One

Last Monday Charlotte turned ONE. It's hard to believe that a year has past since we brought that little 7 pound, 9 ounce bundle with the skinny legs and the fuzzy hair home from the hospital and started our life together as a family of three.

Charlotte still has the same bright eyes, but she's changed in so many other ways. I took her for her 12 month immunizations this week and she weighed in at 23 pounds, 12 ounces with a length of 30 1/4 inches (maintaining her place somewhere in the 80-90th percentile for height and weight). Our chubby pumpkin has been slow to move, but in the past couple of weeks she has begun to crawl more proficiently and pull herself up to sitting and standing. It's so much fun to see her little head peaking around the corner as she comes to find us in another room. And it's such a change to see her sitting or standing up in her crib when we go in to get her in the morning or after her nap. She's still furniture-surfing, but now uses walls too, and can stand unsupported for short periods.

Charlotte's verbal abilities are also improving. She often pronounces the first consonant of an object correctly, ie. "buh" for ball, "duh" for duck, "muh" for milk, etc. She can say "ma ma" and "da da"  - exactly that way, with a gap between the syllables - but more often it's "mamamama!" or "dadadada!" She has her own versions of animal noises that we find pretty entertaining. Charlotte talks to herself when she's playing, and when she's caught up in playing she has a funny habit of using her legs to spin herself around in a circle while seated, usually with a stuffed animal or small toy clutched in each hand.

Since Charlotte's birthday was on a weekday and we don't have any family in Edmonton I decided to invite a few girlfriends with babies to join us at a neighbourhood park in the morning for a little celebration. It was a beautiful sunny day and I think Charlotte enjoyed it. Going with a bug theme, I used caterpillar invitations, we gave Charlotte a large helium bee balloon on the morning of her birthday and then brought it along to the park, and I decorated bug cupcakes (recipe courtesy of Martha Stewart). Needless to say it was a more involved dessert than I usually go for but then I've never had a child turn one before! It was kind of fun - and James helped. Despite the theme, the mosquitoes actually stayed away for the most part - an improvement over the previous weeks. James was able to skip out of work and drop by the park for a short while (and deliver coffee for the adults), so we gave Charlotte her cupcake and sang to her while he was there.

I wish I had more photos of the actual party, but it all went by so quickly. Fortunately a friend captured a short video of Charlotte receiving her birthday cupcake (Thanks Lana!) as well as a couple of photos of the moment. I hope these give you a taste (sorry, cupcakes are all gone!) of the occasion.

Catching up with her friend Madi

Swinging with Jake

 

  

Summer

Wow, the days and weeks fly by and suddenly I realize it's been six weeks since a blog post. In the interim we enjoyed a wonderful long weekend visit from James' Mom (and Charlotte's Granny)  in June and spent the first week of July in the B.C. Shuswap with my family. Since I have a backlog of photos on the camera (but mainly since it's been a busy day of cleaning and errands) I'm going to go light on the writing and let the pictures do most of the talking. Unfortunately it seems that when we're around extended family we almost completely neglect to take photos - too busy savouring their company. So the photos I'm going to share document what Charlotte's been up to around the house lately... I promise I'll be back again soon with a more substantial post.

This child loves the bath...

...and loves teeth "brushing" almost as much.

Snuggles

Looking out at our patio. She's getting pretty good at spotting "buh" (bugs).

Charlotte's favourite activity at the moment: pushing chairs around. This one's not light!

She's pretty pleased about the whole standing/furniture surfing thing.

I'm never sure if she has a destination in mind...

What's a baby blog without a bare bum shot?

If you're happy and you know it

The first year of a baby's life is a constant process of change, but we're struck by the way Charlotte's development seems to happen in clusters. In the past month or so Charlotte's ability to communicate with us has improved significantly. Some of her new abilities include clapping, waving, and pointing. And it's now clear that Charlotte understands a lot of what we say to her. We estimate that she recognizes at least fifty words. These include: Mommy and Daddy;  "outside", "tree", "park", "bubbles", "ball", "book", "clap", "wave"; names of animals; body parts such as "hair", "hands", "feet", and "nose"; "cup" and many of the foods that she eats.

Charlotte is also better able to communicate her likes and dislikes. At the moment some of her favourite things to do include: standing up in her crib (and standing in general), going on the swing at the park, playing with the laundry basket, and "brushing" her teeth (ie. sucking on her toothbrush). It follows that her biggest dislikes are being interrupted from doing any of those activities! Fortunately she's easily distracted from her displeasure at this stage.

Follow our blog

I just wanted to let you all know that I've now added a new "Follow" gadget to the sidebar on the right. If you sign up, you will be notified by email when we've added a new blog post. Or, if you prefer the suspense, you can just keep checking back on your own every so often...the good ol' fashioned way!

Spring

The Victoria Day weekend couldn't have come at a better time - James has been really busy at work lately (it seems like we're always saying that) and we're loving the change of pace this long weekend. Charlotte, our normally fantastic little sleeper, is also in the midst of a transition that has put a bit of a wrinkle in things - she's now moving around like crazy in her sleep. That's not a problem per say, but she's been rolling onto her tummy, which is not her favourite position, and if she rouses and finds herself that way she gets upset. It's not that she can't roll herself back, but she doesn't yet know that she can, so in the meantime we find ourselves going in to roll her back so she can settle back to sleep. I imagine this will resolve itself soon enough, but last night I was up an unprecedented three times to re-position Charlotte. So today James and I are taking shifts looking after Charlotte and resting, and the fact that I am now catching up on email and blogging in bed at 11:30 a.m. feels very luxurious!

