It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

Last year was an amazing Christmas for us as it was our first as a family. I think it was possibly my most favourite Christmas to date, it was so special having our son there with us. 

Noah was only 6 weeks old at the time but this year he's 13 months old and he's incredible. He is such a character and has us in fits of giggles on a daily basis. Even though he's not going to understand what is going on over this festive period it's going to be so much fun for all three of us. 

Over the last few days he's just started to take a few wobbly steps so who know's he could figure out this walking malarkey on Christmas day, how special would that be?!

Anywho I am feeling a little nostalgic so I am going to share some of our Christmas photo's from last year. I can't believe he was ever so small. 

We cannot wait for Christmas and to make more memories with you Noah Nicholas, you are our world. Have a wonderful Christmas everyone! 

Noah's first year in photo's

If you follow me on twitter, facebook or instagram you will know I am probably one of the worst culprits when it comes to babyspam. I'm obsessed and there hasn't been a day that I haven't taken Noah's photo. 

On the lead up to Noah's first birthday I decided to choose a photo from every month to see how he's changed from month to month. Considering how many pictures I take it was really difficult to choose. 

So here they are Noah from newborn to 12 months.. *cries*

He's such a little love and so very cheeky, I'm so proud of him. What a whirlwind of a year! 

Baby Diary: 12 Months Old

Oh my word. You are now 1, one year old, 365 days old! How did that happen? How did this year go so fast? It was your birthday on the 12th but I still haven't come to terms with it. 

Character

You are still that ever so funny and cheeky boy. You are generally always happy and smiling unless you are teething or having a rare grumpy day. You absolutely love to make people smile and laugh. When you discover something that makes us giggle you will do it over and over again, it's really sweet. You are a very smart boy who is quick to learn anything mentally. All the positive traits aside you are still very strong minded and quick tempered at times, you know what you want and how to get it.

Size

You haven't been weighed recently but this month I feel like you have really bulked out and have gotten a lot taller. Although you don't have much fat on you, you are solid and weigh a ton. You are still wearing size 4 nappies and have size 3 feet. You are still wearing 9-12m in most clothing but I don't think it will be long until we are moving up into the 12-18m sizing in trousers and babygrows. 

Health

You have had a bad month when it comes to your health as it's been one little thing after another. You've had bouts of colds, viral infections, rashes, constipation, swollen lymph nodes and have been teething too. We had to take you to A&E for the rash because it was worrying us a little but it turned out to be a side effect from a viral infection. Then a week later we noticed a lump on your neck and I almost fainted with panic. After a quick google we felt better as swollen lymph nodes are common in infants especially after viral infections. We took you to the GP to make sure and he confirmed what we had read and told us to keep an eye on it. You still have the lump at the moment but if it's not gone by the end of November we are to take you back.

Teething has been a big issue for us this month and you hadn't been handling the pain very well. I feel so sorry for you. It wasn't all pain no gain though because you finally cut your first tooth (at 11 months) and then the second came through a few days later. So now at 12 months old you have your two bottom teeth, very cute!

Feeding

You now drink cows milk and absolutely love the stuff. You drink more cows milk than you ever did formula. You now have 3x 7oz bottles of cows milk a day which is 6oz more a day than you took with formula! I have found that the cows milk can make your stools hard if you don't drink an adequate amount of water. You drink roughly 7oz of water a day are are usually good with it but it all depends on how you are feeling, sometimes we need to encourage you to drink it and other days you guzzle it. 

You have three meals a day in between the bottles and pretty much eat whatever we are having. You tried curry for the first time this month and really enjoyed it. It had hardly any spice in it and was full of vegetables so it was no surprise that you wolfed it down. 

Sleep

Last month we thought we had finally cracked the whole sleeping and napping malarkey and sang from the rafters about it. You have always slept well through the night with the occasional wake up for your dummy but that's the only issue we have had. Towards the end of this month both napping and sleeping has been very hit and miss and we think it's all down to teething and the leap you are currently going through.

Last month we could simply lay you down in your cot for your nap but lately when we put you down you cry, especially when I leave the room. I have resorted to letting you cry a minute or two when this happens and you usually self settle. If you don't I go in and comfort you without taking you out of the cot. I am hoping we can get back to normal when this leap is through.  

