12 Months

Okay ... I'm really behind on this post because Micah had his 12 month check up before we left for a long trip to the Midwest.

I also left his stats on a piece of paper that I left in the Midwest ... oops. I don't remember the exact measurements, but I do remember the percentiles.

Weight: 48% (about 22lbs)
Height: 75%
Head: 90%

He's been done nursing since we left for our trip (note: I plan on writing a weaning blog soon) which worked out well because we had to leave him with his Aunt Katie for a few days while Colin and I packed up our house in Omaha.

The unfortunate thing for Aunt Katie was that he started separation anxiety around the same time. It started right before we left ... he wouldn't even let me leave the room without crying (perhaps it may have been related to the weaning?).

It took him quite awhile to warm up to his relatives and by the end of the 2 week vacation he was finally becoming more comfortable being without me. Since we've been back home the separation anxiety has seemed to lessen ... go figure.

I try to get Micah to drink about 20oz of whole milk a day (about two sippy cups worth) and he drinks it best when he uses a cup with a straw, but we're working on a regular sippy cup as well (although we take the one way valve out to make it easier for him).

He eats three meals a day and gets one snack in the afternoon. I'd say he's eating about 1 1/4 - 1 1/2 cups worth of food ground up in the baby food grinder for meals and has about 1/2 - 1 cup of cheerios or crackers for a snack in the afternoon. We've slowly been adding more texture/chunks to his ground food (i.e. oatmeal with raisins) and offering more finger foods as well. I also want to note that we've introduced him to honey and peanut butter now and he loves them!

His hemoglobin test came back low during his 12 month check up so we've been really pushing the cheerios and the baby cereal as well as adding a vitamin supplement with iron to his diet in the evenings as well. We'll go back at the beginning of December to check his hemoglobin again.

Micah's taking two naps a day (10:00 - 12:00 and 2:00 - 4:00), but it seems like he'll sleep his whole morning nap lately and shortens his afternoon nap showing signs of being ready to go down to one nap soon. The past couple of days I've tried to wake him up early from his morning nap to see if he'll sleep longer for his afternoon nap (so that both boys are taking long afternoon naps and I can have a few more moments to myself to get things done), but that hasn't been working.

However, I can't complain because he's still sleeping wonderfully at night. There were a couple of nights when we were on vacation that he woke up in the middle of the night, but that was because he was sick and/or not used to having us sleeping in the room with him. I feel the need to dedicate a future blog to our travel adventures though.

Micah has become VERY efficient in his crawling and can get around pretty fast. He LOVES to be chased ... it makes him giggle so hard that he buckles over and can't crawl away anymore ... it's pretty adorable if you ask me. He's also cruising more and walks pretty well holding on to one hand. It won't be long until he's walking on his own. Although we are entering the season of bumps and bruises until he can master walking and running.

Due to his mobility, discipline has been coming more frequently. When Jackson was younger he'd cry even if I had a serious tone to my voice let alone give him a spanking. Not true for Micah. He will sometimes laugh after I give him a spanking (SIGH)...oh boy ... it takes a few corrections before he obeys, but he eventually obeys. He's a pretty persistent little bugger sometimes, but that will be to his advantage in the future if he learns to use it "for the greater good."

Micah is a go, go, go kind of guy. I rarely see him sitting still to examine a toy or book, but that's usually because he's trying to keep up with his older brother. He's showing signs of being a tantrum thrower, but he has yet to have a full blown tantrum yet.

As far as communicating is concerned Micah can say/sign the following words:

Dada: Dad
Mama: Mom
Da-Din: Jackson
Aye: Hi
No-no: No
Nigh-Nigh: Good Night
dant-du: Thank you
(signs) please
(signs) all done
(signs) more (sort of)
uh-oh
t-t: touch it

I've found that it's REALLY hard to keep up with his vocabulary when I have a 3 year old talking in my ear 24/7. Don't get me wrong ... I'm grateful that my 3 year old is very verbose, BUT there are times when I wish I could pay sole attention to Micah. I'm sure there more "words" he's saying, I just am not able to pay attention to them.

Micah is such a delight! He's so curious and he loves to be with his family. He loves to cuddle more than I remember Jackson cuddling. He's SO ticklish and can be such a silly goose sometimes (I'm wondering if I have a class clown on my hands here). I LOVE that his personality is really starting to shine lately.


That's about it! I'll leave you with this picture of Micah on the morning of his birthday with blueberry muffin shoved in his mouth!