Current mood: happy
Wow-wee how time flies by. I can't believe yet another month is under Mia's tiny little baby belt.. yet here I am! She is officially 17 months old today.. one more month and she will be a year and a half!!! YIKES!!!
As I reflected on this past month I really didn't think there was to much new to report, however, after reviewing my blogs I realized.. YES THERE IS!! haha So as always I might as well get down to business!
We had a small window of time between the HOT weather and FREEZING weather. It was short but we did take advantage of it and took Mia to the park.. ALOT! Mostly her Daddy but I did take her a few times myself. When her and Daddy go, he takes her down the slide (which she likes now because of him) plays in the dirt and climbs all over the jungle gym. Running around and collecting leaves is a thing of the past. Though she does still do it, its not very much or very long.
She has also become a stair climbing pro. Its one of her favorite things to do and I let her do it only if I am behind her "spotting her". She knows this too and often waits for me to be right behind her before she goes up. She also looks back to make sure I am there. The reason for this cautious behavior is because she has slipped a couple of times and slide down 1 step. I am always there to catch her so she doesn't go very far down. She knows this and likes that I am behind her to catch her if it happens again. I also taught her how to climb bak down, something she didn't know how to do before. I did this so incase she ever snuck up the stairs she would know how to get back down. I just tell her to "be careful" or "get on your butt" and she will get on all fours and climb back down carefully. Its very cute to watch.
This month has been one of her moodiest months ever! It ranks right up there next to her baby newborn days!! and thats saying ALOT!!! haha Not sure why the mood shift. I thought it was maybe due to teething and some days it was teething, but the real culprit is the simple fact she is getting older and closer to those terrible twos! YIKES! When she gets mad or doesn't like something she lets you know. She will either throw herself on the floor and throw a full out tantrum, get the item she wants and throws it on the ground, hits you, tears up or breaks whatever she is holding, or just flops on the ground and rolls on her back like a turtle all while crying. Sigh.. ya its tough but I realize that if I don't pay attention or react to her tantrums and just walk away to another part of the house she will quickly stop.. look for me and usually snap right out of it. The hard part is when she does it in public and yes she is finally doing that now. She threw a tantrum in the cart at Cardenas (grocery store) and even with me taking her out and trying to hold her it didn't help. She is starting to act up more and more at stores and restaurantes too!!! Yep she is getting to be a handful!
Adrian went to another computer conference so I had Mia all days once. That wasn't bad, I have healed pretty well from my surgery so it was no big deal. However, one thing did happen while he was gone... one of my old heaters for my old turtle tank exploded and stunk up the house BAD!!!! I have no idea how or why it did, it wasn't even plugged in! The smell was horrid and took days to clear up!
We made a couple of trips to San Diego this month. The first time was a full day of adventure. It started off by going to a good friend of ours, (Brad) wedding. It was first thing in the morning (9am) and it wasn't easy getting down to SD that early. Mia was her normal usual fussy self in the car ride down, but once we got there she had a blast and was a good baby. Everyone at the wedding fell in love with her and she just strutted around the place like she owned it. She collected leaves, was given a couple of tiny red roses, and was in tons of their wedding photos! haha We had a great time. Then later that day we stopped off at Grandma and Grandpa Santos' house for a quick visit. Thats always a treat. They not only showered her with gifts (one of them being a little yellow flute which she LOVES and even knows howt o play) but had a good time getting to know her again. After that it was off to Adrian's Tia's house for a babyshower for his cousin's fiance. Mia had a great time there, hanging out with her little cousins and running all over their house.
The second trip to San Diego was for Thanksgiving. It was the year to spend it with the Cardoso family. It was a great to see everyone again and Mia had lots of fun with her cousins... again. The only bad thing that happen was she wouldn't eat there. I figured there would be tons of good food there that I didn't need to pack her a seperate lunch, but boy I was wrong. She wouldn't eat anything but dinner rolls and fruit! She didn't like the turkey and stuffing.. oh well.
Speaking of Turkey Day, we celebrated our own little Thanksgiving here at the house the day before the official Thanksgiving. I cooked the Turkey and the rest of the food and it all came out great!!! Mia LOVED my Turkey, which was a surprise because she doesn't like chicken. She also loved my stuffing and I had to split it with her! (Adrian doesn't like stuffing so I usually have it all to myself... but not this year).