Milestones

- You turned ONE! Obviously! I still cannot believe it!

- You finally have teeth! You cut your first tooth two weeks before your first birthday and then the second one a few days later. Now at 1 year old you have your bottom two teeth and they are very cute.

- Crawling. You finally mastered the bum shuffle last month but this month you started crawling in the normal fashion.

- Cruising. You can now pull yourself up onto furniture and cruise along it. You are still a little wobbly at times but you are figuring it out very quickly.

- Walking with your push along walker. We hadn't practice much with this so when you toddled off with it suddenly we were very shocked!

- You walk well with our fingers so I think you COULD be walking by Christmas. We will have to wait and see. 

- Balancing. When you are walking with your walker or stood up against something you like to push back and test your balance. 

- Pulling up. You now pull yourself up on anything and everything.

- Round and round the garden. Your Nanna taught you the song round and round the garden and when someone sings it you draw a circle on your palm with your finger, very sweet. 

- Feeding. You now drink full fat cows milk and love it. We also ditched the steriliser at the same time and have had no issues. 

- Understanding. You started cuddling and kissing a few months back but if we ask for a love or a cuddle then you will give us one. If I say "night night" you put your head down and pretend to go to sleep. It's crazy how much you actually know and you baffle us on a daily basis. 

Things you like

- Dancing. Whenever you hear any sort of music you bob along to it. You can be crawling, standing, sitting or laying down and you will still manage to bust a move no matter what position you are in.

- Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, still obsessed with the hotdog song. You have also taken a real liking to Jake and The Neverland Pirates too. 

- Climbing. You are so happier now you are mobile and your favourite thing to do is to pull yourself up on things and you are attempting to climb. 

- The laptop. You are infatuated with gadgets but this month you have been fixated with the laptop. So much so that I am unable to go on it when you are in the same room because you will stop whatever you are doing, crawl over and bash all the keys! 

- Ted. You love our cats but your favourite is Teddy and you are ever so good and gentle with him. It's very endearing to watch. 

- The remotes. You are happy to sit on the floor for ages with a remote in both hand. You know how to turn the channel over and will point the remote directly at the TV and laugh when it turns over. 

 - Fruit. Ever the fruit bat! 

Things you don't like

Napping. This month you have gone backwards and have started crying when you go down for a nap.

When Daddy leaves the room. Once Dad is home from work you just want to be with him so when he leaves the room you cry your eyes out like you think he's going back to work. 

Being spoon fed. You eat the majority of food yourself and you are practicing using the spoon but there are some occasions when I need to spoonfeed you and you really fight it! 

My Mummy Confessions

Whilst Noah napped earlier on today I started thinking about my "Mummy confessions" and thought it would be nice to blog about it. Being a first time Mum with no much experience with babies I had everything to learn once I gave birth to Noah. There have been many things that I did that could of been seen as wrong, choice's I've made that could of been better but that is the world of parenting for you.

I didn't have a clue - Before having Noah my experience with babies was minimal. Of course when I found out I was pregnant I read the books, I googled everything and I asked for tips and advice from everyone. I could of researched until the cows came home but nothing really prepared me for my newborn. 

Once he arrived I felt totally overwhelmed and out of my depth. I questioned and second guessed everything I did and handled him like a porcelain doll. I felt I had a natural maternal instinct but I would often doubt myself and I shouldn't of. I felt like I had to do what you are supposed to do and not what I felt was right. 

I changed his nappy every time he had a wee - Yes when Noah was a newborn I changed his nappy every single time he had a wee! We had bought the newborn Huggies nappies which change colour when your baby wee's. So every time that strip went slightly yellow it was all "OMG he's had a wee, change his nappy, quick!" Looking back now this is hilarious and I can't help but smirk. 

I couldn't sleep unless he was on me - We had issue's trying to settle Noah in his moses basket at first. When we finally cracked it (with the tilted mattress and loop blanket trick) I couldn't handle it. I would lay awake all night watching him sleep in his moses basket making sure he was breathing and often brought him back into bed with me. Needy baby? Nope, needy Mummy! 

We were terrified of bathing him - We have always bathed Noah every other night and in those early days bath time would frightened the life out of us. It felt like a huge mission to get the bath ready, the baby undressed, the baby washed, the baby dried, the baby dressed all while he was screaming the house down! I think he picked up on us panicking too and it made things so much harder work. 

