Kate's 12 @ 12

Family photo on Kate's one-year birthday--July 8, 2008

We have less than three days left of Kate's 12th month (ex-utero, at least), so I figured I'd better start working on my "12 things about Kate at 12 months" post. I started keeping a list a while back, but I'm not sure what I did with it. I hope I don't forget anything. I think this may be my last installment in this series--I kind of started it so I could keep a running list to put in her baby book. And the 12th month seems to be a good stopping point, I suppose. :o)

Anyway, here we go ...

Here Kate is walking along the shore with her Ah-Pah. You can kind of see her "monster walk" pose here. LOL! (Jekyll Island, July 2008)

1. Kate's walking has taken off! BIG TIME! She was taking a few steps here and there before, but now she is walking ALL OVER the place. She's fast, too. It kind of happened all of a sudden one day when Tanna got home from work. We greet him at the door (as is the Korean custom), and Kate just took off walking across the living room when he first came in! So cute! She has what we call a "monster walk" where she walks with both hands kind of up like she is going after someone. It's hilarious! While we are so excited about her new walking skills, I am sad to see the crawling phase go. She is growing up so fast!
   
   
   Kate's last Sunday in the crawlers room at the church nursery.
   
   
   
2. Speaking of walking ... Kate graduated from the "crawlers" room at the church nursery to the "unsteady walkers" room. This happened a few weeks back. We knew it was time to move her to the next classroom, but we figured we'd take her to the crawlers room one last time. When we came to pick her up, she had already been moved to the unsteady walkers class. She's been in there twice now and seems to enjoy it as much as she did the crawlers class.
   
   
3. She loves to throw things out of her crib! She also loves to drop things (her sippy cup, pieces of food, etc.) from her high chair.
   
   
   Here Kate is enjoying some cheese toast! Surprisingly, her sippy cup is still on the highchair tray.
   
   
   
4. No more formula! She finished her last can of formula, and we haven't looked back! We are still working on drinking milk regularly, but she has improved a lot in the last few days. We are sure to mix it in her oatmeal and also give her cheese and yogurt so that she is getting her calcium.
   
   
5. No more bottles, either. Whew, we don't miss washing those--especially the nipples.
   
   
   Here's Kate on her first car ride just after Tanna turned her seat around. We were going to Halmoni and Halabaji's house. She is all smiles!
   
   
   
6. We turned her car seat around! She loves facing forward in the car and looking out the window! What a big girl!
   
   
7. In the morning, when we first go into her room, she will stand in her crib, hold the railing and jump up and down. She is so excited to greet each new day! Either that, or she really wants out of the crib. ... I think BOTH! Whatever is going through her head, it's so cute to see.
   
   
8. No more hairbows. :o( I'm so sad that Kate has started pulling out the pretty hairbows I put in her hair. Same with hats--this girl seems to want nothing on her head. I thought I'd figured out a way to keep her hairbows in--but it didn't last long. (If I distracted her enough when I first put them in her hair, she kind of forgot about them and carried on ... but that is not working anymore.) I hope this is just a short phase.
   
   
9. When you say "Hiiiiiii" to her, she will wave at you. I got a good video of this today--just need to upload it. So cute. Likewise, when you say "YAAAAY!" she will start clapping her hands. (I got this in the video, too.)
   
   
   On the go ...
   
   
   
10. She loves to walk around with various objects in her hands. She seems to "adopt" a thing or two each day or so and just carries them around our place. Various objects include: blocks, rings (from her ring-stacking toy), tubes of Carmex (can't do this anymore because she got a lid off one day), pink swim diapers (weird, I know), small Gideon New Testaments and other books of that size, CDs, play coins from a toy piggy bank, toy drumsticks, etc.
    
    
11. She enjoys watching her "Little People" DVDs. We've tried a few others, but they don't hold her attention quite like the "Little People."
    
    
    Kate loves to "undo" things--here she is taking the nesting blocks out of the stack.
    
    
    
12. She continues to enjoy knocking books off of the bookshelf and CDs off of the CD tower ... as well as emptying drawers and cabinets and such. She also enjoys "unstacking" her nesting blocks and taking the rings off of her ring-stacking toy. Almost as soon as you put these back together, she can get them undone.
    
    
    Kate and Mommy one Sunday after church ...
    
    
    And to grow on ...
    

• This girl poops a lot. We are talking at least three times a day ... usually four ... and sometimes five! Sorry if TMI, but it's true! She sometimes will even have a poopy diaper in her sleep, so we have to check her each night before we go to bed. (Well, we do anyway, but still ...) Her pediatrician said kids usually grow out of this by her age (yes, I asked about it), but I guess she is still working on it.
  
  
• She is so tall! She is almost as long as her changing pad--which makes sense because they typically are around 32-33 inches, and Kate was 30 inches at her 1-year appointment.
  
  
• This is hard to describe, but she does this thing with her hands/fingers. She kind of moves her fingers like she is opening and closing a fist, but she does one finger at a time. I don't think I am explaining it very well, but it's cute.
  

• As Lori posted about her Kate ... you can't take this girl anywhere without people stopping to comment about how cute she is. LOL! :o) Of course, we think she is absolutely adorable, so we're not going to argue with anyone who wants to compliment her. haha! We love her to pieces, and I could just squeeze her guts out!