One Year Old

 Wow, that year went by quickly.  And yet it feels like Kayden has been here for a long time already.  I keep feeling like she's still my little baby because she has no teeth, she doesn't crawl/move yet, she still has her crib mattress at the highest setting because she hasn't pulled herself up yet, she's still nursing...but in other ways it just makes so much sense that she's one already!

 Kayden is still small for her age.  She had her 12 month immunizations this morning and she was 16lbs 13.5oz and 27.5" tall.  She is wearing 12 month clothes.  I've noticed this month that her legs have really been stretching out and looking more like toddler legs than baby legs.  She's really thinning out a lot in general. 

 Kayden doesn't have much hair but she had her first haircut this month.  Some hairs were scraggly-looking so I trimmed them all to roughly the same length.  Much better! 

Kayden doesn't have any teeth yet but she's definitely teething now.  Her sleep has been disrupted for the past week or so and we can see that her gums are swollen and the teeth are right there, though there's not even any white peeking through yet.  But they're coming!  Personally, I think her gummy grin is pretty cute.  And she can handle every type of finger food like a pro, despite having no teeth!

Speaking of food, Kayden has left pureed food in the dust and will only eat what we're eating.  Sometimes, if she hasn't eaten much during the day, I'll pull out some puree or baby cereal right before bed and she'll eat a few bites but mostly she just flat out refuses.  But it seems to be working!  She seems to be getting enough nutrition from what she feeds herself so I can't complain.  She is still nursing 3 times a day but we've also managed to get her to drink whole milk out of a sippy cup this month so I think weaning might be in our near future.  Her favourite foods seem to be noodles, frozen peas/corn, popcorn twists (what kid doesn't love those?!), raisins, and peanut butter sandwiches (cut into cubes). She doesn't like...I don't know!  I don't recall anything she flat-out refuses.

 Kayden's play has changed a bit this month.  The other day we were playing a  game where she would shake  her head "no" and then I would "gobble" her neck saying "yes! yes! yes!" and she would laugh and shake her head "no" again and we would do it over and over again.  That kind of play shows me that she's growing up :)  She has also discovered the fun of buttons this month.  If she sees a button, she has to find out what it does!  This newfound game has been a lot of fun for her just now as she's sitting next to me on the couch while I type this, pressing all the buttons on the left hand side of the keyboard.  Makes for tricky typing!  Her favourite "toys" are the pets (cats and dog), her brother, and anything that plays music or makes noise.

Kayden has been sleeping through the night for most of this month.  Just in the last week or so has she been waking up in the night again.  It started out with sickness (fevers, coughing, etc) so I couldn't NOT go in but I think she has gotten used to the midnight snuggles and is now waking in the night expecting them again.  Last night was the first night of being firm with her that night is for sleeping and, once 10:30pm came and went, she was good for the rest of the night.  She has started crying whenever I put her down for her naps which I hate.  It makes me so tense when babies cry themselves to sleep a couple times a day!  But she always falls asleep and never cries for long so I guess she is just old enough now that she wants to be in on the action instead of napping.  But she still needs the naps so I guess she'll have to live with it.  She naps twice a day, at 10am and 1:30pm, each 60-90 minutes.  She goes to bed around 8pm and wakes at about 7:30am.

 Right from the beginning of her life, I've joked that Kayden is such a girl in that she knows how to communicate.  Maybe that's why she's so content?  She doesn't feel unheard/misunderstood all the time?  This month, Kayden has mastered "yes" and "no" in the form of head shakes.  Well, she's mastered "no" for sure.  She will tell us when she doesn't want any more (shakes head) or if she does want more (reaches, opens mouth, etc).  It makes for MUCH easier parenting when our kids get to that stage of understanding that they can tell us what they want or don't want and don't have to cry about everything.  I'm so glad this girl has discovered it young! 

Kayden's greatest joy this month has been dancing and music.  When she sees me reaching for the little tape player that we have in the kitchen, her face lights up and she starts bouncing.  She hears music and her little body just bounces and dances!  It's so fun to watch her take such joy in music!  Yesterday, on her birthday, I would hold her and sing happy birthday to her while dancing with her in my arms.  I did this multiple times through the day.  At the beginning, she would just raise her arms so she wasn't holding on and "dance" with me by kicking her legs and doing little ab crunches/bouncing in my arms.  By the end of the day, it was a full out grin as we danced around the kitchen.  What a joyful one she is!

