Alexis is a Year Young!

Baby girl turned a year old last week. Still can hardly believe it. I spent that day and those leading up to it remembering what was happening at the same time last year. How awful I felt, how nervous I was. Then on the 18th, after our normal trip for a Stress Test, we were sent to the hospital to "have a baby"! Such a crazy, exciting, stressful,amazing and life changing time! By 11:18 that night we were holding our little girl.

It has been an awesome and challenging year. It's a year that started out rough when she wouldn't sleep and cried more then not (and so did I!). But once her little system worked itself out, it has been so much fun! She is truly a delight. A joy to our family and others around her. She smiles willingly. Giggles. Makes funny noises and faces. She's determined yet so super sweet. We all adore her!

At a year she is:

*Still wearing size 3 diapers, all of her 6-9 month clothes and most of her 9-12 month ones. Still in size 3 shoes but almost ready for size 4.

*She is WALKING EVERYWHERE! Pretty much right after the 11 month post she stopped crawling and started completely walking. She loves to walk! All day long she will walk back and fourth...so cute to watch her!

*In addition to walking she has also learned how to climb this month. She crawled up onto Jacob's little toddler bed and thought that was the best thing ever. So she decided to try something even better...the stairs! One day I didn't see her walking around, went around the corner, and she was already half way up the stairs! I let her finish and she made it all the way up. Now that's all she wants to do and we are constantly having to block the stairs or she won't stay off of them. She can go up great...but not back down. She is keeping us on our toes!

*She has her 1 year appointment this Friday. It will be interesting to see how much she has grown since her 9 month visit and sad that she has to get her shots. I hate when my babies have to get shots!

*She still has quite a few nicknames. I think that I have somehow forgot to write about one of the top ones I came up with. One of the sounds she makes all the time is, "Tee-tee". Stemming from that I somehow started calling her "ti-ti Roni" (R0-Knee) and now sometimes it's just Roni or Rone. The whole family has picked up on it. Tyler, awhile back, started calling her Pexy and the other boys will too. When she gets into everything I like to call her a Lex-a-soraus! There's also Joy Bear and Mama Girl!

*She still has just 4 teeth although it had seemed like she may be teething last week. She has such a cute smile with those 4 little teeth!

*She loves playing and plays so well on her own. She has really been into the magnets on the refrigerator. We have the Leap Frog Farm and Letters on it and they are constantly being spread throughout the whole house! She always has something in her hand, walking from room to room. A baby doll, an item from one of her new play purses, or a magnet! So cute!

*She likes to try and put hats and other accessories on. This is one of those things that is already different then the boys. She wants to do it all of the time. When she finds one of our hats she is instantly trying to put it on and then will walk around with it...adorable! Yesterday she wanted Grandma's sunglasses on and yelled when they were taken from her. Today she took a stethoscope and hung it around her neck...so cute! She loves the sets of bead necklaces we got on vacation and will play with those forever. And she also loves shoes! She will get into our shoe bin everyday and walk around with them, spreading them all around the house!

*As far as talking she babbles a lot. It sounds like she has said "hi" a few times. It doesn't seem like she pointedly calls any of us anything yet but there has been quite a few times where it's sounded like it.

*She waves hello and good-bye almost anytime you say it now...one of my favorite things!

So that is Alexis at a year. I am so happy that I have all of these memories written down at each stage of her life. I plan to keep doing her updates every month since they still change so much. Let me know if anyone is still reading these...good to know you are out there! I hope to get to a post on her First Birthday party within the next few days...it was a lot of fun!=0)