Gibberish No More!

For a while now Claire has used several signs to help guide us towards what she wants, including milk, food, more, all done, hi/bye, eat, dog, and pacifier. Recently however she decided to throw actual words into the mix. The first word that she used to correctly identify something (vs just babbling on like she did with mama and dada) was banana. At first we thought it was a fluke, but again and again if you showed her a banana she would say it. Obviously we were both sad that Mama and Dada were not the first words that she matched up with the real thing, but they came soon after as did Hi, Bye, Dog, Ball and Eye. We are working on more and milk as she has a version of the word, just not quite the whole thing. It has been amazing to watch her take off and for now we are grateful that she hasn't started with the no's. Now if only we could get some teeth.

Here are some more recent photos of Claire taken this week. We'll get some videos up soon.

Moving On Up

This week Claire completed her transition from the Infant Room to the Toddler room. There were a lot of changes for Claire (and us) to get adjusted to. The biggest is that Claire now takes a nap on a cot versus in a crib. All and all Claire seems happy to back with her older friends and with her old teacher Paige.

Since we are on the topic of moving, we thought we would include a video of Claire's favorite pastime - dancing!

Tumbling - week two videos

Claire continues to enjoy her Saturday morning tumbling class. Here are some videos from her 2nd class.

Tumbling and The National Western Stock Show

We are not sure how the time is flying by so quickly! Here are some photos of Claire over the last several weeks.

Hanging out in her whale of a tub

First tumbling class on January 15th- she looks like a natural and rocked their first lesson the log roll.

We took Claire to the National Western Stockshow on the 16th of January to watch the Shorthorn show (the type of cows that Melissa has). In addition to watching the show we also took in a pony ride and checked out the petting zoo. Claire was shy at first, but by the end was running around the animal pens with the goats, sheep, pigs, and donkey.

This week we also reached a new milestone and this one has Mom & Dad excited, but not Claire as it was the transition from the bottle to the cup full time. We are excited to not be washing bottles constantly and Claire is adjusting well with only 2 breakdowns so far. We are very thankful for her great teachers at school who have been helping us with this!

Merry Christmas!

Claire Walking

Today we took advantage of the beautiful Colorado weather and went to the zoo with Claire's friend Siddarth. The kids had a great time walking around the zoo, especially the Tropical Discovery indoor area where they enjoyed the fish and the Komodo Dragons.

A quick video of Claire walking around at the zoo

Happy 1st Birthday Claire!!

3 days old

365 days old

We can hardly believe that Claire is already one!

Please feel free to share a birthday wish or memory in a comment below (don't forget to sign your name!)

The first year has brought us:

To eight states: CO, UT, MA, NH, ME, NM, CT, RI

Milestones: smiles, rolling, laughing, sitting, crawling, pulling up, babbling, cruising and walking

Signs: All done, more, milk. Claire also waves and blows kisses

Food: Claire has turned out to be an adventurous eater, but her favorites seem to be cheese, pizza, dal, peas, pumpkin, pears

Favorite Outings: The Zoo (Claire has been to 3 different zoos), My Gym, Swimming Class

Favorite Toys: Miss Emily Doll, Laugh & Learn House, Ride & Push Car