2011 In Review

January 2, 2012 by Jen.

Hello all! We’ve had a good year here in the Payne household.

Juliana has grown to a staggering 20 lbs and 31.5″. What a big girl! She has started talking and says the following words regularly:
Mama, Dada, Nana, Papa, Meme (for Megan), Robby, yep, no, go, bye, hi, apple, baby, bus, bath, beep, hot, hat, bite, off, and she signs the words for more, water, all done, please, and thank you. She does the animal sounds for cow, dog, cat (kinda), sheep, lion, tiger, and monkey. She attempted something like “ama” for Grandma, and this morning she said Katie. She has loads of other words that would not be recognizable to a stranger, and many that are not recognizable to us. She is also getting more willing to repeat the words that we say. Yesterday she said “Memphis,” the name of the Herrs’ dog who is staying with us. She also sings, in tune, the alphabet song (although not all the letters are clear), and her own special bathtime song. Occasionally something will come out that really sounds like a sentence. “That’s my cousin!” (pointing at Ellis), “What is that?”, “No, I didn’t.”

Since her 2nd birthday in October when she received refrigerator magnet letters from her Nana, Juliana has been learning her letters. She loves it! She can now identify most of the letters of the alphabet, and she says about half of them. Her favorites are B, D, and E. Sadly, she hasn’t even yet attempted J, which is the official letter of our household. She also seems to have a fairly consistent grasp of all the colors. She can regularly identify them, although she doesn’t say any of their names yet.

She loves Christmas trees and lights and her latest obsession is the moon. Reading is her favorite past-time, and she still loves dogs and cats. She climbs up on her rocking horse all by herself and loves to rock it. She loves coloring and made her first craft this fall with her OT: a leaf with bits of red and orange tissue paper glued on to it. Of course it is up on our fridge. She has recently discovered sticker books and loves matching up the sticker with the pictures and then tapping it to stay down.

Her palate is still not very sophisticated. I’m afraid we stick to the following menu 99 times out of 100: mac & cheese, apples, bananas, oatmeal, cold cereal (Raisin Bran without the raisins), yogurt, grilled cheese sandwiches, grapes, frozen peas, and whole wheat Ritz crackers. She has however discovered that she loves hummus, so this gives me hope for a future of more exotic tastes. She guzzles water like it’s going out of style (I think she drinks more oz per day than I do!), and she loves orange and apple juice, although she gets these in very rare doses.

Juliana was sick for the first time on the nights of December 23-24 and 24-25, and for most of the day on Christmas. She threw up several times and was downright miserable. She was so quiet and sweet and endured her pain like a champ. Mostly she wanted to snuggle on the couch with me, which was fine!

Thanks to Monika Bliss Morris for a fantastic fall photo shoot!

We spent Thanksgiving in Michigan with the Paynes and Great-Grandma Kinyon. For Christmas, we traveled to Tennessee to visit with the Minner side of the family. We had a very happy holiday season, and we wish you all well in 2012!

Posted in News | 3 Comments »