15 months, 1 week

 

Kerala had her well baby visit last week and it went really well. She jumped from 5% to 10% in weight and the doctor was really pleased with her weight gain. This is the first time since she was a tiny baby that she has jumped up a weight category, so I was pretty psyched. The doctor was also pleased with Kerala's language and general development. Kerala's latest two words are "flower" and "Elmo" (although she also refers to a Cookie Monster doll as Elmo). We are not really sure how she picked up Elmo since she doesn't watch tv, but she does have an Elmo doll that she loves which I guess we have called Elmo. The doctor also noticed that Kerala is getting her molars in, which may explain why she has been waking up at night (last night she woke up at 1:00am and 4:00am). I couldn't have been happier with the appointment, although Kerala wasn't psyched - she basically cried the entire exam and only seemed to briefly calm down after the doctor left the exam room and before her shots (poor girl).

As you can tell by the photo, Kerala has been getting some time in her baby pool. She also went to the local pool once and had a blast. Kerala is still pretty obsessed with her doll stroller. She now tries to lift the stroller up the stairs - fortunately, she can only lift the stroller onto the first stair. She also will roll over you if you are sitting or lying down in her way. Finally, Kerala's new thing is to blow on or tickle your belly to make you laugh. The other night she kept blowing on Troy's belly before bedtime and was getting the biggest kick out of it. Every time Troy would start to laugh, Kerala would laugh and fall down.

14 months, 4 weeks

 

I know, it has been forever since we last posted. Troy has been busy studying for the bar exam, Kerala had a bad cold and fever and I was busy with work. Things are a bit better now, although I do have to work this weekend.

We have Kerala's 15 month appointment this week and, suprisingly, I am not dreading the weigh in. Kerala is tiny and I get really anxious prior to her weight check. Tonight though we weighed Kerala on JT and Tamra's scale - Troy stepped on the scale and weighed himself and then he stepped back on with Kerala. The scale said she was over 20 pounds! I didn't believe it, so I weighed her again and we got the same result. We will see on Tuesday just how accurate their scale is. If she is over 20 pounds, then that means she gained over 2 pounds since her last check up. I do think she has been eating better thanks to Ellen who has come up with some very creative and delicious recipes.

Kerala has been doing really well with developing her verbal skills. Today she started to respond with "ooh, ooh" when you ask her what an owl says. She also loves to say "uh oh." The other day she said "uh oh" when her friend dropped her water. She also went over and handed it back to her friend! Last Sunday, I swear she said something that sounded like strawberry, but she hasn't repeated so I am not going to count that one yet. All in all, she is up to about 20 words or so. The crazy thing is we don't know how she picks up some of the words. For instance, a few weeks ago in bath she kept pointing to my hands and saying "bubble" when I was soaping her up. Troy and I really don't recall saying "bubble" a lot, but I guess it only takes one or two times and she will pick something up.

14 months, 1 week, 3 days

 

Thank you everyone for your responses regarding milk. I received a number of great suggestions and Kerala's milk intake is getting better. Unfortunately, we have to add Ovaltine to her milk to get her to drink it, but at least we are getting somewhere. Today, she was actually really excited to get her milk, which is such a nice change. Her improved milk intake has made up for her not so great appetite the last couple of days.

This past weekend we bought Kerala a doll stroller that she absolutely loves. She saw the stroller at a bbq on Saturday and was quite obsessed with getting her hands on it. I ran out that evening and picked one up for her and she has been playing with it ever since. It's pretty funny because it's the same brand and style as her actual stroller. She looks pretty cute walking around with it. She usually puts either her duck, a doll or my phone and a sippy of water in the stroller as she pushes it around. Unfortunately, she now wants to push everything around - today at the zoo, she insisted on pushing her stroller rather than sitting in it or walking with us. It made some slow going, but we still had a good time. She got very excited when we saw the dolphins and elephants, but other than those animals she didn't really want to have anything to do with animals.

Over the past couple of weeks, Kerala has added quack, tree and bowl to her vocabulary. When you ask her what a duck says she will generally respond with duck and when she picks up her duck she usually says "quack quack." She also seems to be having conversations with herself, which are pretty cute. I can't wait for her to really begin talking because she sounds like she has the sweetest little voice.

13 months, 3 weeks, 4 days

 

I know we have not posted forever. Things have been somewhat hectic and Kerala actually has not been feeling very well the past few days. She had a somewhat high fever towards the end of last week and, while the fever is gone, has been super super cranky this past weekend. We did make it to music class yesterday and Kerala had a special treat with a visit from my friend Tania. Tania and I became friends in 4th grade and she has been traveling around the world for the past 2 1/2 years. Kerala got to meet Tania and received a beautiful dress from Ethiopia.

Kerala continues to do well with developing a bit of a vocabulary and knowing her various body parts. This past week we realized she would point to her hair and feet if you asked her where they were located. Also, when you ask her what a horse says she will respond with "neigh neigh." Occasionally, she will also respond with panting if you ask her what a dog says. With respect to words, she may say a word a few times and then not say it again for a while. It does seem like most of her vocabulary is based on food - wa wa (water), apple, nana (banana), cracker, cheese, chex, and kix. We have also been working on high fives, which she seems to be getting somewhat.

We are still trying to figure out the sippy cup thing. I think I mentioned before that she takes water just fine, but refuses to take milk out of the sippy cup. This has definitely been a more difficult transition than when we transitioned her from nursing to the bottle. I am actually quite stressed about her milk intake. We still do a couple of bottles and are supplementing with extra yogurt and cheese, but the whole thing has me a bit freaked out so if anyone has any suggestions we would love to hear them. Today I sent to Target to get some different sippy cups to see if that would work. A number of people suggested using the sippy cups with the straw, but Kerala is having a difficult time figuring out the straw thing. We will keep plugging away, but beware Ushma (my roommate from college who is now a pediatrician) you may be getting a panicked call from me shortly.