I learned a big lesson this month as well. Never assume anything. One day I assumed she was playing with her bag of toys and didn't get up to investigate and verify. Well turns out she got ahold of one her of dirty "poopie" diapers and needless to say there was a giant "mess" to clean up afterwards. I have learned that I need to double check ALL the time, because you never know what Mia will be getting into.
We have cut back her TV watching a bit so she can run around downstairs and explore more. This has also helped with her imagination. We have noticed since the TV has been off she now plays with her toys more, talks to them and entertains herself more. She even talks on Adrian's old cell phone, which we gave to her to play wtih. She always walks around the house with that phone and jibber jabbers like shes all into her conversation. Its really cute.
She is getting better at understanding as well. She knows what "Bye bye" means and she will stand by the door. I can tell her "ok time to put on your socks and shoes" and sit on the floor. She will then come over to me and sit on the floor and stick out her foot for me to put her socks and shoes on. I have mentioned before, if I say "want milk?" she will run to the fridge and touch it. I will open the door, she will take her milk sippy out and help me close the door. If her sippy is empty I will ask "you want more?" and she will hand it to me for me to fill it back up. Sometimes she will even try to lift the milk gallon up herself to hand it to me. When she has a dirty diaper I tell her "lets change your diaper, where do we change your diaper" and she will run to the spare room where her changing table is and wait for me to open the door so I can take her inside and change her. Another thing she does which really helps me know if shes ready for a nap is, I will ask "ok time to take a nap or time to go to bed" and if shes tried she will run to the stairs where the baby gate is and put her hand on it. Once I open the gate she will go upstairs to her room. I love how she is understanding so much now and I can't wait to see what else she has learned.
She is starting to use her little princess car that she got from her Grandpa and Grandma Pizano for her birthday more. She now knows to sit on it and push herself along. It works better on the kitchen floor than the carpet. She is also taken a HUGE shine to her little Elmo tent her Grandpa Pizano bought her. She didn't use it for the first month we had it but one day she just decided to check it out. Now she is ALWAYS in there. She will hang her little head out to watch TV and even throws all her favorite blankets and toys in there. She reminds me of a little ferret because if I can't find something I need (like her sippy cups) it always ends up in that tent! haha
Mia is a very picky sleeper. She only likes to sleep in her crib. Getting her to sleep on the big bed or play pen has always been impossible or very difficult. However, this month she is finally starting to take naps on the guest bed thanks to Daddy. He has successfully gotten her to take a long nap on that bed at least 3 times now! I am so happy because it will make spending the night at other people's house a bit easier for us.
A HUGE event happened this month... Mia got a new baby cousin!!!! Her name is Sophia and she was born 11/23!!!! Her Mommy and Daddy are Mia's Nina and Nino and she is the sister of Mia's cousins Tracy, Sarah and April. We are all so excited and happy she is finally here and can't wait to see her. Hopefully if all works out we will be able to finally make a trip up to Oxnard this weekend so we can finally see her. YAY!!!
Along with the new cousin Mia popped out a new tooth!!! Thats right, the count is up to 12 now!
She has also officially graduated to size 4 diapers!!!! I have been tryin to phase out the 3's for awhile but it finally just got to the point where she just can't fit in them anymore. So she is fully on 4's now. We still have some 3's laying around but I am going to hold on to them for the next baby haha diapers are so darn expensive!
Mia loves her books and magazines. Unfortunately she also likes to eat them too so we have to watch her when she has them. She loves turning the pages and jibber jabbering like shes reading them. Oh speaking of books, one day she got ahold of the copy we have of her Grandpa book. I made my Dad a photobook of all the pictures I took of them together while he was here for that month as a thank you gift. I got a copy made for Mia's personal collection. Well she found it one day and insisted I "read" it with her. When we were done and I tried to take it away she got upset and said "Ammpa! Ammmpa! Ammmpa!" her verson of Grandpa! It was really cute. I wanted to give it back to her but I knew she would just destroy it. At least she knows who her Grandpa is.
Mia also got her very first "potty" in the mail this month. I ordered it so we could start taking tiny baby steps towards potty training. Though it has sat on the back burner for while, when we first got it she loved it. She loved opening and closing the lid and even tried to get inside it!! I don't expect her to be potty trained now, but it can't hurt introducing it to her so when the time comes it won't be a new strange thing for her.
