1 Year Old!!!

We made it!  We made it to Quinn's 1st birthday...and what a birthday it was!  We had our families here to celebrate with us, which made it that much more special.  Continuing in a silly tradition that my sister and I have, we gave Quinn a little slice of birthday cake for breakfast (following her toast of course) on her birthday.

Not too sure about her first cake...

We hosted a super fun birthday party with lots of friends and family...and lots of little ones too!  Complete with 2 cakes and a BBQ, I think that Quinn had a great time!

Feeding a gum paste butterfly to her Daddy

The destroyed "smoosh" cake

In other news, Quinn had her 1 year check up and is doing great!  She now weighs 18lbs 7 oz and is following the 10th percentile curve.  She's just petite!  Quinn also just had her check-up with the ortho doctor about her club foot progress and Dr Kontio was very impressed with how she was doing!  We don't have to go back to see him for another 9 months!

As of last night, we started to give Quinn some whole milk at bedtime to start weaning her off of breastmilk.  She was nursing twice a day - once after waking up in the morning and the other time before bed.  Since we are hopefully going to be trying for baby #2 soon, it's time to wean little Miss Q.  She's definitely ready as the doctor has said that it's time to start weaning at this point anyway and I'm emotionally ready to stop.  Not to mention that with her teeth, it's starting to get a bit uncomfortable and she sometimes bites! Ouch!  I can't believe how quickly she's growing up!

Almost Reached The Big "1 Year" Milestone!

A year ago today, everything was set in motion for the arrival of our little Quinn - it's the anniversary of the day that my water broke!  It's hard to believe that it's been a year!  So much has happened and we are truly blessed to have such a fantastic little girl to call our own.

The past few days have been busy getting ready for Quinn's birthday.  I've decided to make a lot of her decorations since custom decorations aren't cheap!  The pictures will be posted after her party...no spoilers here!  We also have our family coming up to spend Q's first birthday with us, so that's really exciting too.  Quinn's so surrounded by love.

It's been a little different lately with our daily routines.  Both of my friends who had been on mat leave with me have returned to work, so the dynamic is definitely different.  I try to structure our day by having at least 1 outing per day.  Usually it's strollercise twice a week, but we also go swimming on Fridays and other days Quinn hangs out in the daycare at the gym while I get a quick work out in.  Can't complain about that - the gym has an excellent day care with fantastic staff and Quinn loves to wave to everyone.

Quinn's also transitioned now to being in the "big girl bath".  We had been using an inflatable ducky tub, but now that she's outgrown that, it's time for the big stage!  She loves being able to splash around and try to chase her toys.  Tonight she really liked the noise that her feet made when she slid them across the rubber alligator decal on the bottom of the tub.

Still no walking or standing on her own, but she's starting to get a little bit more confident.  We try to get her to walk while only holding one of our hands, but she's still quite hesitant.

Quinn's still eating like a champ!  She's a big fan of yogurt lately, so we've taken to buying the individual Activia yogurts in different flavours.  So far vanilla and blueberry are a hit.  Quinn also decided that she really does like fried eggs, so that makes it easier on me for meal times to add in some different varieties of protein.  Her 1 year doctor's visit is coming up and that's when I'm going to ask the doctor about the reaction that Quinn had on her face to hummus.  Hopefully we'll get some good guidance there!

Here are a few pictures from today! Enjoy!

She loves these nutrigrain-like cereal bars for babies

She shoved that whole piece from the picture above into her mouth

Also a big fan of Mom's baked pasta casserole!

Gap-toothed grin!

It's Been a Busy Week

Last week was my sister's wedding and the week was definitely hectic!  Luckily, we have a fantastic little baby girl who was good as gold!  Keeping Quinn on a semi-normal schedule was a bit of a challenge, but that's what play pens are for.  It was also really helpful to have family around that could watch Quinn while I was busy with maid of honour duties.

All that aside, we made it through the crazy wedding week relatively unscathed.  Now it's just time to get ready for Quinn's 1st birthday - which we can't believe is already here!  We're so lucky to have family that are going to be traveling to celebrate with us.

Quinn's still eating up a storm!  Raisin bran muffins, hummus on bread, havarti cheese...you name it and she'll try it!  Also, after a long time coming, Quinn has 4 teeth and got them all in a month!

A little fussy but beautiful for the wedding

She loves going grocery shopping!

11 Months Old!!!

I can't believe that Quinn is 11 months old already.  It feels like just yesterday that we were bringing her home from the hospital.  We've definitely been blessed as she is such a great baby with a wonderful personality.  She's still sleeping very well, even with the teething!  We've only had 1 night that wasn't so great, so fingers crossed that it continues.  Quinn's also very social.  She loves to sit in the shopping carts where she can see everyone and then bask in all of the "she's so cute!" compliments.  She's big on waving to everyone too so that they look at her...I think that we'll have our hands full with our little charmer!

