Hollon Elizabeth - 10 Months

10 Months Old Recap:

Likes: Fisher Price farm, Leap Frog phone, water bottles, pulling up on anything, pushing anything around other than an actual push toy, snuggles, sticking her finger up her nose or your nose, when you jump out from behind something & scare her, drinking water out of your cup, the stool in the kitchen. And she still loves to be held & loves attention.

Dislikes: Not being picked up immediately once she wakes up

Milestones: Pulls up on things, but will not stand up on her own. She'll push her highchair all over our floor, but will not push one of her walking toys. No steps on her own yet.You can ask her to point to her nose, ear, mouth, eyes or toes. She is right about 50% of the time. She made her first animal sound. When you ask her what the cow says, she says "ooooooooo" (she leaves off the "m"). Of course the only time she does it is when you don't prompt her to.

Sleep: FINALLY! We are sleeping through the night. We are not having a 'sleeping through the night' party yet, but we will have a small toast. I don't know if it was turning 9 months, or those 4 top teeth coming in or the 2 week break from our normal schedule. But once we got back from traveling (2 weeks after she turned 9 months), she finally started sleeping through the night. (More info about our struggles later.) She goes to bed around 8:00 and usually sleeps until 6:00 or 7:00. I'm still trying to push her bedtime up some, but for now, it is what it is. She takes 2 naps during the day. One at 9:00 and one around 1:00 or 2:00. She usually sleeps around 1.5-2 hours during her naps. She sleeps with her mam pacifier. She has a few luvees and stuffed animals that she sleeps with, but there isn't one that she is attached to yet. She almost always cries whenever you lay her down, but she usually stops after a minute or two. She is a very light sleeper. So once she goes to sleep, no one can get ice from the ice machine, use the restroom upstairs or breathe within 5 feet of her room. 

Eat: She is still getting her milk from me, 95% of the time. Since I work from home, it is just easy, cheap & convenient. So we go with it. She has her milk at 7:00 in the morning. She usually eats yogurt or baby cereal with fruit for breakfast (around 8:00). She usually has her 2nd thing of milk around 11:00 and lunch at noon. She has more milk when she wakes up from her afternoon nap and then eats supper around 6:00. Her last milk feeding is right before bed. Sometimes there is an extra feeding of milk thrown in, depending on her nap schedule and our schedule that day. I do the same as I did with Jake, we have a "flexible" schedule. I make her baby food most of the time. Usually one Sunday, I'll make a ton of food & freeze it for her. That will last us about a month. She'll eat that if we are at home and she eats the baby food packets if we are out. She likes both and doesn't seem to favor one over the other. I'm having a hard time moving her to table food. I am paranoid about choking. If she eats table food, I break it up so tiny, it is basically just a bunch of crumbs on her tray. I break it up so tiny, she can't get her fingers to pinch it to get it to her mouth. I am definitely the problem and I'm working on it. She does love puffs, yogurt melts & crunchies. When she first started eating, I was worried because she only liked fruits. But she has come around and will pretty much eat anything. I've made pretty much every puree from the cookbooks Cooking for Baby and Weelicious. Her favorite is still fruit though. She loves water. She'll drink it out of a sippy cup, but she really loves it out of a regular cup. (Have I mentioned that she can be high maintenance?) She evidently thinks legos are tasty, because I've had to dig them out of her mouth 3 different times.   

Appearance: That hair. It gets comments wherever we go. I thought as it got longer, it would lay down. But it hasn't. It just sticks up higher. The only time it will lay flat, is if it is wet. And even then, it is trying to stick up. The front is getting longer and almost getting in her eyes. So I usually try to keep that pulled to the side. Her hair color is still light brown, but if it is freshly washed and sunlight hits it, it is blonde. She has 8 teeth now (2 more came in on bottom). So she has her 4 top middle & 4 bottom middle.

Size: 6-12 months in clothing. She can wear 12 month clothing in some things. But the little dress above was a 12 months and was a little too big. (We were getting ready to go run errands and the dress is a wrap type dress. Once I got it on her, I realized it was a little too big, but I was too lazy to change her.) Size 3 diapers.

Talking: Since last month, she has added the words toes, bye, and hi. I still don't think she knows exactly what words mean. But she knows she gets attention when she says them, so she'll do it. Of course she never does it on command, because that would make it seem like we were not lairs. 

Movement: She used to wave by just throwing her arm up & down, but now she'll open & close her fist. But she does it to her face, so it's like she is waving to herself. She loves peek-a-boo and loves to hide things behind her head. She crawls all over the place. Her favorite place to crawl to is Jake's room or a bathroom. She is not sure about stairs and doesn't seem to be a climber. She'll walk around pushing a chair or stool but will not walk using a push toy or holding your hand. I like to pretend she can give kisses. I really think she is trying to bite my face, but I pretend it is kisses.