I don’t know where to start. Again.
Again. You’ve blown our minds.
Yes, we are first time parents so our minds are pretty easy to blow. But you’re still a rockstar, regardless of anything.
At 10 months 6 days exactly you took your first independent steps. The next day you ran from mommy to grandma, and back. Then to daddy and back. By midmonth you were taking 10 steps on your own. They were wobbly and were more like running than walking- you were in the process of falling and catching yourself over and over again, which is what walking is, essentially. You spent this last month doing nothing but walking holding onto one of our hands. You don’t like holding two hands. Oh no, you push the second hand away and walk with pride holding onto only 1 finger. Crawling is long abandoned.
{In the picture above: I love your little chubby legs and feet in this picture above. I try to put skirts on you, but you’re just too small to pull them off without looking , well, like that. It’s still cute to me!}
You balance was so shoddy that I didn’t think you’d truly start walking any time soon. You still couldn’t get up on your feet from a sitting position without pulling onto or pushing off of something, even if it was super low. You couldn’t stand for very long. Yet precisely a month after you took your first steps, at 11 months 6 days, you threw my hand aside and RAN! At the mall, all around the racks of clothes.  Now 2 weeks later you still run around excitedly rather than walk. But that’s for the next month’s letter.
{In the Picture above: You love the outdoors and often bang on the door to go out. Your Smart Trike is getting some great use as you love the freedom it gives you. Â These photos were taken back when it was cold- we wouldn’t get out of warm rockstar looking stylish NUNUNU pants and your Pediped sneakers.}
You have become a toddler in the biggest sense of the word. You communicate with us SO well. Signing has exploded and while you can’t exactly show certain signs well, you’re trying. Your repertoire includes: horse, dog, lights, all done/gone, more, sleep, ball, clean up and a few others. You don’t sign eat or drink, which baffles us, because we show them every time.
{In the photo above: Diligently studying the new  line of Boob Design maternity and nursing wear. Lexi approved! :)}
You sign each time you see or hear something you know a sign for. Your favorite signs are light and all gone. Whenever someone leaves the room, you go “All gone!” with a confused expression on your face. It is beyond adorable. You sign light every time you see any kind of light or when a light turns on or when you want us to turn on the light in your nursery. If you’re hanging out with grandma or daddy and you suddenly realized that mommy is not around, you sign “all gone” and go looking for mommy. You walk into each room one by one, signing “all gone” if mommy isn’t there. Then finally you see find me and it’s the sweetest smile and laugh in the world. You’re a mommy’s girl, no doubt about it!
{In the photo above: More NUNUNU with the  bold NO!, the word you don’t yet use. Lexi with attitude – I like! The blue funny looking elephant in the photo is tumbling furniture from bObles}
You squeal with delight when you see kitties, dogs, teddy bears. Those are your favorite things. You laugh when you see a lion and look up at me expectantly because you know you will hear a “ROAAAAR!” from me. You look mesmerized at pictures and videos of horses and donkeys.
Of course, you’re obsessed with our iphones. We try to hide them from you but the second you see them, you start whining. There are two things we let you do on it: read books and look at pictures of animals. You can spend a long time looking at animals on the iphone, so needless to say we don’t use our phones around you a lot.
{In the photo above: Looking especially adorable in Skylar Luna Organic pjs with your Warm Buddy teddy bear ( it has a microwaveable pouch) that you sleep with, while looking at animals with daddy on the iphone. Your very first braid adds to the cuteness!}
Your napping has improved greatly as soon as you started walking. You now sleep for at least an hour to 2 hours, with the average being 1.5 hrs. Most of the time you have 2 naps, but often you skip your last nap. Unfortunately that doesn’t mean your night sleep has improved. You still wake up 3x or more a night. Whenever you’re teething, you’re restless and wake up more. We still bedshare and it works the best for you. And whatever works for you works for us, too. The crib is firmly back in the box and in the garage. Until you’re ready for a big girl bed, I don’t see you sleeping in a crib.