She is also becoming more clingy to me than ever. I can't even cook in the kitchen without having my little shadow following me or sitting on the floor next to me. She demands that I give her my attention all the time as well. This is proving to be difficult now. Even with Adrian there, he can't persuade her to stay with him if I am in the kitchen or other room. She will always go to be near me. If I use the restroom and don't take her in with me she will try to open the door or just stand outside of it trying to talk to me. If I go out to the gym or outside she will wait for me by the door until I get back. She is constantly with me all the time, which I don't mind but sometimes she does get in the way. Especially when I am cooking! I am so paranoid that something will burn her or splash on her and insist she stay out of the kitchen while I am cooking. Sometimes I have to lock her in the livingroom with the baby gate just to ensure she won't go in the kitchen.
She is also getting taller and taller and has learned to reach for things on the table. This is troublesome because most of the stuff on the table was put there because we didn't want her getting to it. Just recently she learned she can push things up to the table so she can stand on them and reach even more stuff on the table!!! She also loves getting to the mouse and keyboard on the computer desk. I can't even count the number of times shes messed up what we were watching on tv or clicked on all kinds of stuff. Just today she somehow managed to get solitar open and I don't even know how to do that! haha Sigh.. Mia is a handful sometimes!! haha
She has also started biting her crib and one morning I noticed she bit a huge chunk of wood off the rail!!! Noooooo!! We are planning on reusing the crib for the next baby but I think Mia has other plans. She was munching on that rail so much I had to order a special over for it. Its a cloth cover that goes over the rail and prevents the kids from chewing the wood. It seems to be helping... so far... that is until she learns to untie the fasteners!
Mia's new favorite song is Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. She LOVES this song whenever it comes on TV via YouTube or Sesame Street. I sing it to her too and she automatically stops what she is doing, dances to it, and when I am done she claps. Its the cutest thing ever! I love singing that song to her.
She has also started doing this new strange thing lately. Sometimes when she dances, she will get this serious look on her face and stare up at the ceiling and look back and forth during the whole song. Its almost like shes mesmorized by something. I can't figure out why she is doing this but she does it out of no where too, there doesn't even need to be music playing... hmm....
We also got our Christmas Tree this month. It was fun taking her to the tree lot and watching her run through the trees. We ended up coming home with the biggest tree we have ever gotten!! 7 feet! We even had to buy new lights for it since our old strand wasn't enough. Of course Mia LOVES the tree... especially pulling on the lights so needless to say we had to put a baby gate around the tree to keep her away. We only have ornaments halfway down the tree. I didn't want to create any more temptation for Mia to mess with the tree. However, she did do one cute thing. The first morning after buying the tree, I went to put a pitcher of water in it and Mia watched me. I told her "the tree is thirsty and needs to drink water". She then got her milk and water sippy cups and put them in the tree!!!!! PRICELESS!!! She kept doing that over and over until we put that fence around it. Now she can only look at the tree and can't touch it.
I learned another lesson this month. No more pomagranates for Mia!!!! Though she does like to eat them, she did choke once on a tiny seed. That wasn't even the bad part.. after choking on them she learned how to gag herself purposly and try to make herself vomit for attention. Oh NO!!! So ya that afternoon was no fun, since then I haven't given her any more pomagranates! haha
Mia also did one of the most amazing things this month. She was watching her Elmo show, like always, and when Elmo started to count she would put her number toy with the same number. So when Elmo said "One" she looked down at her toy phone and pushed 1 and it said "One". Then when Elmo said "Two" she looked back at her toy and pushed 2 and it said "two" She did this all the way till 4! I am so shocked by this and proud at the same time.. my little girl is so smart! YAY!
Well thats about it for the month. Phew.. lots to tell and I thought it was a slow month haha. I guess I gotta learn, nothing is slow when Mia is involved!!
SUMMARY:
Weight:
Height:
New things: likes the slide and can climb up and down the stairs and jungle gym, plays the recorder aka flute, plays more by herself, talks to her toys and play phone, copied Elmo counting, slept in the big person's bed for multiple naps, plays in her tent, got a new baby cousin, tooth number 12, likes Turkey and stuffing (Mama's only), got her potty, learned how to gag herself by coughing to hard, throwing more tantrums, reaching on the table and using stepping stool to get things out of her reach, loves Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, put sippy in tree, ate a chunk of wood off her crib, dancing with or without music while looking up
Goals met from last month?: Actually for the first time she didn't really meet any goals I set for this month. She is saying less and less words on command (mostly due to her moodiness), though she does entertain herself she demands to be with me all the time while she is doing it and she still doesn't have a huge variety of foods she likes to eat. Granted she does like Turkey and stuffing, both aren't something I can cook very often.
Next month's goals: So with the above being said I think I will contiune with the same goals for this up coming month.
