One Year!

Updated 11/19: I almost forgot one of the coolest things Rowan can do now. He can identify most of his body parts! He can point to his eyes, ears, mouth, teeth, hair, fingers, toes, belly button and (ahem) penis when you ask him to! If you ask him about that last one, though, you risk him trying to pull off his diaper. Silly baby! Ooooops...I mean silly toddler!

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I can't believe he's 1 (yes, I know this is late)! Here's a little report on what Rowan's doing at one year (and, of course, some cute pics). There are two more new posts below, too, since I had to make up for my lack of posting lately.

On the motor front: Rowan gave up crawling shortly after he turned 1. He's getting pretty quick on his feet now! It's actually really nice that he's up on two feet. Now I don't feel so bad about putting him on the ground in stores or at the mall since he doesn't have his hands all over the dirty floor.

In addition to walking, he enjoys dancing and spinning in circles. And he's become pretty skilled at kicking and throwing a ball. He climbs up and down stairs with ease (sometimes a little too quickly for mamas nerves!) and can easily get down from furniture. He loves to climb, too! He climbs on my old toy box all of the time and then shakes his booty when gets to the top. We went to REI today, and he LOVED climbing around in the children's play area.

On the communication front: Words that we're sure Rowan says include mama, ball (bah), duck (duh), dog (dah), car (cah), all gone (gah gun while doing the ASL sign) and bye bye (buh bye while waving one hand). Bye bye is BY FAR his favorite phrase! He politely says bye bye to every morsel of food that he drops from his highchair to the floor. He says bye bye before he throws a ball. He says bye bye every time a door shuts or someone leaves the house. He even says bye bye to his baby doll before he puts it in his toy box. Sooooo funny!

We think he's been saying daddy (dee dee) more consistently, but it can be hard to tell -- especially since he's a pretty hard core mama's boy right now. He seems to call his water cup bah bah, which I don't understand since he's never had a bottle. Maybe he's trying to say water? He also says buh for books sometimes.

He also barks, quacks, hoots, says cockadoodledoo (cookiedookiedoo), makes a horsie noise and a monkey noise, and blows fishy bubbles. We have some of his funny noises on tape, so I'll have to upload them sometime soon.

He knows and uses the ASL signs for more, cup, all gone and eat. He picks up the signs really quickly, but I'm afraid I haven't been good about teaching him knew ones lately. I've started working on "help" since he often searches for assistance reaching things or getting up on the furniture. I'll have to dig out my book and teach some other new ones as well.

On the eating front: Rowan is starting to eat more at each meal. He's not a kid that just loooooves to eat any time any place (he'd almost always rather not be in his high chair -- too much to do!) but he sits down to couple of pretty good meals every day and has a couple of snacks in between. It seems one meal always ends up mostly on the floor (bye bye). I wouldn't call him a picky eater, since he tries pretty much anything when he's interested in eating. He just doesn't like to slow down and be strapped in a high chair.

When he's interested in eating, though, there's no stopping him and he'll wolf down his food in no time flat. Breakfast has been the meal he's usually least interested in. But then yesterday he walked right over to his highchair and then happily ate a baby cereal and whole wheat pancake and a yogurt/fruit smoothie. He's kind of unpredictable that way. Just when I'm ready to throw in the towel, he'll greet me with a big appetite and some resounding mmmmmmm's. But our pediatrician says to expect now that since toddlers eat fairly sporadically. And since he's still nursing he's getting lots of calories from milk.

Rowan's favorite foods are meats (homemade turkey meatballs, free range chicken dogs, Mexican spiced chicken), pasta, egg yolk, fruit of any sort (blueberries, pineapple, apples, oranges) and some veggies (sweet potatoes, green beans, tomato sauce). He's starting to like yogurt more now. I make him smoothies with plain organic yogurt, fruit and a little splash of organic grape juice. Otherwise, he drinks mostly water from his cup. Our pediatrician isn't big on kids sipping juice. It's clear from all of the newer recommendations on feeding babies/toddlers that there's a stronger push toward healthy eating habits to curb the childhood obesity epidemic. We try to feed Rowan whole, organic foods as much as possible -- especially since every morsel you can get into a busy toddler is so precious!

On the learning front: It's been clear for some time that Rowan understands almost everything we're saying. He follows instructions and laughs when we're being silly. He's got own funny little personality now, and we have so much fun together. He loves to read books (often over and over and over again)! I know that's a good thing, but how many times can you read Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear before going completely insane! ;-) His favorite book now is a baby animals picture book. He points to each animal, and I say the name of the animal and make its noise. Reading books together is really special because he actually sits still for a minute!

We go to ECFE classes and we've starting going to a drop in time for 12-24 month olds. It's funny to watch Rowan react to the other kids, especially the older ones that are running around and being crazy. He gets this wild look on his face like, "watch out mom, that's gonna be me someday!"

OK, it's getting late now! No doubt our brilliant Rowan does many more fascinating things, but I'm in desperate need of some sleep! So I'll cease with the bragging and leave you with some cutie pie pics taken shortly after his first birthday.