{In the photo above: Playing Peek-a-Boo with the blanket! You love this game and will often hide your face to initiate it or push a piece of cloth onto ours}
You nap times are pretty consistent: 11 am and 4 pm with some differences based on your wake up time and general mood of the day. It’s the schedule you set for yourself about a month ago, but I am sure you’ll keep adjusting as you grow. You often go to sleep at 12:30 pm nowadays and take one long nap and then skip the second nap, so I know that’s what your future schedule is going to be once you drop that nap completely.
You also go to bed willingly and happily when it’s time. You either walk us upstairs yourself ( and AT THAT POINT I KNOW that you want to sleep), or start whining a bit and when I say “Let’s go sleep?” (in russian), you whimper and put your hands to your ear to sign “sleep” ( it’s our sign that we use for sleep). Then we say good night to everyone while signing sleep and walk into the room. You readily climb onto the bed ( our king size mattress is on the floor), find your  teddy bear that you sleep with and wiggle waiting for me to lie down to nurse.
{In the photo above: Being your usual cute self while playing with toys. Rocking Horse is from One Step Ahead and buckets are by B.Toys}
You love to brush your hair and attempt to put hairclips in it. You mock brush your teeth, you carry purses around.
Whenever you want something, you have this sound you make “eh?”, almost a whine but not completely. You point at everything and make a sound with a question in your tone, other times you say “ETO?” (“this” in russian) and we tell you what you’re seeing.
{In the photo above: a clip in your hair. Trying to put I love this outfit. It’s my new discovery, Wheat Baby, occasionally sold on MyHabit, with some random white leggings. Most of our hairclips and bows are from Hopscotch Boutique}
You are absolutely obsessed with grandma! Your face lights up every time you see her. I don’t know what you’re going to do when she goes back to Russia. She is so awesome at playing with you, too! She is genuinely excited about everything you do and loves you as much as we do if not more ( not that it’s possible for anyone to love you more than we do)
{In the photo above: watching your singing video with grandma. Your grandma is your biggest cheerleader. Bigger on than I am and I go gaga over everything you do.}
You babble all the time with different tones and intonations. I can’t say you’re using words too often, at least not the ones we can recognize. You repeat our sounds and say a lot that sounds like words, but your vocabulary is still the same: mama, dada, eto (this), meow (which sounds more like a squeal, but you’re definitely saying meow).
You understand pretty much everything now. Even the most random things. You only need to hear something once to remember what it means. I always see you looking attentively at us whenever we explain something new to you. You point to all kinds of animals in a book when I name them and ask you where they are. You actually sit there and look through the whole picture until you find what I am asking for.
{In the photo above: enjoying your Little Tikes playground. Shabby Bow by Hopscotch Boutique}
You love playing and walking outside and feeding our lions up front. You destroyed the bushes by the statues, because you tear off a leaf and feed the first lion until he is “full”. Then I say “Let’s go feed the other one” and you readily run to the other side of the house to feed the lion there.
Books are still a huge love of yours. You want to read them all the time, instead of playing with toys. You point at pictures in the books and now you seek out objects that you like: bees, butterflies, kitties, dogs, teddy bears. You study every picture carefully and then point at whatever excited you and squeal. You know most books well and are aware of the order that they story goes. I try to animate every book as much as I can for you with sign language, faces and sounds. So whenever we get to a page where I make a face/sound/sign you always look up at me with an expectant smile.
You recognize shapes of things. For example, if there is a shadow of a kitty in the book, you know it’s a cat and meow/squeal in delight while pointing at it.
{In the photo above: A surefire way to get some cute pictures of you is to sit you down with a book. That way you don’t crawl away from camera and contently sit there paging through the book looking adorable. You’re sporting robot pjs by Skylar Luna (how cool are they?) and reading a “10 Little Fingers & 10 Little Toes” book}
You snuggle! It’s just so awesome to hug your soft warm little body when you put your cheek against mine and just lay there. When you wake up in the morning or from your nap, you roll around me snuggling for a long time, pointing at the lights on the ceiling, babbling, signing “light” and hugging me.