Kayden isn't moving yet.  She only mastered rolling at 11 month and only realized it could get her places in the last day or two.  Even so, she doesn't always remember that she can use rolling to go places so most often she just lays there.  She doesn't crawl/scoot at all either.  I always joke that it's nice to know where at least one of my kids is at all times...she's always exactly where I leave her!  And I can even leave her on a table/chair and she won't move.  Now, of course I don't leave her unattended in unsafe places, but I'm just saying...if I needed to run to grab something while I'm changing her diaper, chances are pretty good that she'll still be on the change table when I get back 10 seconds later.  :)

And that's our girl at a year!  What a beautiful, wonderful girl she is, inside and out!  It has been a joy to watch her grow this past year, from a tiny, sleeping-all-the-time newborn to a joyful, inquisitive, smiling one year old.

Pictures, anyone?

Levi loves to help vacuum.  I'm not complaining!

Enjoying the dog :)

Love these two and their special connection :)

Bath night! 

I love that just-woke-up look...

Sleeping girl...perfection.

She's learned the wrinkled nose look from the best...her brother.  She pulls it off pretty well and has made it her own too :)

There's the boy's version of the wrinkled nose smile :)

Cutie.

hehe.  This happens so much.

Marble maze made from lego.  Turned out to be more frustrating than fun...but I'll store this idea in my back pocket for another rainy day when Levi's a little older.  With a little more coordination, I think it could be a good time!

At long last...The House.

I've put this off long enough.  People have been wondering and asking about our house but I've kept thinking that I would take pictures once it was DONE.  After having lived here for two months now, it's becoming clear that it'll only really feel done once we have gone through every room and made it ours.  But that could take a while (hello, BUDGET!) so I finally just bit the bullet and took pictures this morning.  I didn't clean, I didn't set anything up.  This is how it looks in the middle of a day of playing!  Enjoy!

This is the front of the house (in summer, can't WAIT!).  The door on the right is the one we use.  The other door goes into the living room.

This is the first thing you see when you walk in the door. That's the door you see on the left...attached garage is to the left of that yet.  This window faces west.

On the right, where the jackets are hanging, is the rest of the entrance.  The door you see is into the garage.  Two steps up brings you into the house.  On the right is the desk you just saw.  On the left is the family room.

This is the family room.  Gas fireplace in the corner is the heat for this room.  That window is opposite the window above the desk and faces east (beautiful sunrises out there!!).

More of the family room.  The door you see at the back leads onto our deck.

Walk straight into the kitchen and this is what you see on your right.  The door at the back is the master bedroom (which I'll not share a picture of today...I'll wait until that one is done!)  The kids bedroom is just around the corner by the fridge, straight ahead.  The bathroom door is just to the left of that last cabinet on the left.

Walk to the fridge and turn around and this is the rest of the kitchen.  Bedroom doors are right behind me.  Family room is to the left.  The opening you see on the right is the dining room/living room.  The bathroom doorway is just to the right of that doorway.  This window faces south.

Living room is on the north west corner of the house.  The window faces west.  There is SUCH good light in this room during the day!

This is the dining room.  Excuse the mess on the table.  We were busy doing crafts this morning (Levi's favourite activity these days!).  Plus, he and Kayden were having lunch while I was taking pictures.  Also excuse the placement of pictures!  After we moved in, I just took random pictures and put them on pre-existing nails just to keep them safe and we haven't moved them yet.  The photo wall in the living room is the only place where we actually have put in our own nails!  This window faces south and the entrance to this room is just out of sight on the left hand edge of the picture (the exersaucer is right in front of the doorway).

The bathroom is huge.  I believe the previous owners took out the third bedroom and made both the master bedroom and bathroom bigger.  While the third bedroom would have been nice for us, I do enjoy having so much space in the bathroom!  And, we do have some plans up our sleeve for creating two more bedrooms in the hopefully near future...stay tuned!

