We’re on our fourth ear infection which means we have to see an ENT to talk about getting tubes if she gets one more in the next few months. I want to avoid surgery at all costs, even though I know it’s routine and she’ll be totally fine.
As a kid I was often sick and mucus-y and had stomach issues. Once we realized that it was dairy causing all of these problems for me and cut back, things cleared up for me in a big way. Amalia is still on cow’s milk dairy formula, which I think might be making our ear infection situation worse.
When I brought her in for yet another ear check last week, I talked to her doctor about this at length, and she said it was ok to start weaning her now even though she isn’t quite a year yet. Anel and I went back and forth on what to replace her formula with because we want to avoid cow’s milk if possible. We considered everything from homemade almond milk to oat milk to coconut milk.
After talking to her pediatrician (who’s amazingly progressive), friends with similar issues, and some experts that we really trust, we settled on goat’s milk. It causes less phlegm issues than traditional dairy, and often people who can’t digest cow’s milk have no problem with goat (myself included).
I bought her this powdered organic goat’s milk that has added vitamin d and folic acid (two important nutrients that baby’s get from cow’s milk) and started slowly adding it to her bottles this week along with probiotic drops.
She went absolutely nuts for it, so I upped the proportions to 50/50 already and it’s only been a few days! I’ve never seen her drink her bottles quicker, she’s obsessed. I’ll, of course, report back on the mucus/ear infection situation.
Bottles vs Sippy Cups
I didn’t realize there was such a debate about when to move from bottles to sippy cups until I started asking about it in my mom’s Facebook group! Sheesh, the learning curve on a daily basis as a mom is insanity. Right now we’re still using bottles, but our plan is that when she’s fully on the goat’s milk (within 2-3 weeks), we’ll switch her two day bottles to a sippy cup and continue giving her the bottle in the morning and right before bed.
The next step after that will be to switch out the morning bottle, but I’ll probably wait another month or so before doing that. A lot of people are all about cold turkey but I am nervous to change too many things in her routine at once so I’m hoping this technique works for us.
I’d love to know how you guys made the switch and what sippy cups are your favorites! And file that under sentences I never thought I’d write a year ago 🙂
HER SCHEDULE
6:45-7:00am- Wake up
7:15am- Bottle 1- 5oz of formula/goat milk mix (plus probiotics)
7:30am- Breakfast. Here are some of her favorite breakfasts.
8:30am- Off to day care (on weekdays)
11:00am- Bottle 2- 5oz of formula/goat milk mix
11:15am- Nap
12:45pm- Wake up
1:00pm- Lunch- I’m working on a post about what I pack for her school lunches!
3:00pm- Bottle 3- 5oz of formula/goat milk mix
3:15pm- Sometimes a snack if she’s still hungry.
4:30pm- Day care pick up (on weekdays)
5:30pm- Dinner
6:00pm- Bath/massage
6:20pm- Bottle 4- 9oz of formula/goat milk mix, then right to bed
6:40- Asleep
HER DISPOSITION
She’s wild as always and never ever sits still per usual. Most of the time she’s happy and loud and chatty and adorable but when she’s frustrated she definitely lets us know. Her favorite thing to get angry about is if I give her something to eat that she’s not in the mood for. She will yell and throw it on the ground.
Boots loves this, of course, but I’m trying to put the kabosh on this type of behavior from an early age. It’s not going well, haha. One trick that seems to work is if she’s about to throw food, I’ll say, “It looks like you’re all done with that” and take it from her hand. One of her daycare teachers taught me that trick so I’m hoping it works!
While she’s all over the place, she can also sit and be calm if she’s really into something, like her beloved books. She now loves to grab her book du jour, climb up on my lap and hand it to me, which is her way of asking me to read it to her. It’s super sweet… until she does it 14 times (no exaggeration) in a row with the same book. I could read Jamberry in my sleep at this point!
Her favorite foods
Breakfast- We have a lot of great ideas for the most important meal of the day.
Pesto- I could put pesto on garbage and Amalia would eat it up. For the record, I promise not to feed my child garbage, but you get my point. I make my homemade vegan basil pesto or buy one with parmesan from the farmer’s market. Whole Foods also sells a few great options that she loves.
Fish- Whenever we bake or grill fish (cod, salmon, sole, etc) she goes crazy for it. When I put pesto on it, she really loses her mind. Hands down fish with pesto is her favorite meal. Sometimes I bread it and bake it first, but she doesn’t seem to care about whether it’s breaded or not.
Meatballs– She likes my turkey meatballs (she’s not a fan of beef so much) with tomato sauce. I cut them up into pieces for her and she can pound 2-3 of them for dinner these days.
Blueberries- I really thought that her blueberry kick would be a phase like everything else but it’s now lasted about four months so I’m pretty sure they’re her food version of a soul mate. She’s also into the delicious sweet strawberries that I get at the farmer’s market, but not any other strawberries, naturally.
Spinach Littles- Dr. Praeger’s Spinach Littles are such a clutch snack option because they’re packed with greens and actually taste amazing. I usually heat up one or two extras for myself. She’s also majorly into their California Veggie Burgers.
Eggs- She likes scrambled eggs with spinach and cheese for breakfast, but sometimes I give them to her for dinner if it’s a really long day or we’re pressed for time.
Bread- I mean who doesn’t like bread? When we take her to a restaurant, she goes ham on the bread basket every time. This one place we go to serves it with hummus and that really gets her excited.
HER FAVORITE THINGS
The beach- We took her to the beach a few weeks ago with some friends and she walked right into the water (with Anel’s help) and promptly sat down and started splashing around. The last two times we’ve brought her to the ocean she was not a fan, so this got me super excited since the beach is my favorite place in the world.
Books- You already know about her love for books, but it just keeps growing and growing! As I mentioned above, she likes to read the same books over and over again and never seems to tire of them.
Walking with her walker- She loves going up and down (and up and down and up and down) the hall in our house with her walker. She gets so proud of herself and often stops to clap and laugh. It’s adorable and makes my day every time.
Her first birthday party
When I asked what you guys wanted me to include in this post, I got a huge amount of requests for details on planning her first birthday party. We’re going to host a BBQ for some friends and family in our backyard. I’m not making a huge to-do of it and I want it to be fun and easy for us and our guests.
Because we don’t get a lot of shade in our yard, we’re planning to rent a pitched tent type of situation with some tables and chairs. We’re going to have a local Mexican restaurant cater it and get a cute cake she can smash for the obligatory baby smashing first birthday cake photo. I’m telling everyone not to bring gifts, and instead will be encouraging them to donate to the ACLU in Amalia’s name.
So far, that’s all I have planned! I will be sharing photos of the party once it happens though, not to worry. Knowing me, I’ll get carried away last minute… We’ll see!
WORST MOMENT
Finding out that she had another ear infection was tough. It is hard to see her in pain but also felt frustrating because it took us one step closer to getting tubes which we’ve been praying to skip. That being said, it was also a kick in the pants to start weaning her off of cow’s milk so I’m hoping this last one was a blessing in disguise.
Luckily, with ear infections, they usually clear up within two days of starting antibiotics so that’s a plus.
BEST MOMENTS
When she brings me a book and crawls into my lap and snuggles in for me to read, my heart feels like it might burst right out of my chest. She lays her little head on my chest and sometimes holds my hand, and I tear up half the time because it’s so sweet.
Read her one month, two month, three month, four month, five month, six month, seven month, eight month, and nine month, and 10 month posts.
