Rooney, 13 Months

13 Months At-a-Glance

Remembers games from day to day (and where she hides things)
Can stand up by herself in the middle of the floor
Has taken two steps on her own
Loves to point and grunt
Spent the weekend at grandma's without mommy and daddy
Rode on the park swing for the first time
Eats table foods
Loves repetition
Done with bottles
Still rear-facing on the road
Loves bananas and can eat an entire avocado in one sitting!

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Did you know the terrible 2s technically start with a child's second year of life? We've seen a couple mini tantrums/mood swings, especially when she is tired or hungry. She is also working on a lot of teeth (see below), which might be the biggest reason for the fussiness. Please pray for our patience and humor! Most of the time Eric and I just look at each other and laugh because we don't know what else to do! Regardless, this is such a fun age! I love it! It is definitely my favorite so far. And we've seen more changes in the past month since she was 6 months old.

Growth

Weight: 23 pounds, 6 ounces (according to Wii Fit). I'll weigh her at my parents' this weekend since that is more accurate and then update here. She was 3 ounces heavier at her 12-month checkup, but I wouldn't be surprised if she lost a little weight.

UPDATE 4/8/13: After weighing her on a more accurate scale, I'm going with 23 pounds, 13 ounces.

Clothing size: 18-24 months/2T. I kind of glossed over the 24-month clothes because I figured 2T was the same, only longer. (Hint: It is.) Since Rooney is tall, I thought that'd be fine. Well, she's been in 18-month clothes since she was 9 months and now she's ready for the next size, but the 2T stuff is still a bit long for her...so, maybe I shouldn't have completely skipped that size. Oops.

Diaper size: She fits in both size 4 and 5 diapers.

Shoe size: 5. She has two pairs, which is totally enough. One is black and one is pink, so at least one pair goes with any outfit.

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Food

A big change this month was our transition off formula: And with that, lots of changes to her diet. We decided to wean her from formula to whole milk. There didn't seem to be an awesome alternative for whole milk (for our family), and I think the final straw for me was when I read that Ashley switched from hemp milk to whole milk because of carrageenens.

Anyway, the milk switch for us went quite smooth. We did it before we switched to sippy cups, because I thought it would be easier. She didn't seem to notice much of a difference in taste. For a week we did 50% milk / 50% formula, and then switched to 75% milk / 25% formula until our formula was gone. The first couple times she had straight milk, she would take the bottle out of her mouth and look at it, and then put it back in. Almost like she was saying This looks right, but tastes a little different. Still, she would drink the whole thing (8 oz bottles)!

Milk definitely doesn't keep her as full as formula did, and she seemed a bit more gassy afterward. (Boo, dairy!) I didn't like her having so much dairy, so I'm glad with the sippy cup (see below) she drinks a lot less. I would guess she only has 6-10 oz of milk per day now, and lots of food! (Don't worry about her low milk intake, we give her lots of healthy fats! Gotta keep growing that brain!)

Foods: We are completely done with purees. She loves to feed herself. She has tried a bunch of new soft table foods this month, as well as some standbys, including: guacamole, avocado strips, clementines, pancakes, English muffin, chicken, French toast sticks, pasta, deli turkey, strawberries, crackers, broccoli, cooked carrots, green beans, peas, rice cakes, lasagna, pears, peaches, cinnamon roll, wheat toast, scrambled eggs, saltines, blueberry muffins...and the list goes on! They say she is a great eater at day care! I think guacamole and bananas are her favorite. We try to limit her grains, but like most kids, she loves them!

Side note: Happy Creamies have been one of my favorite finds! Our Target carries a couple flavors, and I love that they are non-dairy (they are made with coconut milk) and contain probiotics.

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Although her list of new foods is long, the fickle-ness of toddlers and their eating habits is definitely showing through. Some days she loves clementines and the next she'll shake her head at it or spit it out. Some meals she eats a ton and others she doesn't show much interest. I try to not care and don't make a big deal of it in front of her. I figure she'll eat when she's hungry. I read that she needs 900-1,000 calories per day, and most babies get half of that from milk. She has three meals a day and two sit-down snacks, so she eats about every 2-3 hours.

