I can't believe that Lizzy's first year has already flown by. It has gone too fast for us, but we are enjoying one year old Lizzy so much. We thought this might be a good time to give an extended update on Lizzy. Lizzy loves:
Music. Since the time she was about 3 months old, music has had an amazing effect on her. It can soothe her when nothing else can. She would be happy listening to music all day and seems to hear the music in everything. She catches it in the background at stores, restaurants and on TV.
Lizzy has a lot of toys that play music and right now the other features don't interest her as much. She will just push the buttons that play songs over and over again and dance while she listens. She has a small toy that she can carry with her that plays classical music and she will just hold that up to her ear and play the songs over and over again in the car. She also loves the Primary songs and her favorite Christmas music is Mannheim Steamroller.
Books. Lizzy loves looking at books. We read a story before every nap and every night before bed and she enjoys it so much. She likes to just pick up books and look through them by herself. Her favorite is a popup book she got from her cousins.
Food. She recently went through a phase where she could just eat constantly all day long. She was like a little hobbit with 7 meals every day. Her favorite foods are Bananas, Eggs and Chili Cheese Fritos but she will eat pretty much anything we give her. Her 6th tooth is just breaking through now, so she has 4 on top and 2 on bottom. Just recently she learned to fold her arms for prayers and does it faithfully every time we pray together. It is so sweet.
Play. Lizzy loves to play, obviously. She is pretty adventurous. She has liked riding on Daddy's shoulders since she was about 8 months old. Besides all of her toys that make music, she likes fitting toys together and is starting to figure out the rings toy. She enjoys sitting on her little walker car or pushing it around the room and lately she likes to pull out the chairs from our dining table and push them around the room.
Lizzy loves playing peek-a-boo, getting pushed around on her car, climbing stairs and being chased. She also loves getting into everything. Lizzy is always moving. She has reached a hard age for church, but we've found if we feed her puffs she can be pretty good in meetings. Changing her diaper or getting her dressed can be a challenge most days because she hates to sit still. We have had to dress her standing up since she was 9 or 10 months old.
Lizzy is very social. It takes her a while to warm up to adults but she loves all kids. She really enjoys playing with other kids and loves her cousins so much. She really likes the attention of adults as well.
Laughing. She seems to have a great sense of humor and laughs at the funniest things, including whenever we are laughing at something. But she now also laughs by herself at her own private jokes.
Talking. Lizzy still says Mommy and Daddy when she wants to, but lately she has started saying, "I Done" when she is done eating or doing any other activity. She also says "Nana" for banana and "Doll", which is so cute. She yells out "hi" every time we answer the phone. She likes to jabber a lot.
Standing/Walking. Lizzy loves to stand and will just stand by herself in the middle of the room for long periods of time now. This just started so suddenly a few weeks ago. She is making a little progress on walking every day. She doesn't do it much but we have gotten her to spend a few minutes with us every evening walking back and forth and the distances have slowly gotten a little larger each day.
Sleep. Lizzy is keeping a pretty good sleep schedule. She takes 2 naps throughout the day, and though they vary every day, she usually gets 2.5-3 hours of sleep with both. She also goes to bed really well by about 7pm every night. She isn't sleeping as well as she used to, thanks to the new excitement of unassisted standing and walking, but still does pretty well.
Lizzy is the sweetest, happiest little baby. Her birthday and Christmas were so much fun. We are so glad to have her and are excited for all the things we are all going to learn in her second year.
