Happy Birthday, Mikaela!

On Tuesday, November 2nd, Mikaela turned 1 year old. It has been quite a year!

- She drinks milk now. No more formula! We are almost done with bottles, too. She still gets one at the babysitter's for nap sometimes and we offer water in a bottle at bedtime. Otherwise it's sippy cups only.
- Pacifiers will be the next to go, but with the adjustment to no bottle, we haven't tackled that one yet. However, she's not really attached to them, they are just something to do at night in her crib. Hopefully we'll have that one broken over Thanksgiving break.
- She loves pull-toys and musical toys. She either walks around the island in the kitchen pulling/pushing toys or sitting with a toy that sings/plays music. She also likes to play the piano.
- She babbles quite a bit. The only words we recognize are Mama, Dada, and Hola (she hears Spanish all day with her babysitter). She signs milk, more, all done, please, and cookie (which actually just means crackers or puffs or something like that).
- She still only has 4 teeth, but it doesn't seem to slow her down when she eats. She really likes yogurt and green beans. So far, not a fan of fruit or potatoes.
- This past week sleep has been off. Not sure exactly why, but prior to this week sleep was great, going down about 7:20 and waking at 6:45-7 the next morning. Now she seems to wake once a night irate and we spend an hour getting her back to sleep. It's probably the transition off bottles that is causing this, but I sure miss the sleep!
- She's in her big girl car seat now, but it still faces backwards because she doesn't weigh enough.
- Stats:
Weight - 19.2 (20%)
Length - 29 3/4 (75%)
Head - 18.25 (80%)
The head circumference jumped from 25% to 80% but everything else was in her growth curve.

Today we had her birthday party. It was just the grandparents at our house for lunch, cake, and presents, but we had a lot of laughs and shared some great memories.
After Gran & Papa Bill arrived, Mikaela fell into her toy box and proceeded to get all of the bead necklaces and put them on. I guess she felt her princess jacket wasn't fancy enough for the party.
Here is the adult's cake that Donna made. It's very primitive, and not at all pretty, but it tasted good! Mikaela's cake was a giant cupcake that looked like the green M&M character (made by Kroger), but I forgot to snap a picture. My sister got one with her camera, so I'll get one eventually.
Sitting on the table like her mom and aunt used to do...
Opening presents: She really didn't understand this process so Mommy opened them all, but she enjoyed playing with everything once it was out.


She got an abacus from Aunt Amy, a purple homemade afghan and laughing baby from Gran & Papa Bill, a pull toy caterpiller and TVCC Cardinals shirt from Graempa & Graem-ma, and a V-Tech laptop and toy piano from Mom and Dad.



Cake time: It took her awhile to get into it. She was definitely more a fan of cake than icing but seemed to enjoy it anyway. We all enjoyed watching her eat it.
Getting sleepy...


Drinking tea from Papa Bill's glass: This is a Moreland tradition.