This is the kids bedroom (remember, right off the kitchen by the fridge?).  We painted both this room and our bedroom before we moved in.  While we were at it, we painted the oak trim and doors white and replaced the hardware/plugs/lightswitches.  As we work our way through each room, we plan to paint trim and replace hardware/plugs/switches.  We're also on the lookout for good deals on light fixtures but no hurry.  The kids enjoy the fans :)  The spots on the wall are removable so it'll be easy to switch up the look in this room whenever the design bug hits.  The pictures are Dick and Jane photos of the siblings playing.  I thought it would be fitting for a shared bedroom.

And that's our house!  The basement has our guest bed, laundry and storage but is mostly unfinished/wood paneling and has no heat/windows so there's not much to show.  We might do minimal work to the basement but it'll likely just be painted and decorated a bit so that company doesn't feel like they're staying in quite a...BASEMENT.  I believe Nathan's brother has officially refused to ever sleep down there, though both of our parents and my sister have spent a few nights down there with no complaints.  Maybe they're just being nice...though apparently you can't hear the kids from down there so I'm thinking about booking myself a night down there for a little "getaway" one of these days.  Oh, the possibilities!

This house is situated on a 10 acre yardsite with ALOT of grass, some pasture, some old corrals, a shop (where we park our vehicles), and some trees.  It's beautiful out here and we LOVE being here.  We can't see any neighbours by day and at night we only see lights in the distance.  We're 12-15 minutes from town and on a quiet road so we don't even see vehicles going by every day.  I can't even describe how much like home it feels already.  I've loved our homes in the past but this place...it just has that staying quality.  I feel like I'm finally HOME.

Eleven Months Old

 Kayden is 11 months old!  Only one more month before her birthday.  Now THAT is hard to believe!  Where did my teeny tiny little newborn go??  It has been a fun 11 months :)

 Kayden remains the sweet, content, easy-going girl that she's always been.  I was reading back through my journal the other day and noticed that I described Kayden in her first week of life very much the same as I would describe her now.  Laid-back.  Easy-going.  Patient.  Only really making noise when something is quite wrong.  Ok, that one has changed a little, but she's still pretty quiet.  She "talks" a bit and cries occasionally when she doesn't want to sleep or when Levi is bugging her but mostly she is quiet and watching or playing.

 Kayden has been chewing on things but she doesn't really seem like she's teething yet.  She's not drooling excessively, acting uncomfortable, feverish...nothing.  Even her red cheeks seem to correspond to sickness and not teething.  Well, I guess she'll get teeth eventually :)  For now, I'll just enjoy not being bitten!  Those first teeth are RAZORS I tell you!

 Kayden not having teeth hasn't slowed down her food intake at all.  She has been downing TONS of  pureed baby food in between her meals of "real" food and breastmilk.  She eats pretty much everything we eat and gets frustrated if we don't share our food with her :)  She took her first bottle this month with very little coaxing.  She's also been drinking out of a straw cup a bit but not enough for me to feel good about weaning her completely.  We're working on it and I'm hoping that she will be completely weaned around her first birthday.

 Kayden weighs just over 17lbs and wears mostly 12 month clothes.  She is still on the smaller side for her age, but if I'm going to be carrying her around, it's probably for the better!  She is still not getting around on her own at all.  She can walk when we hold her hands and stand for a few seconds at a time on her own, but she isn't pulling herself up, isn't crawling, isn't even rolling as a means of transportation.  She is quite comfortable rolling over by herself now though!  I don't mind at all if Kayden is slower to start moving.  I'm enjoying the life of always knowing where at least one of my kids is!  She's always right where we leave her!

Kayden has learned to play peek-a-boo by herself this month!  It is so cute.  She'll grab a blanket or toy or, this morning, her shirt and lift it up to cover her face (or just over her head which doesn't cover her face but is cute nonetheless!) then put it down again.  "Where's Kayden??"  "OH! There she is!"  It's always good for a few laughs.  Kayden is learning new things to make us smile all the time.  If she notices that shaking her head "no" or patting something with her hand makes us smile, she will do it over and over.  That said, she doesn't really seem like an entertainer.  She's more of an explorer, doing things over and over to learn about the results more than to keep us laughing.

 It really feels like Kayden has turned into a snuggler this month.  I'm not sure if it's the Christmas festivities that have made her feel more snuggly or that she is just becoming more snuggly as she gets older but it always melts my heart when she lays her head on my shoulder or chest.  I'll take all the cuddles I can get!  She isn't a terribly shy girl, it doesn't seem, though there are times when she definitely prefers to be in my arms over anyone else's.  That said, if I leave the room, she can often be distracted with toys or animals and be fine without me.