You sing! Like, try to repeat our tune a lot! It’s so much fun! You love doing it while eating or after you’re done with the meal. Â Sometimes we just have to say “Can you sing for us?” and you start. Other times you sing just because you’re happy. And that makes me happy! You’re just the cutest when you start showing off in front of everyone. As soon as you see that everyone’s attention is on you, you start acting: fake laughing, singing, dancing, tumbling- whatever it is you have access to.
Your hair is long enough that I have to BRAID it or put it in a pig tail to get it out of your face. You are the cutest when you have your bangs off your face. We actually found daddy’s 6 months old picture and you look almost nothing like him there. People say that when you have bangs, you look like daddy, when your hair is up, you look like mommy.
You eat well at times, and other times barely touch your food. You definitely get hungry on certain days so much that you cannot wait for us to heat up your food. You eat everything we put in front of you! Your diet mostly consists of beans, veggies&fruits&berries, grains and some fish. We always give you some organic fruit pouches after a meal as dessert, too. You have not had a taste of sweets yet, so fruit is it for you.
{in the photo above: Wearin NUNUNU leggings, Pedipeds and carrying an awesome Alphaberry we bought for the car for you. Except for you don’t part with it at home.}
You laugh so much now. Being able to move on your own made you one happy baby. Your smile and laugh is the most adorable thing to me. You scrunch your nose, snort, giggle, show your stubby top teeth. You look like the most adorable little piggy. The best minutes of my day are when I can make you laugh, my sweetheart!
{In the photo above: Organic Robot pajamas by Skylar Luna}
You do so many fun things that I wish I could remember right now! But  I will keep this letter short. It’s already coming out too late and I cannot remember what you did just two weeks ago versus now. So I’ll stop here and will be back for your next letter with more fun things.
I am so excited to be planning your birthday party. Just to think that you’re almost one year old is too much for me. It’s too much awesomeness!
I am not sad you’re turning one!
I am so happy for you, because you have never been so content with life and yourself. Â You have control over your body and things you do. That makes you so happy, I can see it! If it were up to you, you’d skip the whole newborn/baby stage and go straight to toddlerhood, I know it!
I am off to order desserts for your party while you sleep! I love you, girl!
Oh she’s such a big girl already!
So cute, so happy 🙂
You’re doing such a great job with her guys!
I can’t believe that Lexi is 11 months old already! I’ve been following your blog ever since Lexi was maybe 4 months old. She has really grown. She’s so, so, so precious and beautiful. I may not always leave comments to your posts, but I LOVE reading your posts. Just love them. Your pictures are amazing and beautiful as well. I’m glad to see that you’ve taught Lexi some sign language! I can’t wait for my little guy to pick up on that too.
She’s such a sweetie! I love reading your monthly posts because I have a daughter about the same age and it’s so cool to see how similar they are. I love how you say “Again. You’ve blown our minds. Yes, we are first time parents so our minds are pretty easy to blow.” it made me laugh, it’s so true as first time parents perfectly normal developments seem so amazing! I’m sure our friends and family secretly roll their eyes when we go on and on about little normal baby things lol. As for the running thing, my girl did a similar thing (first step @ 9.5 months, walking on her own a week later and running a week after that, it’s been a little exhausting, ha!) and from talking to other moms it seems that stumble-y baby run is really common for unsteady walkers. My daughter did that running thing for a while before she could slow down and walk carefully (and getting up and down on her own took a few weeks after learning to walk as well).
Don’t worry about the lack of talking, at our one year dr’s appt I was worried because they usually have 1-3 words + mama and dada at that age , and my dr said that as long as they have 1-3 words by 15 months it’s fine. And sure enough at 1 year + 1 week we had 4 words!
Enjoy her first birthday party! We got our daughter a cake to try (she hadn’t had any sweets up to that point), and it was funny because she couldn’t care less, I guess just feeding her healthy food meant that she hadn’t acquired a taste for sugar and she didn’t like it at all! I’m sure it won’t last but we’ll enjoy it for now. 🙂
OH-MY-GAHH. Remember when we were pregnant and exchanging pregnancy “woes” stories? Ahh! She’s almost 1 and I keep muttering to myself, “where has time gone?”
I’m in love with her rocking horse guy- does she actually sit on it and rock?
Happy 11 (almost 12) months, pretty girl!
She is soooo adorable!