Co sleeping was more for me - Noah and I have co slept on and off since he was a newborn but for the past 4 months we have exclusively co slept. When we moved in to the inlaws house while our house was being renovated it really set Noah's sleep off kilter as he point blank refused to sleep in the travel cot. Not that I needed one but I did enjoy having that excuse when people often shared their two cents on the whole co sleeping situation.

"He will never sleep in his own bed you know.." 

"He will be sleeping in your bed when he's 16.." 

Oh how wrong you all where! To all those that worried so much about me snuggling up to my son at night. The parenting police, the mothers of the year and random facebook acquaintance's, don't worry I haven't spoilt my baby! Much to your relief he now sleeps through the night in his own cot, in his own room. Although some nights I do will him to wake up so I can go in and bring him into bed with me! Needy Mummy strikes again! 

Oh I could probably go on and on as parents we have so many confessions! Do you have any that you would like to share with me?!

Pampers Unicef Campaign

As parents some of the most heartwarming, endearing and humbling moments have got to be watching your baby achieve their first milestones. From that very first smile, first roll and first steps there is literally no joy like it.

For the 9th year running Pampers have teamed up with UNICEF for the '1 pack = 1 vaccine' campaign. Since 2006 this campaign has paid for an outstanding 300 million vaccines! By doing so this eliminated Newborn Tetanus in not 1, 2 or 3 countries but 15. Last years campaign was very successful but there are still babies at risk in the poorest countries in the world. 

We need to team up together to help more babies reach their firsts. By simply watching this video Pampers will donate the cost of 3 vaccines to UNICEF. Do your part. 

To keep in with the theme of things I thought I would share some photo's of some of my Noah's firsts. Enjoy!

First photo

First day out

First time in town 

First costume 

First Christmas

First smile

First time crawling

First time standing unaided 

- I was not endorsed for this post. I simply wanted to support this fantastic campaign. 

Baby Diary: 11 Months Old

Another month, another baby diary. You are now 11 months old baby boy! And wow, just wow. You have come on leaps and bounds his month. Physically and mentally you have developed so much and your personality just keeps on growing too. I feel like we are closer than ever and I think this is my favourite age yet. 

Character

You are so funny and cheeky. You love to giggle and make others laugh by performing and if people applaud you well it just makes your day! You are so so smart too. You learn and pick up new things so easily and really don't miss a trick. You have been able to kiss and cuddle for a while now but this month you kiss and cuddle all the time and it's heaven seeing how affectionate you are becoming. On the flip side you can have such a temper at times and can have little crying episodes when you don't get what you want. You certainly know your own mind and I know which parent you get that trait from.... Ahem.  

Size
I guesstimate you are around 23lb now. I can tell you have put some weight on this month because you feel so much more solid. You hardly have an oz of fat on you but are like a sack of spuds! In the nicest of ways of course! You are still in size 4 nappies. You wear 9-12m trousers, vests and babygrows and you are just moving up into that size in tshirts too. Most 6-9m jackets still fit as all the ones I bought seemed to be bigger fitting. 

Health

You have had the occasional cold and constipation just like last month. Your wheeze had come back too so we took you to our GP who prescribed another inhaler after I said it helped last time. I would like to take you to see someone else though for a second opinion as this wheeze does seem to come and go a lot. With asthma running in the family I think I need to have it looked at further. You have been teething more but we are still waiting for teeth. We are hoping you cut your first tooth before your first birthday! 

Feeding

You have still been having 3x 5oz bottles of formula a day and around 8oz of water. You love your food and have 3 generous meals a day. This month you have really enjoyed oranges and you absolutely adore sandwiches! You mainly eat what Mummy and Daddy have now and you really enjoy sitting down for meals with us. You always share your food too which is really cute! 

We introduced your first bottle of cows milk today. You drank 1 oz and then refused the rest. I don't know if you didn't like it, need to get used to the change or if you were full up from your late dinner. Only time will tell and we will see how we get on in the morning. 

Sleep

Since we've moved into our new house your sleep has changed dramatically! The first night we had you in our room and you were fine. The next day I decided to see how you slept in your cot in your own room at nap time. Nap time was great and you slept fine. You napped so well in the cot during the day I decided to see how you managed at night time too. Night time came and you pretty much slept through! 2 weeks on and you usually sleep 8-8 which is fantastic. If you do wake up it's because you have banged your head on the cot or have a limb stuck through the bars but you usually settle again. 

