Audrey Katana

Behold the beauty that is Miss Audrey Katana on her 1st birthday. (And before anyone asks, yes, she did wear 3 different outfits today.)

Happy birthday, tiny one. You are so loved.

Audrey had her 1st birthday party today, even though her birthday is next week,  lucky girl. She had a great time. There were presents and food, and most importantly, cake.

The party was duck themed, as chosen by Zoe, on Audrey's behalf.

There was a big cake for everyone.

Audrey tried to get in on that action...

but she had her own cake.

May I present the love story between a girl and her cake.

"Hey look! A duck!"

"Gotcha, little ducky!"

"Hey, what's this?"

"Hey, can you hold this for me?"

"Hey, wait a minute, that's MY duck!"

"CAKE! AND A DUCK! AND CAKE!"

"YAY CAKE!"

"Oh goodness, so much cake!"

"I approve of this entire experience."

Now that’s the way to celebrate a birthday. Happy early birthday, tiny one.

Tiny can say “Hi”, but only when she wants to- she’s no monkey, here to perform for your amusement.

She’s also eating like a fiend, and her 8th tooth (front left) is poking through.

She keeps trying to boycott her morning nap.

That is all

Before I forget:
Audrey has 2 more teeth- the upper middle right and the one right next to it on the right (that one came in first), with the upper middle left and the one right next to it on the left working hard to come through too.

She can effectively do the signs for “food” and “all done”.

She can say “dada’ when prompted, but I don’t know if she connects it to Bruce yet.

She’s sleeping really well (knock on wood- a lot) – through the night and slight, but decent naps, except on Sunday when she eschews any and all naps.

She goes to sleep at 6 pm and sleeps until around 6 am, not too shabby. (Again, lots of knocking on wood.)

She’ll eat almost anything you put in front of her- cheese, grapes, apples, strawberries, pretzels, bagel; she’ll pick them right up and eat them. Once we get her high chair we’ll try new and inventive cuisine.

She really really really wants to crawl. She’s getting really close- she crawls backwards quite effectively, and does one or two scoots forward before going onto her stomach flystyle.

She swam the other day- I put her down in the swimming pool and she kicked to get to me. She wasn’t at all happy about it, but she did it!

That’s all for now, pictures to come soon. Especially because she was wearing monkey ears yesterday.

Audrey is apparently allergic to mangos. Yes, I’m being far more adventurous with her food-ing than I was with Z.

She also took (or is in the process of taking) 2 naps today LONGER than 1/2 hr, hallelujah! The last two days have been rough. She has a cold, and that’s not helping.

She’ll be crawling any day now. I think she’s plotting to make a break for it at an opportune time.

She can wave full handed, and sometimes dual armed. It’s highly amusing.

That is all, carry on.

SHE SLEPT THROUGH THE NIGHT! 12 HOURS!!

Whether or not that happens again tonight is yet to be seen, but there is light at the end of the tunnel, and it may or may not be the sleep train, depending on whether that’s a good thing.  Is it good to collide with the sleep train?  🙂

So we’ve had two nights of sleep training, or as it could be called, Project Exercise Those Lungs.

The first night, Audrey went to bed at 6 and fell asleep some time after that- after crying and screaming for her binky. She falls asleep just fine usually at 6, so I knew it was just the lack of binky that was making her mad. She slept until 10, when she usually gets to eat- the first big test. I let her cry, and then scream when she realized I wasn’t coming- and that went on for 1/2 hr.  Then she fell asleep and slept until 2 (again, a usual time for her to wake up). This time she was raring to go from the second she woke up, and screamed intermittently for an hour before she fell asleep. That was one long hour, let me tell you. Luckily I had my iPod, and just listened to Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy while she wailed. She slept until 6ish, when I figured it was only fair that she get to eat, seeing as it was morning.

Last night, she went down at 6 and set up a wail again, but fell asleep pretty quickly. Then she proceeded to wake up every hour or so until about 10 and cry for a little bit and then fall back asleep. I really think that had less to do with the sleep training than with the fact that she’s just gotten comfortable rolling onto her tummy, but not back onto her back- so she rolls onto her tummy in bed, gets mad about it, falls asleep, wakes up and is still on her tummy, and remains mad about it. Lather, rinse, repeat.   At ten she went on for a while, but once she fell back asleep, she slept until 6 this morning.  I could tell she was still tired, but she really wanted to eat, so I got her up, made everything really bright so she knew it was daytime, fed her and kept her up to play for a while, and then put her down for a nap around 7. She fell right to sleep and slept for another hour or so.

Tonight I put her down at 6, and she grabbed her blanket and was out almost before I got to the door. We’ll see what happens tonight- cross your fingers!!

Audrey just turned 8 months and is a little darling.  She has 2 teeth (on the bottom) and 2 more threatening to come in on top. She rolls over onto her belly really well – she can roll onto her back but doesn’t prefer it.  She grabs at everything,  and passes things really well from hand to hand.  She can sit up decently well by herself, unless she leans to one side or the other, then she’s done.  She isn’t sleeping through the night but will be soon (BWAAAAHAAAHAAA!!) – we’re starting sleep training tonight.   (Pray for us.)  She “talks” a lot, babbling and shouting most of the day.  Here’s some pictures of her looking cute.

Playing with a balloon

I just think this is a cool picture

Looking a little perturbed (she wasn't actually, she just looked that way.)

Playing with her big sister

And channeling her inner Godzilla:

One minute ago Audrey rolled over, from her back to her front.  She’s been trying for about a week now, so we’re quite excited on her behalf.  She’s rather bemused.

Just popping in here quickly to note that Audrey started smiling 3 days ago and it’s adorable.