What fun Quinn has been having with food!  I'm starting to relax a bit more with what I'm feeding her and starting to feed her some of our food as opposed to the semi-bland (spice-wise) food that I've been making - think plain pasta, plain steamed veggies, etc.  That being said, Quinn has tried (and loved!) shepherd's pie, zucchini quiche, and spaghetti with meat sauce.  I was definitely glad to get her to eat the quiche since she doesn't seem to like the consistency of  scrambled or fried eggs and I wanted to ensure that she wasn't allergic.

Spaghetti face!!!

Quinn also cut another tooth last week!  So now she has both on the bottom and the top two are definitely not far behind - I can see the whites through her gums.  Her little toothy smile is just too sweet!

As far as crawling goes, she's still doing her funny belly flop to get around.  Sometimes she'll do a couple of moves forward in a "normal crawl", but then it's back to the belly.  She can really move, so I guess that she's just efficient!

Falling asleep at Strollercise

Big girl eating out of her new bowls!

Teeny Tiny Peanut

OK...now what is the latest to report?  First of all, we've made the decision that I am going to be a stay-at-home-mom for the next few years!!!  HUGE decision and we're so happy with it!  I absolutely love being a mom and am lucky enough to have the opportunity to do this!  Plus, later on when I decide to return to active practice, I have a career path that allows me some flexibility (i.e. I could work from home if I chose).

Enough about me...on to Quinn!  Last month we had gone to the doctor for her 9 month check-up and she had dropped off of her weight curve, so our doctor said to come back in a month to re-weigh her and see if she has bumped back up or stay on the new curve.  Turns out that she has decided to change curves, which is completely normal at this age.  Quinn's head circumference and length have stayed on their curves (75th and 50th, respectively), and her weight is now following the 10th percentile - she weighs a whopping 16 lbs 8 oz!!!  It's funny that she's so slight seeing how the kidlet eats like a piglet!

Quinn's also walking around furniture now.  She hasn't yet stood on her own yet, but you can definitely see the wheels turning!  She's also mimicking what we say...it's usually either "mama" or "nana" and the occasional "dada".  We haven't counted any of them as her first words yet...but it's coming! :)

Finally making progress with a sippy cup

Eating out of a bowl...new work in progress

Loves pesto sauce!

Loves blueberries even more

But it looks like raspberries might be the new favourite

Quinn vs. Avocado

So I'm not a big fan of avocado...but usually Quinn is.  It's been a great fruit to have around since she started eating solids - I used to just scoop it out with a spoon to feed it to her.  The other day, I cut one up in chunks and she fed herself and she ate the entire thing!  This made me happy that I had bought 2, although it made a giant mess all over Q, her high chair, and the floor (I made sure to strip her down to her diaper beforehand)...she definitely needed a bath afterward!

Tonight being bath night, I decided to let Quinn at the second avocado.  And she HATED it!  She kept spitting the chunks out.  I thought to trick her by putting the chunks in her mesh feeder, and that worked for a little bit, but then she wised up.  Eventually I just gave up because I had had enough of catching the chunks that she kept purposefully dropping on the floor.

Here are the pictorial evidence of tonight's conquest by Quinn:

My little Shrek-face

Floor destruction

The many attempts to get Q to eat avocado - spoon, cut up with a knife, mesh feeders

First Tooth

It finally happened...yesterday as we were talking to my parents on Skype, I noticed something in Miss Q's mouth.  At first I thought that maybe it was a spit bubble on her gums as she was talking up a storm, but then I realized that her gums had opened and there was a little tooth poking its head out!  Then on further inspection (i.e. running my thumb over her gums) I felt the edge.  Wow!!!  She was definitely a late bloomer in the tooth department, as this tooth made its appearance at 10 months and 4 days old.

Other than that, Q's been motoring around like nobody's business.  She's still doing the funny swim/crawl thing, but it's very efficient and probably gets her around faster than if she crawled the old fashioned way.  She's also very good at pulling herself to standing on anything - coffee tables, her play table (her favourite toy at the moment), someone's legs - and much prefers to be standing anyway.  We've installed a baby gate on the main floor to keep her away from the stairs and are probably going to gate off the other stair access points this weekend.  Yesterday she decided to crawl up a couple of stairs after the cat...so it's time to rope that off!

Food-wise things are getting quite fun - Quinn's eating with her hands now, so everything is a new experience.  Sometimes I'll throw in the odd puree or cereal, but mostly her meals have consisted of finger foods.  She's a big fan of toast fingers and cheese bits!