When it comes to naps you are a changed baby. I simply place you in your cot, walk out the room, you roll onto your side and go to sleep!!!!!!! Let me explain those exclamation marks.... You have always needed to be cuddled to sleep and couldn't self settle. This isn't thanks to anything I've done, you did it yourself!

As much as I miss co sleeping and having naps together I am so proud of how great you now are with both sleeping and napping and how much you love your own room. 

It just goes to show you cannot spoil a baby. Let them sleep in your bed. Cuddle, sing and rock them to sleep! They are only babies for a short while! Let babies be babies and they will do it when they are ready!

Milestones

- Speech. You are very very vocal. You could already say Hiya, Mama, Dada, Nana but your new favourite word is Dad and you say it all the time! Dad, Dadad, Dada. We do get the occasional Mam too. 

- Knowledge. You know certain requests such as; take out, wave, up, ta, off. You also grab your hairbrush and try to brush your hair and will attempt to put a sock onto your foot. Clever boy! 

- Responding. Last month you learnt to give me something when I said "ta" or dance when I said "dance. This month you wave when I say wave or waving. So cute. 

- Crawling. We are FINALLY crawling! Well sort of as I wouldn't call it a crawl. It's more like a backwards bum shuffle. Not the typical crawl but it certainly gets you from A to B. 

- Pulling up. You now kneel and try to pull yourself up onto everything. If someone is sat on the floor you will shuffle over to them and literally clamber up them like a climbing frame. 

- You can now sit up from laying down on the floor. You roll from back to front, get up into the crawl position and then sit up. You shocked me today by doing it so easily!

- Standing. You are so good at standing now and can stand a few seconds unaided. When you are standing against something you will often let go to test your own balance. You are trying to cruise with furniture and I think it will be a matter of weeks before you are. It's so exciting because it's almost like you have learnt everything all at once. 

Things you like

- Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. Move over Doc Mcstuffins, move over Spongebob Squarepants there's a new favourite in town. You are absolutely obsessed with the hotdog song and you smile so much when it comes on. The smile is usually followed by some giggles and lots of dancing! 

- Standing up. You love for me to hold your hands while you are standing. You try to take steps but most of the time you dance! 

- The cats! Since we've moved into the house you have seen the cats everyday and you love them. Considering you are so young you are ever so gentle with them and they are really good with you too. It's like they know you are a baby and are patient with you. It's lovely to watch you interact and enjoy them like we do. I can't tell you how important I think it is for babies to learn how to love and respect animals.

- Cuddles and kisses. You are always kisses and cuddling us now and you love it but not as much as we do! There is nothing like a cuddle and a kiss of your baby. 

- Your own room. I can't believe how well and how quickly you have taken to being in your own room. It feels good knowing that all our hard work has paid off.

- Diet coke cans. Yes you are still obsessed with them. You will point none stop at them and end up throwing a mini tantrum if we don't let you hold the empty can. We've resorted to drinking it in mugs to try to trick you. You still want the mug but you aren't as fixated as with the cans. 

- Remote controls. You play with them all the time and even point them in the direction of the TV. We have caught you many times almost buying a movie off the Sky store!

- Wires. Another obsession that I would prefer you not to have! I have to try to hide every wire but that's impossible with an eagle eyed baby!

- Gadgets. You are a real bloke. Laptops, iPads, iPhones. You see one you want one! You even know to turn them all on and off with the button! Move over Steve Jobs! 

- The changing bag. Possibly your favourite thing to do is to pull everything out of the changing bag and play with spoons, wipes and your inhaler. 

- Fruit. I think you could live off it if we let you!

Things you don't like

Being told no! Go's without saying really! 

Nappy change. You used to be dine but more often than not you will now cry/tantrum when we change you. That's if we don't give you a toy to play with. 

The car. I thought all babies loved the car but not you. You get bored of being in there for too long and often cry and become restless. 

Here are some more pictures from the month cause I literally struggled to choose which to upload this month! Baby spam alert! 

Just think the next time I am writing you monthly update you will be 1 year old. I literally cannot believe it. Where have all these months gone?