SHE's studying her animals - ot-ter, ma (horse), mao (cat)

SHE's sharing Grandma and Grandpa with Robbie

SHE's going round and round

SHE's on the late schedule today (nap 6-7:30)

SHE says Happy Thanksgiving with a bunch of Elmans

SHE was checked up. Her percentiles: 60 weight, 75 height, 90 head size

SHE goes down backwards

SHE climbs down backwards

SHE loves her grandparents

SHE's in her rain bybble

SHE's rocking out!

SHE's waving her magic "Go Stanford" wand

SHE's a dancing machine

SHE's choosing from her bookshelf

SHE's sliding down the bus

SHE's being chased

SHE's walking down the hall

Baby Steps

Sierra has been walking independently (not holding on to something or someone) for a few weeks now. But this weekend we've noticed that she's taken another leap forward. She's been walking much further on her own - including from the couch all the way across the living room and to the shutters, and choosing to walk instead of crawl a few times. It's not long until she's always rushing around on two instead of four limbs.

Words

Here are the words Sierra can say:

Wa (socks in chinese)
APP-uhl (apple, and other round foods)
Bahb-bul (bubble, as in "See this container? Blow bubbles for me!")
Mama (duh)
Meeeeh! (What all animals say, as in "Yang yang shuo shemma?" (What does the sheep say?)
Up (as in going upstairs, pick me up, or flicking the light switch up to turn on the lights)
Ma (horse in chinese)
Ba-ba (equivalent to dada which she doesn't really use)
I'm sure there are a few more, I just can't remember!

Words Sierra can understand:
all of the above, plus:
milk
he shui (drink water in chinese)
belly button (as in "where's mama's belly button?" and she pulls up my shirt and points, and "where's sierra's belly button?" and she points to her belly)
mao (cat in chinese)
Lemma
Naya
bee (as in "what does the bee do?" And she tries to say "Bzzzzzzzzz" but it's more like a raspberry)
"If you're happy and you know it" (to which she claps her hands. she's been doing this one for awhile now!)
And there are definitely more, as babies understand much more than they can say. I'm just spacing.

SHE's driving around the neighborhood

SHE's playing quietly after waking up

SHE likes the fountain running like her nose

More on her 1st B-day

Last night, we were blowing bubbles again and she said "Bubble" and pronounced it very well!

I forgot to mention that about 2 weeks ago, Gran spent a whole day going through every toy (5000 toys in her age category!) on toysrus.com to find the best toys for her birthday based on ratings and also what SHE might like given her personality. Gran sent Josh a list to buy online with our coupons and rewards points and gave us a check for them. She got a Little Tikes school bus slide, Little Tikes rocking puppy, an Infantino where's my tail? puzzle, a Vtech piano with microphone... Last weekend Gran picked up a Chicco farm where you press animals for words and music. There was also an $80 soft activity block that plays music that was a little hard to get her interest so far. We may return it.

Happy 1st Birthday, SHE! (And bah-ples!)

To my wonderful, sweet little girl - happy birthday! I can't believe it's been a year.

Unfortunately, Sierra has had a cold since Sunday night. Monday she threw up continuously just as she was starting lunch. I've also had a slight cold and may have given it to her. It's much worse in her though with her head all stuffy and gasping for breath while nursing. It's like she's swimming (suck, swallow, gasp, suck, swallow, gasp...) Poor little girl.

Earlier this week we were blowing bubbles for the first time in awhile and it's her new favorite thing. She laughs and smiles and pokes them to pop them. She has great restraint with watching them and gently touching them (hoping not to pop them). She says "bah-ple" and crawls to the bubble container to ask us to blow bubbles. She does this all the time. If we stop blowing bubbles, she goes "bah-ple" and looks at you to blow more.

For lunch today, she had fresh fetuccini pasta from whole foods. She loves noodles. Tonight Mudder is making a meatball for her at the suggestion of Liling for her birthday. It's for good luck.

SHE's ONE!!!

SHE says "Bah bul" (and she is all sniffly :(. )

SHE wishes Robbie a Happy Birthday

Palo Alto zoo

Saturday (yesterday) we went to the palo alto junior zoo, a small zoo with raccoons and bobcats. Sierra really enjoyed making various circles around the zoo while we walked her around. She waved wildly at another girl her age who didn't seem to get it. She also waved at various animals and plants. She laughed at the goose honking. The goose was probably her favorite bc of this. He was pretty vocal and entertaining! Afterwards we went to the playground next door and then on the way home, I saw her blinking, blinking, blinking... and then she fell asleep! in the car. She hardly ever sleeps in the car. She'll cry if she is tired instead of sleep.

Happy 1st birthday party, SHE!

This afternoon was rainy outside but sunny inside with Sierra's happiness and enthusiasm running around the house during her birthday party featuring Norm/Jen/Jade and Kevin/Diana/Diana's mom/Kui. Robbie called in sick.

Dada downloaded a bunch of happy birthday songs to play in the background and gran gran hung colorful balls (christmas ornaments in fuschia, turquoise, gold, ) from the ceiling and i hung a "HAPPY BIRTHDAY" banner from the wall above the gap between the living and dining room. It was very festive. Mudder had bought these two decorations the day before and it was nice to see her excited about decorating for Sierra when she's usually so practical about everything.

Sierra wore her pink bunny outfit. I baked a dairy free apple cake and used dairy free frosting mixed with natural food dyes to write happy birthday in purple, an apple, and a heart in pink. gran cut a piece of pea pod into a leaf and stem shape so that the apple looked like an apple instead of a pink blob. :)

Sierra was outgoing and happy as usual. Jaden was a little shy but warmed up later. Sierra had some apple cake but gagged some of it out after eating a bit too much. Then she excitedly walked around back and forth and back and forth even though it was naptime.

Jen mentioned Jaden gagged out most of his lunch after eating a piece of eggyolk that was too big, so maybe this is normal baby behavior after all!

SHE's starting her birthday week celebration

SHE loved mommy's homemade all natural "ap-po" cake

SHE's a baby model

SHE's napping in the car -- first time!

SHE's walking around Palo Alto zoo

SHE is Snuggle Puppy

SHE's making copycat spitting noises

SHE's happy the Giants