Thursday, July 1, 2010

Belated 15 Month Birthday

Sweet Pea celebrated her 15 month birthday on Tuesday.  We visited with her pediatrician and overall she is doing very well.  Here are the highlights:
  • The hand, foot, mouth disease is gone!
  • She weighs 19 lbs 5oz (puts her 50-75 percentile on DS growth charts)
  • 28 1/2 inches long (puts her 50-75 percentile on DS growth charts)
  • Doctor recommended we try to move away from Alimentum formula to regular soy milk and we are thrilled about that shift!  Sweet Pea is liking the soy milk (original flavor is all we have tried so far) and one and a half days into it she doesn't appear to be having any reactions yet so keep your fingers crossed.  This will save us a lot of money each week and make fixing her drinks a lot easier.  Now we just have to start transitioning to her drinking it cold...
  • We are going to switch reflux medications to Nexium in hopes that it does more for her than the Prevacid is doing.  We won't switch for another week or two because we need to make sure that she doesn't have a reaction to one of the vaccines she was given that we might mistake for an issue with the new medication.
Cognitively Sweet Pea is really doing well!   She is putting the plastic cookies through the slot in the milk jug and the shapes through the holes in the shape sorter container.  We help by covering up the wrong holes, but it's still great!  Sweet Pea has figured out a lot more of the things on her huge rain forest toy...putting balls into the elephant, pulling up to kneeling and playing with the ball and other toys on top of it, she even put a ball on the slide this afternoon!  This toy may be huge, but it really is great for her!



Her babbles are becoming more entertaining in that she is doing some of them with a ton of inflection.  We have fun mimicking her and she laughs so adorably when we do.

She has learned two new signs this month...please and thank you.  Yes, we have a polite little girl.  Ha!  We can't teach her milk or eat which would really be useful, but we can teach her to be polite.  Go figure!  Her thank you is the most adorable thing ever because she has combined blowing kisses with thank you so you get a kiss sound with the hand motion.  I'll try to get it on video sometime because that would be something to keep for her memory books.  Her "all done" sign is maturing as well.  It used to be just one hand and we would show her that it was supposed to be with both hands at the same time.  Now she does one hand, then switches to the other and then often finishes with the original hand again.  She knows that she is supposed to do both, just doesn't have them at the same time yet.  Baby steps!

Sweet Pea does her own kind of dancing now too.  It's all just waving the arms around frantically, but it is too cute.  She doesn't maintain it for more than a few seconds, but boy the smile she puts on when she does it!  This little girl loves her music and loves the toys that she is able to make play music by herself!

Food: Everything is still pureed, but we have brought back in squash which she used to hate.  She is eating more quantity and we just have to remember to get another container out when she finishes a jar because often she is still wanting more.

Now for a TON of photos and videos...

First are a bunch from our playdate on Sunday with the local DS support group.  It was at a great facility called NAPA Center and they had a lot of fun things for all the kids to do.  The zip line was a blast, Sweet Pea finally found a slide that she loved, we realized that a drum set may be in our future, gabbing with good friends is always a favorite of hers, a big ball pit to sink into was a fun new experience and we may need to be afraid of her taking our car keys in the future...





























And here is one of her showing off another new trick on her rain forest toy...and making sure Mommy is watching her do it.  I love that she yells at the toy at the end when it isn't doing what she wanted it to!  It shows her true colors...



And one final picture for an extra special Crazy Aunt that we can't wait to move out here in a few months...her hair really is growing!

13 comments:

  1. Oh my gosh!! Those pictures of Sweet Pea and that other little love together just melt my heart!! I love how they are interacting. Someday I hope that is Ella and Sweet Pea!!

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  2. Now that's what I call a mohawk! She's getting more punk rock by the day!

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  3. She is doing so wonderful! I love these pictures and that NAPA place looks awesome!

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  4. I am with Denise, love the pictures especially with all her T21 friends, cute. Thankful for a great checkup for you Sweet Pea!

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  5. wow sheis doing great, what a little social butterfly. Great pictures,love the ballpit, looks like she did too

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  6. Looks like Sweet Pea is doing fabulous!! Love the pic of her chatting with her friend!! So sweet:) I especially loved the video with her rain forest jungle gym, Landon has one too, he even yells at it when it doesn't do what he wants too!! 2 Peas in a pod!!!

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  7. She is doing great. Lindsey loves her rainforest toy. She looks like she is having so much fun in the ball pit and on the slide.

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  8. I am so glad she liked the toy A&B picked out for her!

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  9. So many of these pics remind me of Chloe!!!! Loved the videos too. Especially the one of her going down the slide. I watched it twice and laughed each time! She's so silly! Looks like a nice time! Glad to hear she's doing so well.

    Just wanted to mention too that Chloe switched from Alimentum to soy milk around the same age that Sweet Pea is and we discovered that soy milk does not have near the same amount of calories. It wasn't until Chloe was lethargic and lacking energy (and not progressing developmentally) that we finally put two and two together and realized she wasn't getting enough calories! I'd hate to see that happen to you. Chloe's off Alimentum, but drinks a soy based toddler formula now (Go and Grow by Similac). You might want to double check with your pedi. (Or just compare the carton with the Alimentum). Our doc is AWESOME but missed it. HOpe I'm not the bearer of bad news! Email me if you have any questions.
    Amy

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  10. Love the pictures of her in the ball pit and yelling at her toys! How fun that she has new signs too. I need to get better about using them. The only one I am consistent with is milk.

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  11. All beautiful, the news, the updates and especially the pictures. A room full of T21 babies and toddlers??? Must of seemed like HEAVEN!!

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  12. Sweet Pea is awesome.She is doing so much fun stuff. She looked pretty brave on that swing thingy.

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  13. Your little one is adorable! And that facility is amazing! Congrats on such a sweet little one.

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