11 Months & Some Change...

Emma turned 11 months old a little over a week ago and I am still getting used to it. Exactly three weeks from today, she will turn ONE! It has been amazing to watch her over the past couple of weeks because she is just growing and learning so much, that everyday is different. Just this past weekend, she has taken much more of an interest in walking! She actually stood unassisted for a few seconds this weekend and I pretty much immediately burst into tears. :)

Emma must also be going through a growth spurt because she is pretty much an endless pit now when it comes to food and she is drinking more formula than ever (of course right before we end up giving it up haha). She will not almost consistently polish off her 6 ounce bottle, which she usually has 3 or so a day. At about 10 weeks old, we ended up dropping a bottle mostly just from taking queues from Emma. She is still a little picky about eating, but pretty much wants nothing to do with baby food anymore. She wants the good stuff! I find that I am struggling a bit though trying to think of things that she can eat now. Really the only restrictions at this point are milk (for another month), peanut butter (not until 18 months), honey and shellfish. Those are still the big no-goes but other than that, we are more limited to what Emma can and can't chew. My goal for the next couple of weeks (since she wants big people food anyway), is to try to get her onto what we are having for dinner, at least when possible.

At 11 months old, Emma...

• Has 6 teeth (with another one just about to pop through).
• Is now walking up and down furniture and is constantly on the go!
• She says a couple of words like mama, dada, nana, baba (for bottle), duck, bye bye and can almost say ball.
• She loves to "play" with Shamus more and more everyday!
• Has a couple of favorite toys, like her colored rings (just like her Uncle Brian), her stand up piano/table, her toy cell phone from Aunt Mary, her lion toy from her Gigi and Papa, her pink soccer ball at Mimi's house, her little toy puppy "Oscar" and by far the favorite is her pink bear.
• LOVES the Build-a-Bear that Mommy got from Emma's Aunt Mary a LONG time ago. She loves to listen to the recorded message!
• Is very weary of strangers and anyone she doesn't know.
• Points at everything!!!
• Can now dance!
• Still loves her Tigger & Pooh cartoon!

Our next step with Emma's VUR is coming up shortly as well. On Tuesday, we are heading back to Johns Hopkins Hospital for the DMSA renal scan, so fingers crossed that the test shows no kidney scarring from her previous UTI/Kidney infection!