11 Months

Where's Stella?


There she is!

Stella is 11 months old today. In a month she'll be one. Wow.


Stella with her first balloon. Unbelievably, she hasn't popped it yet!

Happy Sunday!

A Day in the Life of an 11 Month Old

As you can see, it's a pretty rough life being a baby:


Fresh, homemade food put in front of me three times a day, kicking back to eat at my leisure...

Stella's just a little over a month away from her first birthday. It's amazing to think of how much she's changed in that time. We're even starting to have more communication with her. When we say "water" she looks at her sippy cup; she can even make a baby sign to ask for water when she wants it. And she's learned the name of at least one of her many toys and stuffed animals:


Monkey!

After breakfast, we typically set her down in the living room while we clean up the aftermath of the meal, and Stella typically pulls out and flips through many of her books. This always makes me smile, but it's been hard to get a picture of it. Whenever she sees me with the camera, she comes crawling.


Morning book time!

And we're coming up to our first Halloween. Stella had her very first costume party today. We were thinking at first that she'd be a monkey (one of her first nicknames was "Tummy Monkey", hence the stuffed monkey seen above!), but then our friends who travelled around the world showed up with a panda head hat from China and it was clear what she would be this year.


Baby Panda!

Of course, the downside of basing her costume around a hat is that she's pretty intent on pulling it off as soon as it's on her head. (Same with socks and shoes.) So mostly she looks like a baby in black and white. Maybe a penguin. Maybe a skunk. Maybe just a lame parent without a good costume idea. Until we pull the hat out and put it on her head--briefly--again. Oh well!

Mom and Babe Friday Adventure

Adventure time!

I generally treasure my Fridays home with Stella, but today has been an especially good one. Stella woke up from her morning nap in really good spirits, smiling, laughing, playing with her toys and generally being a lot of fun to be around.


Playing with Monkey. Before that, she was playing peekaboo with her burp cloth.


Coming to investigate the camera

After a quick lunch, we headed downtown to meet a friend from our midwifery clinic at the Aquarium. Tyler and I have been meaning to take Stella there for months, and it was a lot of fun. She especially loved the shore birds, the seals and the sea otters.


In front of the "Window on Washington Waters" which was pretty cool

Besides this fun day, we've managed to capture a couple other good moments on video. We can still occasionally find something that makes Stella laugh hysterically, over and over again. This particular time, it had to do with my realization that my socks and her shirt were closely coordinated. Two days ago, it was fake sneezing. You never know, and you kind of have to take advantage of it, because it always stops being funny. (This also usually happens in the evening when Stella tends to get a little manic when she's getting ready for bedtime.....)


Hilarity!

She's also started giving "kisses"....


Kissing Daddy

Before this, Stella was trying to kiss Tyler's cheek/chin (which she does to me), but his beard kept confusing her....

Cruising with my Crew

It seems like--all the sudden--we have a cruiser:



It's amazing to think of how much Stella has grown in the past 10 months. She's a smiley, social, inquisitive, observant baby who loves animals and music. She's got an independent spirit and can be a little stubborn, but I certainly can't fault her for those qualities. Her little joyous baby spirit is infectious, and I'm still anxious to hear what's going on in that little head of hers.

I've been meaning to post for awhile. Somehow, life has felt really busy. I was sick, Stella got sick, I had my first trip away, I got a promotion at work (I'm now Vice President of Evaluation), our office moved to a new building where I have an office with a window and an amazing view (I just need to remember to take my camera to work) and we're navigating the schedule of a baby who needs to take two naps a day, at a certain time, in her crib, and eat food three times a day. It's not easy to just pack up and run errands, meet friends, or do things outside of the house. Suddenly, life feels like it's all about Stella's eating and sleeping again.

Unfortunately, we've misplaced the cord from our camera to download pictures, so the video will have to do for tonight! More (hopefully) soon....