“And whatever works for you works for us, too.” – that’s number one rule in our house,too.
I think she looks just like dad with her bangs up or down! He makes a cute baby girl!
De-lurking to ask a question re: sleeping. We have a two month old and I’m trying to get him to sleep seperately from us (bassinet OR crib) but he nurses to fall asleep and then I fall asleep too (side lying position)! I have a movement monitior I love using (for SIDS) but it requires him to actually sleep in the crib, not our bed, haha. How do you transfer Lexi? Does she wake up when you try to move her? So she goes to sleep nursing in your bed and than you transfer her to a co-sleeping thing or crib or what?
Hey, Jill! I am not sure maybe I misspoke and wrote “co-sleeping”, when I meant bedsharing. We have NEVER been able to transfer her onto the bed without waking her up, let alone the crib. And when the mattress had to be lowered, that spelled the death of the crib because no way we could lower her that much and not wake up. SO she falls asleep while nursing and stays asleep that way. Because she wakes up too often in the night, that is also the only way for me to get any sleep, because with nursing and bedsharing I barely have to wake up.
She never took to the co-sleeper either. We sold it when she was just a few months old. The only thing that has worked consistently has been bedsharing.
I used to spread my shirt in the crib securely, so she coupd have my scent next to her. Then place her after she falls asleep, and tap her to go back to sleep if she wakes up. It worked. And yes, when you lower the crib, it gets harder. So we bed shared from 9mos to 13 mos, then dropped the night feeling. I think as a newborn they are easier to transfer and fall back asleep, so I’d get into that habit. Oh, Elena, she stopped sleeping through the night for a few mos, I think 6 to 9 mos….she grew about 4 teeth during that time. She did go back to sleeping through the night though so hang in there. We don’t believe in cry it out either. For us, we just say its temporary, she has growing pains and most of all, she will grow up quickly. Now that she’s older, she is very secure and outgoing. I only have good memories of her baby days.
Ha! We tried the scent thing. Didn’t work. I think we pretty much tried every single thing and all that has worked in bedsharing. I have the same attitude as you said “it’s temporary, soon she won’t be a baby anymore”
Oh man, your adorable little girl is not helping my baby fever! My ovaries ache just looking at her. 🙂
Lexi looks so much like your husband! What a gorgeous, happy baby.
Beautiful baby but it does look like she might have a “lazy eye”. Have you gotten it checked out? These things tend to be easily corrected with early intervention.
Yes we have and no it’s just one of her lids covers the eye a bit more. Will correct itself as she grows. Thanks for the concern 🙂
Amazing material for a future book which I bet your princess will publish when grow up :))))
Hi, I’m a long time reader and first time commenter. I absolutely love your blog and have been following it since I was pregnant. My little guy is 2.5 months now! Just wondering about the signing – how old was Lexi when you started and how long did it take for her to sign back? Which words did you start with and how often did you introduce new signs? Are there any particular resources you recommend? I would love to read a post all about baby sign language. I can’t wait to begin with my little one when the time is right!
That’s a great idea for a post! I’ll write one this week! Thanks for the questions!
She is such a darling girl! growing up so quickly, too! I love the lace leggings Lexi was wearing in the pics on the playground. Can you share where you got them?
Hey, Rachel! It was on Zulily. Don’t know the brand, but can look it up for you if you need it
Hi Elena,
i was curious did you read a specific book about teaching Lexi signs? I have a one month dauther and I am trying to document as much as possible. What you eat while breastfeeding? I know you do not eat meat, did you also give up the rest of animal products?
I am writing a post about signs right now and will cover it all 🙂
In the first few months of BFing I didn’t eat dairy, tomatoes, processed foods, onions, garlic.
I still don’t eat dairy (except for rare occasions when it’s in something), meat or chicken.
she has grown up SO QUICKLY!!!!!!!!! I can’t believe she’s about to turn one. that’s just crazy.
I love all that curly gorgeous hair – too cute.
Oh, I love reading your blog. Lexi is so adorable and she is about to turn one. Such a cute big girl now! I just can’t figure out my little one growing up so quickly too. So excited! Nice photos!!!