 Kayden's favourite toys are still animals/dolls and if they are real life animals or babies, even better!  Her eyes just light up when she sees them and she squeals an excited "eee!"  Kayden has also discovered the fun of toys that make noise this month.  Buttons are so much fun.  She has also realized that any container with toys in it can be dumped so this has also become a favourite game.  Kayden seems to really enjoy music and starts to "dance" whenever a tune is playing.  Dancing, for her, consists of sitting down bounces...kinda like little ab crunches.  She'll just sit there bouncing.  It's pretty cute, but I'm biased :)

 Kayden's eyes are definitely not turning brown, that is 100% clear by now :)  But they are not staying a true dark blue either.  They still have blue around the edges but hazel is coming in from the middle now.  Depending on the day, they are either blue or grey or hazel.  Just like her daddy!  Her hair is still quite short but there are individual hairs that have survived from birth that stand straight up sometimes.  Her bald spot on the back is filling in nicely, though you can still see where it was.  Whenever I get anxious to start doing little girl hair, I just remind myself that once it starts growing, I'll have to do every day so I'll just enjoy this bald head as long as I have it!

 Kayden had her first Christmas this month.  With that came her first new years and her first night spent at "grandma and grandpa yellow puppy"'s house.  Other firsts?  Not sure.  It's been a fairly uneventful month as far as firsts go.  She pulls her toques off every time, that's a first!  Umm...yeah.  Moving on...

 It's hard to believe that this is the last month of Kayden's first year.  We'll be celebrating her first birthday before we know it.  It feels like we just celebrated Levi's first birthday and now it's hers already.  Time sure flies.  Cliche, yes.  But it's true.  We love our little Kayden Grace.  Happy 11 months, my girl!

Oh, and I almost forgot!  Sleep!  The issue that just keeps giving :) Actually, we've made some significant steps ahead in this department this month!  I was just so exhausted and at my wit send trying to get Kayden to sleep through the night. I had tried EVERYTHING and everything just seemed to make it worse. So finally I decided that, just for ONE night, I would not respond to her at all. I knew she wasn't hungry, no ear issues, not sick. And one night of no mama wouldn't kill her or scar her for life. Turned out she just cried 12 minutes the first time, 10 minutes the second time, and 90 minutes the third time. But she made it through!  And seeing how well she did, I decided to stick with it. A few days/weeks later and she's sleeping through the night more often than not!!!  We hear her wake up sometimes but she just puts herself back to sleep. You wouldn't believe how luxurious it feels to go to bed knowing that I might not have to get up until morning. It has been a long time coming :) Oh, sweet sleep how I've missed you...

Ten Months Old

Kayden Grace is 10 months old.  That feels dangerously close to the one year mark!  This little missie sure is growing up these days.  I feel like she has grown up a LOT this month.

I have no idea how big Kayden is.  Her legs are definitely stretching in preparation of the first steps which are just around the corner.  She probably weighs more than last month but she doesn't feel much bigger so who knows.  Last month she was about 16.5lbs so this month she's probably around 17lbs.  Our bathroom scale battery died this month so I have no way of checking where she's at :) She's officially grown out of anything smaller than 12 month sleepers, though 6-12 month shirts and even 6 month pants still fit.

Kayden's hair is slowly coming in, though she still has a pretty prominent bald spot at the back.  Kayden's eye-hand coordination is ever-improving.  She can easily grab even the smallest little pieces with thumb and forefinger and put them carefully into her mouth.  She choked on her first marble this month, thanks to this skill...though I'm sure if presented with the opportunity, she would have managed this earlier.  Yes, everything still goes in the mouth.  I'm sure she's teething by now but no teeth have made an appearance yet.  And all day long, she's still happy as a clam so if she is teething...best teether EVER!

