Well, it’s finally here! Savannah is 1 year old! It’s pretty crazy that this time a year ago, we were in the hospital waiting to be discharged home. She has grown and changed so much since then!
Savannah is weighing about 21 pounds, according to the scale at the pediatric ER recently (more on that in another post). She goes for her 12 month checkup this week, so we’ll find out her official stats then :) I was surprised; I really assumed she wasn’t up to 20 pounds yet. Must be all that food she eats! Update: At her 12 month checkup on May 3rd, she weighed 20 lbs 5 oz (60th percentile) and was 29 3/4 inches (75th percentile). Savannah is still nursing 3-4 times per day, but we may transition down to “first thing in the morning” and “right before bed” before too much longer. Who knows…we’ll just play that by ear :) She actually likes whole milk pretty well though! She has tried it several times over the past week or two, and it doesn’t seem to bother her that it’s cold. Yay! She has started refusing to drink my pumped milk in a bottle for Rae Rae a couple of times, so I’m glad that she will at least drink cow’s milk when I’m at work. Savannah is still a pretty big eater and isn’t too picky! She usually eats as much or more than Brooklyn on many occasions and has been known to finish hers AND Brooklyn’s supper more than once :) She got hold of Brooklyn’s apples one day and started taking bites of it like a big girl…peel and all! She loves fruit like her big sister, but also likes meat and veggies too. She has recently figured out how to push our hands away if she doesn’t want to eat something, but thankfully that doesn’t happen too often. I’m sure she will get pickier as she gets older, but right now this is one area where things are easy for the moment!
Savannah is still sleeping well at night…knock on wood! She goes to sleep around 8 PM at night and usually sleeps until around 7 (give or take 30 minutes). I’ll take it! Most of the time, she will go to sleep without much of a fuss these days…as long as she’s got her paci! She also sleeps with a little lamb lovie blanket (that was given to Brooklyn but she never really got attached to it).
Savannah still takes 2 naps per day, although sometimes she doesn’t always take a great morning nap. I’m wondering if she’ll be ready to go down to one nap/day soon. I wouldn’t mind that…it would free up our mornings to go out and do things this summer! She generally sleeps about an hour to 1.5 hours per nap, but sometimes I’ll get lucky and she’ll sleep a little longer.
Savannah is just starting to cruise along the furniture. She doesn’t do it too much yet, but she’s definitely getting more comfortable with it. She can let go of the furniture and stand without falling for a few seconds at a time; usually, it works better if she’s holding a toy or something to distract her. Once she realizes she’s not holding on, she immediately sits down ;) I think she probably could stand and cruise without any trouble, but she’s just not confident enough to do it much. The benefit of being a second-time mom is that I’m not worried about it; it will happen when she’s ready!
Not too long after she turned 11 months old, Savannah said her real first word that we were sure we could understand: “cat”! These day, she says “cat” all the time…when they come into the room, or when she hears them meow. It seems like she is trying to say other words sometimes, but we can’t understand what she’s saying yet. She doesn’t really point at objects yet with her finger, but sometimes she will gesture with her whole hand at something. She likes to turn the pages of books, but she isn’t super interested in listening while I read yet. Part of that is probably that we’re reading mostly longer books that Brooklyn wants to read. I need to do a better job of reading simple board books with just Savannah.
We are starting to see Savannah’s silly side come out, and it’s lots of fun. She now enjoys playing Peek-a-boo; however, instead of covering her eyes, she normally puts her hands on the sides of her head. It’s pretty cute! She loves to imitate what we’re doing, whether it’s clapping or waving. I can telling she’s studying and observing so much these days. She loves to be tickled and for us to pretend to “eat” her belly button. She loves to smack her lips together to make popping sounds, and she and Brooklyn think it’s hilarious to have “spitting contests” back and forth. It’s very lady-like too! ;)
Savannah continues to be more and more interested in exploring the house. Her favorite things to get into are the drawers in our bathroom, the pantry, the Tupperware cabinet, and anything in Brooklyn’s room. She likes climbing on top of the low shelf on the foyer table and end table in the living room. We’ve caught her on top of the dishwasher more times than I can count. She also likes turning on the faucet in our bathtub. Basically, if we turn our backs for more than a few seconds, there’s no telling where she’ll be! :)
Likes: being with Mommy (she’s still very much attached to my hip and cries when other people try to take her!), exploring the house, spitting, being tickled, playing Peek-a-boo, talking about “cats”, cleaning up (she thinks it’s a game to put blocks back in the tub or play food back in the basket), standing up in the tub
Dislikes: being taken away from Mommy, not being allowed to explore what she wants to get into, getting out of the bathtub and ready for bed, watching Mommy leave the room
Savannah is still wearing mostly 12 month stuff, but based on her weight, she could probably start wearing some 18 month stuff too if I tried it on her. Most of her 12 month clothes fit fine though! She is wearing size 3 shoes, but really doesn’t wear shoes too often, especially now that it’s warm outside. Once she starts walking, I’m sure that will change! She is in size 3 diapers, and we are starting to stock up on size 4s as well. She is working on tooth #4 AND #5 (one on top and one on bottom), and I think another one on bottom might not be far behind. We’ll see!
Whew! We survived the first year! Sometimes it felt like all we were doing was treading water, but we made it. It was definitely an adjustment going from 1 to 2 kids, but I feel like maybe we are on the downhill—at least for now! Savannah, you bring us so much joy each day! You haven’t been the “easiest baby”, but we wouldn’t trade you in! ;) We love you so much and are looking forward to your next year of life!