As far as general family matters, this week is a very exciting week for the Smerry household - Troy is graduating from law school! We are so excited. Unfortunately, this does mean that he will have to start studying for the bar shortly. His graduation is this Friday. Northwestern does allow parents to bring their kids across the stage when they receive their diploma. While seeing Kerala up on stage would be adorable, the ceremony begins at 1:00 which is when Kerala goes down for her nap so she will miss it.

13 months, 5 days

 

We all had a great weekend. On Saturday, we went to Kerala's music class where she had a blast running around. We finished the day off at Henry's and Silas' birthday bash. Kerala had a great time playing with all of the little ones. Unfortunately, I didn't take a ton of photos, but check out Kerala and her bud Valerie Violet in the April photos. Kerala was sporting her new party dress that her Auntie Heather, Uncle Ryan and Cousin Hannah bought her for her birthday.

Yesterday, we took advantage of the fabulous weather with a trip to the park and a walk. We spent an hour (which in toddler time is an eternity) at the park. We had a great time and Kerala got to hang out with Silas and JT. On our evening walk, Kerala walked the entire time. She did fall a couple of times, but she got right back up. She was super psyched by the puppy that she met a long the way and even tried following the puppy when his owner and him started to go off in a different direction.

The only mishap from the weekend was when Kerala was flattened by a little girl in music class. Both Kerala and the little girl were running around and Gracie (the little blue eyed linebacker) ran into Kerala knocking Kerala down. Kerala was fine - I think she was more shocked than anything else. I felt really bad for little Gracie - she kept asking her mom if she was going to receive a time out.

Lately, Kerala has been doing the cutest little dance when we sing "Five Little Monkeys." During the song, Kerala will tap her head when we sing "one fell of bumped her head" and she will point her finger as if she is saying "no" when we sing "No more monkeys jumping on the bed." It's so funny how she picks things up. I always tap her head when I sing the song to her, but I didn't realize she was making the connection between her head and the song.
Kerala has also added "apple" to her list of words and today she pointed to her "mouth" when I asked her where it was.

1 year, 3 weeks, 5 days

 

Kerala and I have had a fabulous week. I have been home on vacation and Kerala and I have had such a blast. We have been really really busy with trips to the Nature Museum and the Children's Musuem in Oak Park. Kerala really enjoyed the butterfly haven at the Nature Museum and was enthralled with two dead butterflies. The Children's Museum was okay, but I don't think we will make the trek out there again. We also went to story time at a local book store. Unfortunately, Kerala did end up making a little boy cry during story time. He seemed to be a pretty sensitive little guy, but I did feel pretty bad about it. She didn't hit him, just yelled at him. While we can't really reason with her, we have been trying to say no. She clearly understands no as evidenced by her repeatedly telling me no when I was trying to put a diaper on her tonight.

Kerala has picked up a number of new skills this past week. She is now quite capable of climbing on furniture. Unfortuantely, today she has been trying to climb onto the window sill, which is problematic. She seems to be doing well with her communication skills. She typically points to her nose and tongue if you ask her. We have been working on belly and cheeks, which she seems to be figuring out as well. She also responds with what sounds like "moo" when you ask her what a cow says.

As far as food, let's just say Kerala enjoys somewhat spicy and flavorful foods. Troy made chili this week and I thought that there was no way she was going to eat it because it was too spicy. She gobbled it up and seemed to really enjoy it. One of her favorite dinners is this dish called the Chila Fry that we get from a local mediterannean restaurant. It's pretty fun to expose her to different foods and see her reaction.

1 year, 2 weeks, 4 days

 

Well, it isn't easy managing a blog and being a working mom - so that's why I haven't posted lately. Kerala has been doing fantastic. She primarily walks now, which is quite exciting. She loves to walk down the hallway carrying something (usually a box, a ball or these two huge red plastic pot holders that flop while she walks). She also seems to be doing pretty well with developing a vocabulary. While she isn't consistent, she seems to trying to say new words everyday. Yesterday during breakfast she kept looking at Cloud and saying what sounded like Cloud. Also, in the last two days it seems like she is pointing a lot more, which is helpful for us to figure out what she wants (although, sometimes she just points for the sake of pointing).

The only down point in the last couple of weeks was Kerala getting a fever. Last weekend she had a pretty high temperature Saturday and Sunday. This resulted in some restless sleep over the weekend for the whole family since Kerala was up quite a bit during the night. While her fever went away on Monday, Kerala did not resume sleeping through the night until last night.

As you can tell by our photos we are still trying to get organized with all of the fabulous birthday presents she received. Her favorite toy lately has been this duck that sings the chicken song. She just hugs that thing as soon as it starts to sing. Because of space constraints, we are going to have to rotate her toys, so some of her birthday toys will be going away for about a month.

So lately I have been on a big kick about the family eating healthy. With Kerala eating what we eat, Troy and I realize that we are going to have to change our eating habits. While we aren't horrible eaters, we do order out a lot and tend to rely on very quick and processed meals for dinner. Lately, I have started to try to make meals the night before so that all we have to do is heat them up when I get home. Troy has been enjoying it, but Kerala wasn't the biggest fan of what I made this week - stuffed shells, stuffed peppers. Hopefully, Troy and I can come up with recipes that please the whole family.