Mealtime is very messy, no matter what she's eating! We need to start remembering to take her shirt off before she eats!

Another huge change was her transition from the bottle to a sippy cup: I was really not looking forward to this transition. The bottle has been our crutch, you know? Sometimes it's the only thing that can calm her down. The first couple times were hard. She totally refused the swap-out and would throw a mini tantrum to the point of hitting herself in the head with her hand. That was not pretty!

I bought a bunch of the 10 oz. Tommee Tippee Explora Lil Sippee cups (with handles and without). She has 6 (two at day care, 4 at home). They leak occasionally, but the soft spout is supposed to feel just like a bottle. We just kept offering the sippy, and she got better and better at drinking out of it, and she eventually stopped throwing a fit when we gave it to her before bed. Or, if she did throw a fit, we just put her down anyway without a bottle. Most times she had just eaten dinner, so it's not like she needed it. In the morning, instead of a bottle, I simply put her in her high chair for breakfast with a banana and a sippy cup. She prefers food to drink, for sure. She usually just takes one big drink at the end of her meal.

After a week or so, we were done with bottles (I think the last day she had a bottle was March 19). It took us about 10 days to switch. Our pediatrician said to get her off bottles by 15 months, so I'm glad we were able to do that. And it has been awesome to not have to wash them!

Words: uh oh (more like ah ah) and daddy are her favorite words this month. It's almost like she forgot she can say bye and momma :), although those were her favorite words a couple months ago.

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Naps: 1 or 2

She will take two naps at home on the weekends and Wednesdays, and one nap at day care. They have tried to put her down for a morning nap but she always refuses (by throwing her pacifier across the room :)), so then they go on a stroller ride or wagon ride.

More stories from day care:

She goes around to all the cribs and pulls out the sleep sacks. She does this at home, too; it just made us giggle to think of her doing this to all the cribs (I think there are 5) at day care.
She loves going for stroller and wagon rides, and cries when they are over.
When the Easter bunny visited, Rooney loved him and kept petting him.
They had an Easter egg hunt! When Adah (her BFF) got her egg open, Roo crawled right over and helped her eat all the Cheerio's.

Walking update: She is still not walking. She likes to stand, loves to crawl and has taken a couple steps a few times. Of course there's a part of me that wishes she was walking (it's the first thing anyone asks when they hear she's 1, and she's got dresses to wear!) but the rest of me knows it's totally OK (she's healthy and it's totally normal!) and that it will be super crazy once she figures it out. I know it will happen eventually. Everyone told us she'd be walking by Christmas when she crawled early, so it does kind of feel like we've been waiting forever. But there are no walkers in her day care room so she doesn't really see little kids walking very much. I think it will be a few more months!

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Teeth: She is teething hardcore right now. She has 4 full-grown teeth. Today I could see two more fresh ones that popped through on the top, but they may go back down so I'm not counting them yet (we saw two others pop through that are no longer showing). I can also see that her gums are very swollen and based on the outlines I can see, it looks like she is working on 10 more teeth. No joke! I counted!

Baths: Still twice a week, on Wednesdays and Sundays.

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Easter: We had a great Easter with my family! We went to Panera for lunch, home for a nap, church at 3:00 pm and then Cheesecake Factory to end the night! Her grandmas pulled through with Easter baskets! She got a T-shirt, yogurt melts, Lollacup, Babushkups, a little stuffed turtle, stuffed bunny and some cash. Oh, and some bunny ears:

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Family time: I think one of our new favorite rituals is weekend grocery shopping! Roo and I sometimes go on Wednesdays, too, to get out of the house.

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I feel like I should start a new photo series called "Rooney in shopping carts." (Hey, that's a good idea! I'm doing it!)

I've recently read how good it is for kids to play outside, so we are looking forward to spring weather! We've had one day in the low 60s, and it was so wonderful to not wear a coat!

I love having a 1-year-old! I still feel the relief that I felt at her first birthday. I think a huge part of it is not having to bring bottles and formula with us everywhere. Wherever we go, she can order off the menu and find something to eat! I really feel like we can pick up and go most times without a diaper bag! It has been so nice.