Her playing has changed a bit this month. She's discovered the fun of peek-a-boo, pulling a blanket over her face to hide from us then moving it with a big smile as we say "peek!"  She bangs toys together on purpose now, just to hear the noise. As I watch her play, she seems more deliberate in her actions, as though every movement is an experiment to see what will happen as a result. She also seems to be finding her "silly" side as she sometimes will do something just to make us laugh. This is just starting though and has maybe happened once or twice that I've noticed. She has also discovered her toes this month and put her toes in her mouth for the first time this morning. Late, I know. I blame cloth diapers for reduced range of motion :)

Kayden's sleep patterns have not improved at all this month.  I moved her into our room (as mentioned in the last post here) but the results have been not as drastic as I'd hoped.  She has this terrible habit of waking up between 10-11pm every night and crying for 1-3 hours.  Nothing seems to be wrong except that we're not holding her.  If we pick her up, she is happy and calm but we put her down and there is screaming so intense that she starts gagging.  Seriously, girl.  Just sleep!  After that night-interruption, she usually sleeps in 2.5-3 hour increments before waking again for a feed.  She goes to bed between 7-7:30 and wakes for the day between 7:30-8:30am.

Kayden is a happy happy girl.  Well, "content" is maybe a better word.  We don't hear alot of giggles from her and even smiles are not a constant thing.  It's not hard to get her to smile if you're part of her family, but you'll most likely get a serious face if you're anyone else.  She is often a quiet observer, occasionally making a little noise or babbling a few words.  She definitely doesn't have any "words" yet.  No "dada" or "mama" or anything like that. She does have sounds like "aah!" and "ayaah!" that come out more regularly but it doesn't seem like she's trying to talk much yet. She loves animals, babies and faces/fuzziness in general.  She gets most excited when she sees animals (pictures or real life), babies (pictures or real life or dolls), or her brother playing and laughing excitedly.  When she gets excited, she flaps her arms like she wants to just fly over there and join in the fun.  Sometimes she almost tips herself over, she is flapping so wildly. 

Kayden's most notable changes have been in the physical realm this month.  She has become quite the steady stander, even just in the last week or two.  Her favourite is to hold onto our fingers and then steady herself and let go.  She can stand on her own in the middle of the room for seconds at a time!  It's incredible, really.  She's even tried to move her foot forward on a couple occasions but actual steps and walking are still a ways away, I think.  Though at this age it can happen so fast!  Kayden is not crawling yet, nor skooching, nor rolling so once she gets fed up enough with not being mobile, I think she'll just work on walking that much harder.  I wouldn't be surprised if she just skipped crawling altogether.  I say that she's not rolling but as of this morning, she has now rolled both ways (front to back and back to front) at least once.  :)  She mostly just lays down the way we put her though.  She can rotate in circles a bit when she's laying down or sitting up but even that doesn't happen alot.

Kayden loves to eat.  She often insists on eating what we're eating, even if I've already put a version of it on her high chair.  It sometimes just NEEDS to be out of our bowls.  She does incredibly well, considering she has no teeth.  She still nurses every 3 hours (day and night - sheesh), but is more and more ok with stretching that a bit.  Today she went 4.5 hours and was freaking out a bit and I couldn't figure out why - it's so unlike her!...until I realized that I hadn't fed her since before we left for town that morning and it was now 3pm.  In my defense, I did give her some lunch while we were eating but still.  Poor girl. I haven't been very careful with introducing one food at a time this time around.  Even starting with pureed foods and working up to different textures has been different from last time.  It went from a little bit of baby cereal straight to crackers and all sorts of things.  But I followed her lead and she's done great with it.  I think I'll go this route again if we ever have more kids.  It's much less work and stress than the way "they" say to do it!

Here is a picture of Kayden trying to stand on her own on the couch.  Notice both hands are off the couch?  She practices standing alone ALL the time.  She's getting pretty good at it :)  She seems quite willing to try new things over and over again until she gets it.  I try not to compare the kids, but Levi's personality seems much more hesitant to try things unless he knows he'll succeed on his first try.  Kayden seems to be much more willing to experiment and try things over and over again until they work, not phased at all by things not working the first time.  This is only one way that Kayden is different from her brother.  It has been interesting to see how these two are different.  Right from the beginning, they have been two totally different kids.  And they compliment each other so well.  I think they'll have fun growing up together :)




What a crazy and fun 10 months it has been.  You make being a mommy easy, Kayden. Even when you are awake and crying in the middle of the night, you give the best smiles and hugs.  We love you to pieces and look forward to another month with you!