EdelWeiss: "Happy Girl" {12 Months}

Carly had her 1 year check up this afternoon, which means I can finally post her 12-month blog. I suppose a week late isn't so bad. We had a good appointment and she handled those nasty shots like a champ, once again. It helps a lot that they let her sit on my lap while they stick her. The kid has a high pain tolerance, that's for sure!

Carly is a pretty happy little girl, a joy to be around and the love of our lives. It's hard to believe she is 1 year old, although we feel like she's been in our life for a long time. It's hard to even remember our Florida life without her around. So without further adieu, here's what she's up to this month...I'll break it down into 3 categories:

Play

Her absolute favorite parts of life are being outside and in water. We try to do these things as much as possible, which translates into most days going for a run and taking a bath. Most weekends we now try to hit one of the water parks and spend nearly the entire day under the sun (she has a very nice skin color as a result, I might add).
She has explored ever crevasse, nook and cranny of our home, and her favorite spots are in the bathroom, the kitchen cabinets and standing on her changing table or rocking in her chair.
She loves anything that has a button to press, lights up, plays music or can be dumped all over the floor
She continues to place everything in her mouth, and has shown a special interest in eating my hair
She has decided that the word "no" is funny and will do whatever action she is doing over and over again upon hearing that word
Diaper changes have become increasingly more difficult as she likes to feel the product inside
She enjoys opposites: in/out, up/down, on/off, open/close, etc.
She has resorted to screaming when she needs our attention or doesn't like something and we are working DILIGENTLY to help her use her words and actions by giving her more to use.
Is one of thee most verbal babies I have ever met. She has her own language and generally forms words using, "di-doo," "doo-di," "doo-doo," "wi-geet" and "joo-gi."
She refers to herself as, "Gigi," and regularly says, mama, dada, JJ, hi (she says this an average of 200 times per day and it is her go-to word for everything), & bye.
The telephone is her favorite toy and loves to chat, pretend or for real
She's a climber and has creatively made a few impressive obstacle courses
She's standing on her own for minutes at a time but prefers cruising and crawling...although she did walk ACROSS the waiting room at the doctors office today. So much for a first step...make that first steps. ;)
No teeth but those bottom two are a comin'
LOVES animals, just loves them....whether in real life or in a book
Books only hold her attention if they have actions, animal noises or flaps to open and close...she has a few books memorized and can answer the questions or complete the sentence to a few of them. Her absolute favorite book is "Moo, Baa, La La La" followed by "Wheels on the Bus"

Eat

Carly is a food enthusiast, always asking to eat and seeking out whomever has food or drink nearby.
She is not a picky eater in the least bit, but most enjoys sweet potatoes, iced animal cookies and anything chocolate
She tends to have a "fruit of the week" that she asks for daily and then will all of a sudden refuse to eat it. Her "fruits of the week" have gone from bananas to grapes, to blueberries and currently we're on oranges.
She doesn't like strawberries...so far the only food she will continually reject. We've been trying to give them to her since she was 8 months old but each time have had no success.
We introduced milk this week and she spits it out if offered in a sippy cold while cold, but will drink it if it's heated and in a bottle.
Loves water and chugs her sippy cup multiple times per day. Also enjoys spitting it on people.
Smacks her lips when she's hungry
Asks to nurse once/day. We've tried to wean this feeding but so far we haven't convinced her to stop.
Loves to eat ice and throws a tantrum when told no.
Her record for most food in one sitting was 3 eggs, cheese, crackers and mama milk
Goes about crazy when she sees iced animal cookies and knows exactly where they are in the pantry.

Sleep

Overall enjoys sleeping and goes down without a fuss. She generally plays for a few minutes before falling asleep and sometimes will play for 10 minutes when she wakes up from a good nap.
When asked if she wants to take a nap will sometimes point to her room or crawl in there, with us close behind.
Is OBSESSED with her paci, and will hunt for one at random times during the day. She knows we keep one in her car seat and one in her crib, so she frequents those locations when searching. I have been against the paci from day one for this very reason, but here we are and both Brian and I have come to the conclusion that if it makes her happy and serves as her sleep aide that we have no problem letting her continue use. We are, however, starting to put our foot down that the paci is only for car rides and sleep time.
Is a paci thief and will take the paci out of any babies mouth during a play date
Is also a paci giver...on multiple occasions I've been laying on the floor playing and closed my eyes for a few seconds and sure enough, a paci will be inserted into my mouth. How sweet!
Monkey has become a close friend and confidant, and she frequently wakes up from naps telling him/her (I think I want monkey to be a girl...) all about lots of things.
When I enter her room to get her up, she quickly leans down to grab monkey, followed by finding paci and refuses to leave the crib unless she is accompanied by both. We then stand over the crib until she has thrown both back in (which she thinks is a fun game). We want both to be associated with sleeping, but will probably let her start playing with monkey outside her crib in the near future
Started sleeping through the night 5 days before her first birthday and does so 5 out of 7 days per week. WOOHOOOO!!! I think a year of middle-of-the-night feedings is plenty!

Carly about broke the scale this afternoon, weighing in at 19 pounds 12 ounces (before nursing, and 20 pounds on the dot after nursing) and tipped the top of the charts at 30.5 inches. She's grown exactly 10 inches and 12 pounds this year and ranks in the 27th percentile for weight and 88th for height. That's a jump in both measurements, but a huge jump in height! The doctor said their percentiles at the one year mark are a good representation of what they will be all throughout childhood, verses the marks she has received at her check ups throughout the year. We also found out at the office today that our doctor suddenly quit two weeks ago due to a family emergency. But he didn't take a leave...just quit. I thought it was very strange, but pray that everything is okay! The doctor covering all of his patients is the only other doctor on staff in the office, who has gone from part time to full time until they find a replacement. She's a mother of three and wants to return to part time as soon as possible. I think we might switch offices when we move, so I suppose it's good timing. The doctor we saw was incredibly sweet and was very impressed that Carly has a vocabulary of 10 words! She also thought she was one of the prettiest little baby girls she had ever seen. :) And...we gave her peanut butter in the office, just in case of a reaction...but we are in the clear! Last thing to try is honey...which she can now have at any time. Oh, and fish...but I don't know when she will have an opportunity to eat that.

Her schedule is still pretty consistent with what she's been doing the past two months, but now she is finally taking naps that are over an hour on a regular basis. I feel like I have so much time! I finally know how my friends were getting so many crafty things done!

7:00am-up, nurse
8:00am-breakfast
10 or 10:30-nap (one nap is generally an hour and a half, the other 45 minutes but isn't consistent on which nap is the long one and which is the short)
12:30pm-lunch
2:00pm-nurse
3:30ish-nap
6:00pm-dinner
7:45pm-get ready for bed with lights out hopefully by 8:15pm)

We've found that if she is sleeping before 8:30pm that she will sleep until after 7am, but if she goes to bed after 8:30pm than she wakes before 7am. Warning to our families...we will be very strict about her bedtime in Iowa, so plan on it! :)

Lastly, here are her 1 year photos in her sweet lady bug dress. It took me 42 snaps but I think I ended up with some decent photos. I'll do a big photo shoot with her outdoors very soon. I also learned that she needs a bright colored bow, because after the edits her black bow makes her hair too dark.