They say it's your birthday!

JC all brand new on his birth day, one year ago

Today is JC’s first birthday!!!!!!!!

I really wish I had my blog earlier so I could have done little posts like this every month but I figure better late than never right?

It’s crazy to think about how much change has happened in the last year. When I brought JC home, he pretty much slept all day. Being a newborn plus the added fact that he was a preemie made it so that he slept for about 2-3 hours, would wake up to eat and then immediately fall back asleep. I knew it was important that he saved his energy so he could grow and get bigger. Now he’s so active and alert. He’s a little person interacting with the world around him, learning a million new things every day. I feel truly blessed to witness his ability to find joy in the simplest acts. Everything is brand new to him and he loves it.

Let’s go through some stats shall we…

JC ‘s sleep schedule has been pretty much the same for the past three months or so. He wakes up between 9 and 10. He goes down for his morning nap between 11:30 and 12. He sleeps until about 1:30 or 2. His afternoon nap normally occurs between 4:30 and 5:30. He sleeps until about 6-6:30. We start his bedtime routine around 9 and he’s down for the night between 9:30-10. When it comes to sleep, I really can’t complain. This kid is a champion napper. He has slept through the night since he was about 4 months old. OCCASIONALLY he wakes up in the middle of the night due to teething pain but it’s very few and far between. I feel pretty lucky that I have a baby who loves sleep as much as I do.

He’s eating three solid meals a day now. We are still nursing about four times a day. Well I guess three times a day since yesterday when I decided to officially start weaning him. We are both ready. JC’s favorite foods are scrambled eggs (with cheese, bell peppers, and/or tomatoes), rice & beans, avocados, yogurt with rice cereal & mashed up blueberries, ANY pasta/sauce combination, and quesadillas. He mostly drinks water but he has had a little bit of orange juice a couple of times and he LOVES it. He likes to feed himself with his hands but he hasn’t quite figured out that you need to tilt a cup to get water out of it. I’ve tried switching his sippy cups from a cup that has a soft sippy part to one that is hard but I’m not sure if he gets how it works. He finally seems to get how straws work now though and he likes drinking from them.

His favorite toys are his train and his new “mail cart” as I call it. Both of these are big and have wheels and are meant to push around while standing up. He is getting a lot better at pushing them without falling over. His favorite books are Biscuit and Baby Faces. They’ve been his favorite for a while. JC really only notices the TV when Sesame Street is on it; Elmo is his favorite. Besides that he isn’t huge on television.

JC is an expert crawler and pulling himself up to a stander. I catch him letting go of whatever he’s supporting himself with and he can stand for 10-20 seconds before he falls down. One of his favorite things to do is pull himself up to a stand using our headboard on our bed and falling down on purpose. He’ll fall on his butt and then on his back and he’ll laugh and laugh. It’s so funny to watch him play little games like this. He also loves to dance. His favorite songs are anything that involve a guitar, but especially Jack Johnson. Or when his daddy plays for him. Katy Perry is still his number one lady.

He’s starting to figure out how to clap. He’ll put his hands together and move them up and down. His pincer grip is pretty much down pat. He’s really good at picking up cheerios and other little pieces of food and feeding himself. He tries to pet the cat but usually ends up pulverizing her. Luckily, she’s really sweet and seems to be ok with it.

He says the words “dada”, “mama”, “baby”, and as of yesterday “birthday”. If he knows what they mean, that’s a different story. He has become quite the babbler. He used to be the strong, silent type but lately he will sit on the floor and babble all day. He’s also what you could call a “hand talker”.

Baths are very enjoyable. We are still using the little inflatable tub in the big bathtub but he’s getting more and more curious about the rest of the bathtub around him. He likes to stand up and splash down on his baby booty.

We are FINALLY getting some teeth! Well a tooth, to be exact. It is his bottom right center tooth, if that makes sense. It made it's first appearance a couple weeks back and has been slowly but surely making its way up. JC totally digs brushing his teeth tooth too. 

That’s pretty much JC, in a nutshell. He’s still super mellow and easy going. He has a little bit of stranger anxiety that’s setting in but that’s normal. It just takes him a little bit to warm up to you if he hasn’t seen you before or in a long time (which for him is more than a day). But once he does, he loves most people. I’m really looking forward to what the next year has in store for us!

I’ve still got to go through all the birthday party pictures from the weekend. I’ll get those up ASAP! Here's a teaser picture.

That is my adorable cake monster. Needless to say, he enjoyed his birthday cake.

<3 Melissa