This past week we enjoyed gorgeous, 20 plus degree Celsius weather, which has meant trips to the park, windows and patio door wide open all day, and lots of barbequing. Charlotte loves going to the park, which provides new places to stand supported and other children to watch. She has fair skin, though, so even with a hat, sunscreen, and keeping in the shade as much as possible we've had to limit her sun exposure.

The arrival of spring has breathed new life into Edmonton. Every year that we've been here I've been amazed at how green and lush the city becomes - at the end of a long, bleak winter it is easy to forget. In contrast to Calgary, which is quite arid, Edmonton is a woodland environment, and it is evident now not only when we walk in the river valley nearby but even on our tree-lined street. Although our neighbourhood is primarily made up of apartment buildings, it is an older area of the city and well treed. On Wednesday I took Charlotte to the downtown library for a baby program we like - it's a comfortable half hour walk from our place, and she had her morning nap on the way. Afterwards we enjoyed our lunch outdoors at Winston Churchill Square (by city hall) with our friends Megan and Noah. Many downtown workers were also enjoying their lunches in the square (including the Mayor - our minor celebrity sighting) to the sounds of live music. The downtown farmer's market opened on Saturday, and the three of us walked there for a quick browse and some hotdogs (though none for Charlotte yet). It was a beautiful day and packed with people. To me this is city living at its best, and it's been fun to start sharing it with Charlotte.

Grass!

A Jack Layton rally in Edmonton. We didn't quite get close enough for a kiss for Charlotte

"Reading", a new favourite pasttime.

Happy baby

 

Nine months

Charlotte was nine months old yesterday, and it feels as though she's entered a new stage - a stage somewhere between baby and toddler.
  

We see this in her abilities and temperament.
When Charlotte is awake her legs are almost always in motion, kicking away.
She reaches for things now, most often to indicate that she wants to be lifted into a standing position at the couch or by her crib. This is her new favourite thing: standing supported - with almost total disregard for balance, mind you!

Charlotte's reaching motion is usually accompanied by a grunt, and her repertoire of sounds continues to grow. She has sounds for, "hey, look at me!", and "what is that?", and sounds that she makes when she's eating that are equally intense whether she's enjoying her food or not.
She's beginning to get into finger foods - cheerios (excuse me, "Nutrios"), toast, cheese and broccoli are early favourites - which is fun.

Charlotte is quite deft at turning the pages of her books.
She is also beginning to nap in longer stretches, for which I am thankful, although she keeps me guessing by throwing shorter ones into the mix.

As Charlotte communicates better, I see some toddler willfulness coming through. She wants to stand, not sit, then she wants to stand by the coffee table, not the couch, thank you very much, and after that, back to the couch, please. And while you're at it, pick up those books and coasters so I can push them off the coffee table again, would you? Today was a bit of a high maintenance day - I'm not sure if she was experiencing some discomfort, if she was spoiled by all the attention over Easter and didn't want to go back to playing on her own, or if it was just one of those days...

But Charlotte also laughs more easily now.

She plays little games with us and responds to our laughter. Every so often she'll come at us with a big open mouth - we're not sure if it's a kiss or not, but it's definitely affectionate. These are the kind of things that make the fussy bits not such a big deal after all.

An Easter family photo

Personality

It's been longer than I intended since the last post, and in the interim Charlotte has cut two teeth. Goodbye gummy grin, hello pearly whites. She's braved it well - a little extra fussiness now and then but no interrupted sleeps. After months of saying, "maybe she's teething...", we really weren't aware what was happening until the first tooth appeared last week. I was cleaning her face after breakfast one morning and there it was. A second one came through a few days later, so she now has a pair of teeth on the bottom.

In other news, Charlotte has had her first haircut. It was getting a bit wild, as you can see.

 

 

James talked me into trimming the front as well, which I immediately regretted. It was nerve-wracking taking scissors to her, especially since Charlotte desperately wanted to turn her head to look at them. Here's a photo of her right after the haircut. In the blue sleeper and the short hair we called her Little Lord Fauntleroy. Poor baby - the things we subject her to!

Fortunately it's growing back, as hair does.

 

 

Charlotte is more than eight months old and she still shows no real motivation to move! She's got the sitting down quite comfortably and has a good reach when she lunges for toys, but she has only rolled over a handful of times and crawling doesn't seem to be on her radar. Her legs are getting stronger and she enjoys standing supported. I'm sure many experienced parents would tell us to enjoy this relatively immobile state while we can, but like most new parents we find ourselves anticipating the next stage.

 

What we're most enjoying these days is seeing more and more of Charlotte's personality emerge. Observant and calm are her most evident qualities. Charlotte is very attuned to her surroundings and quick to spot anything new, for example, if I get the vacuum cleaner out or put a vase of flowers on the table. Sometimes she seems a little disturbed by changes like these, and it makes me think that perhaps she's picked up some Shantz OCD (you know, the good kind of obsessive, the kind that makes a person really organized!). The other day while we were waiting at a bus stop she spotted a bird building a nest before I had. She also loves digital clocks and will stare at them watching for the numbers to change. Incidentally, we think she recognizes the word "clock", since she's looked right at it more than once when we've mentioned it to her. It's amazing to watch Charlotte take everything in. 

 

Charlotte is not as smiley as some babies but she's usually calm. She doesn't get easily worked up and she soothes herself well. She's never been into the soother, but she will suck her thumb when she needs some comfort. Charlotte generally wakes up about 7 a.m. Since James usually doesn't need to get up for work until 7:30 we'll often leave her in her crib for a little while, and after chatting to herself for a few minutes she'll go quiet. We assumed that meant she had drifted back to sleep but discovered recently that she was just looking around her room and sucking her thumb, patiently waiting for us to come get her.

The highlight of the past month was visits from my sister Jenny and James' parents, and we're looking forward to a visit from my parents next week. It had been a couple of months since seeing family and we all enjoyed the visits. More details (and pictures) to come!