Our Mini Winnie: 12 Months Old

Lately, Laney loves standing. She crawls around and tries pulling herself up to a standing position on every piece of furniture in the house. There have been a few moments where she lets go of the furniture and stands on her own, but it's only for a second or two. We've had to take baby proofing to another level by removing everything within her (now much higher) reach. If you look around our house, the only things you'll find within a 3 foot distance off the floor are her toys. We're constantly on the lookout, because she keeps surprising us by grabbing things we didn't think she could get her hands on.

We've also been saying "No" more often. We try not to say it too much because we don't want her to start tuning us out and ignoring that word. We want it to retain some sort of value so she recognizes it as something serious whenever we say it. If she's doing something we don't want her to do, and we can distract her or easily stop what she's doing, we'll do that instead of saying No. But if she's doing something that could result in her getting hurt (like pulling herself up on the television console and slapping the TV, which could tip over), or if it's something she will repeatedly do no matter how many times we try to pull her away (like splashing her hands in Cash's water bowl and tipping it over), we'll give her a stern "No," pick her up (kicking and screaming), and move her away from that object. At this point, she has definitely learned which activities are off-limits, and she'll test us… For example, recently she crawled up to Cash's water bowl, looked right at me, and stuck her hand in the water. I said No, and the second I started walking towards her, she quickly turned and crawled away from me at top speed, smiling and squealing. I try so hard not to burst into laughter! She's such a stinker, and it really is the cutest thing, but I have to try to keep a straight face so she doesn't think I'm playing a game with her.

It's also difficult not to laugh when I tell her No and she keeps doing whatever she's doing over, and over, and over again. I do my best to give a consistent reaction so she understands that the same action will produce the same results, and I won't give in and let her get away with something if she's persistent. There was one time she pulled herself up on the TV console, I said No and pulled her away, and she crawled right back over to it and pulled herself up again. We repeated this about 10 times, and she never lost steam. By the 10th time she pulled herself up on the console, I was having a hard time not laughing. I couldn't hold back my giggles, because her determination was so cute and hilarious. I had to put her in her jumper to contain her and force her to do something else (she happily started jumping and forgot all about the TV).

At 1 year old, Delaney is FINALLY sleeping through the night on a pretty consistent basis (knock on wood)! She falls asleep around 8-8:30pm and sleeps until 6:30-7:00am. It's heaven for me! (Just in time for baby boy to arrive and the sleepless nights to start all over again… but that's okay, it's worth it.) Before having Delaney, I always imagined I would start sleep training around 6 months and my baby would would instantly start sleeping through the night. HA! Looking back on that, it's pretty hilarious. I was so wrong. She's an excellent sleeper, but when she would wake up in the middle of the night, she was hungry and she would NOT go back to sleep until she had a bottle. I got into the routine of letting her cry for 5-10 minutes to see if she'd fall back asleep (rarely she would), but if the crying grew louder and hit the 5-10 minute mark, I would just hop out of bed and get her a bottle. Every few weeks, I would let her cry to see if I could break the habit of waking up in the middle of the night for a bottle. Those nights, she could cry longer than an hour without losing steam. She'd just get louder and more angry as time passed, and the only way to get her back to sleep was to fill her little tummy. Knowing she was crying for a reason and not just to play, I couldn't let my hungry child cry (especially since she was growing so much - she needed that food) so I just resigned to the fact that I would have to get up and feed her each night. The bottle, burp, and diaper change only took about 20 minutes total, and she'd fall right back asleep. I, on the other hand, would get back into bed and lay there for an hour or two, trying to fall back asleep…thanks, pregnancy hormones. Fortunately, she seems to have settled into an awesome sleep routine. She still cries in her sleep once or twice every night, but it only lasts 2-3 minutes. She takes 2 long naps each day and falls right asleep for those, too. Good sleeper = happy mama!

Laney loves talking. We can't understand most of what she says yet, but a few of her favorite words that we can understand are "dada" (this makes Brad very happy) and "oh wow." Brad, Noni and I never realized how much we say "oh wow!" until Delaney started saying it. Now we notice ourselves saying it all the time, and she says it nonstop. It's so cute! When she wakes up from a nap, I can hear her on the monitor saying "oh wow wow wow," and she'll look at something, point, and say "oh wow!" She also repeats what a monkey says ("ooh ooh ooh ah ah ah") and what a bear says ("grrrrrr"). It's so much fun hearing her say things in that little girl voice.

Her first trip to the zoo, and she got a major close-up of a giraffe!