Tuesday, November 17, 2015

11 Months Old

Well I am clearly not an avid blogger. I think of doing it every now and then, but fail to write anything down. That's one of the things about having a kid...there is just such little spare time. It's funny because we have whole weekends with nothing planned and I have grand visions of getting a million things done, yet all I can manage to do is get to the grocery store and do a load or two of laundry. Of course it's all worth it because we get to spend our unproductive weekends with the world's most adorable, little human, even if all we're doing is watching her tear around our house like a tiny tornado.

Josie becomes more fun every week. When she was 6 months, I wrote that I wanted to make that phase slow down. While I do wish all of these phases would not go so quickly, each one has been more fun than the last.

At 11 months, Josie is extremely mobile. She crawls really quickly, and has moved from her army crawl (which she started a little before 6 months) to being an all fours with her belly off the ground. She now also does a funny little crawl with one foot on the ground and one knee on the ground. I think it's a precursor to walking, which is not far away. She can cruise around the house pretty quickly, walking behind her toy car. She can also stand on her own for about 10-15 seconds without falling.

Josie is eating all sorts of different foods. Like a good Wisconsin girl, she loves meat and cheese. Her other favorites includes Cheerios, sweet potatoes, peas and carrots, grapes, blueberries and bananas. Also....she is NOT allergic to peanut butter!! The new advice is to get peanuts to kids early in order to prevent allergies. We had her tested because of my allergy and the results were negative. I of course was still super paranoid, but we fed her some Bamba snacks today and she did not react. (Bamba snacks are Israeli peanut puffs - thanks to our neighbors for sharing them with us. ) I hope she doesn't develop an allergy as she gets older. It's no fun having to worry about it and of course, having to give away half your Halloween candy after trick or treating.

Josie is interested in anything and everything. Emily takes her to ECFE with Christopher every week, and the ECFE teacher has commented on how engaged Josie is. They sing a song at the end of every class that has hand motions that go along with it, and Josie tries to do those along with all the older kids. She signs for "all done" and waves goodbye and hello. She seems to understand us when we ask her questions. The other day I asked her to go get a book to read and she grabbed one and brought it right over.

Speaking of books, she loves them. Her favorite activity these days is going to grab a book from her shelf and bringing it to one of us to read. As soon as we're done, she moves on to the next adult in the room to read again. And then back and forth and back and forth. She bounces up and down while we read with a huge grin on her face. But she only wants to read certain books. She'll pick through a huge pile until she finds the one she wants. Some of her favorites are Barnyard Babies, Dear Zoo, Bubbles Bubbles, Bedtime Bear,and Peakaboo at the Zoo. She still loves I Am a Bunny, The Going to Bed Book and Goodnight Moon.

It's hard to believe she's almost one. She continues to be sweet, smart, determined and adventurous. I can't wait to see what the next month will bring.

7 months

8 months

9 months


10 months


11 months




Sunday, November 1, 2015

Summer Recap

We had a very busy summer. Josie went camping twice - once with Emily and Ben and their friends near Hinckley and once with the whole Kurth family near Kenosha. We went to Hayward to spend time with friends Haley and June, and to Minocqua to visit Grandma Fay and Grandpa Otto. We spent a whole week with Baba Ralph, Meema Jo, Uncle Robby and Aunt Andri, Uncle Ben and Aunt Emily and Clare and Christopher in Evansville. Josie had her first outings to the Terrace and the Farmers' Market in Madison. We went to Detroit Lakes to see friends Garrett, Laura and Signey. We went to the Minnesota State Fair. We went swimming a lot, which Josie loved. (Although we did have to keep her from drinking lake water.) We went on lots of hikes and walks around the neighborhood. Here are some of the highlights!

First camping trip!

Camping at St. Croix Falls State Park, Hinckley

Union Terrace with Uncle Robby

Practicing for college at the Union Terrace, Madison

Blueberries. Yum.

Josie and her buddy, June


The beach at Lebanon Hills Regional Park, Eagan

Our backyard!

Driving her car at the park...

Minnesota State Fair - in a Badger outfit!





Getting ready for football season - Go Pack Go!