I finally wrote down and counted today and Kayli knows 22 signs! She is such a smart little girl. She is even starting to put 2 signs together too. Here is a list of the 22 signs she knows, mostly because I want to have a place where I can see her progress and this is the closest thing I have to a journal (I know I know, Ive just really NEVER been good at keeping one).

Mom, Dad, Baby, Eat, Drink, Milk, Cracker, More, Dog, Cat, Horse, Bird, Duck, Fish, Ball, Airplane, Shoes, Hat, Bath, "All Done", "Signing Time" and her newest sign is Please.

If she wants something and you ask her "What do you say?" she will sign Please its sooo cute and you cant help but get it for her! :)

She is also very verbal. She says Daddy, Mommy, Baby, Kitty, Doggie, Turtle, Shoes, Grandpa, Grandma and Thank You! (Im sure there are more, but I just cant think of them). She is so cute she really tries to repeat everything I say!

Kayli does so many cute and silly things right now. One of the cutest is when she wakes up in the morning she hands me my cell phone and signs “Dad”. I guess she is just used to the routine of waking up and calling her Daddy. During the day from time to time she will find the phone and say/sign “Dad” and she is always walking around the house saying, actually more like yelling his name, like she is just waiting for him to come home at any minute. She LOVES to sit at the computer with me and just look through all of her pictures. She laughs at herself, signs “baby” over and over again and gets really excited when we come across a picture of her with Pete. She smiles really big and starts signing and saying “Daddy” like crazy! I’m sure she will be so happy to see him in 11 days.

Today I had her sit with me while I scrolled through some of the more recent pictures of Lindsay and Logan and she was having a BLAST! She was waving at Lindsay, laughing at her, and trying to figure out how in the world to get her out of the computer screen. Too funny!

My parent’s backyard backs up to a fairly busy residential street and there is a fire station right across that busier street. So needless to say we see and hear the firetruck quite often. Well Kayli gets soo startled by the horn and/or the sirens that she stops whatever she is doing, throws herself onto the ground and then onto her stomach and then looks around until its “safe” to get back up and play. If she is on the trampoline she literally goes from standing and jumping to flat on her stomach. It is so hilarious, I really need to capture it on video and then send it into America’s Funniest Videos. She does the same “stop and drop” maneuver when there is a loud truck, airplane or motorcycle too. She really is so much fun to watch!

She LOVES to play in water. I have to keep the dog dishes picked up around here or Kayli will transfer all of the food into the water, and then eventually dump the water bowl onto herself and the floor. She has a small pool in the backyard that she loves to get in and out of. She doesn’t usually sit in the water, but will walk around in circles kicking the balls around the water. Im hoping she will like to get in the pool at Grandpa and Grandma Madsen’s when we are visiting there next week!

Kayli loves to play with and watch animals. My parents have a small zoo here with their 4 cats, 2 dogs, and a turtle and she has a lot of fun with them. She uses my Mom’s golden retriever as a chair since she is old and is usually lying down. She sits on the cats in an attempt to save them from Scooby (the small dog) who grabs them by their ears and drags them around the tile floor. She still fears the turtle a little bit, but I cant blame her, Im not much of a turtle lover either. Something about their rough skin or something I don’t know. Anyways she will walk around the entire backyard looking under the bushes, between the trashcans, in the flowers, and behind the BBQ to try to find him. I know she has found him when she starts her whining/crying routine. She will just stand there and whine at him, for some reason! When he’s out and about she wont get too close to him, especially when hes moving, unless someone is holding her hand. I guess she has a love/hate relationship with poor AWOL the turtle.

OOPS! I cant believe its been over 2 months since I have updated here!

Kayli finally got the hang of walking at the end of March, just before she turned 14 months. Mom Madsen told us that Pete didn’t walk until he was 14 months old and I guess Kayli decided that she wanted to follow in Daddy’s footsteps! Pete was so glad that she figured it out before he left for the summer, since he really didn’t want to miss out on such a HUGE milestone. She is getting pretty fast now, and is running me in circles. I think its so much fun to take her out and about, to the park, playing in the backyard, and prancing up and down the neighborhood, which she loves. I think this is my favorite stage so far. She is so interactive, is really gaining some independence and her personality is really starting to shine!

Kayli had her first trip to Disneyland on Wednesday! We all had soo much fun! We started the day with breakfast with some of the Disney characters at Goofy's kitchen at the Disneyland Hotel. She didnt really know what to think of all the weird looking things, but as long as they stayed at a distance she was fine with them. When she saw Goofy and the big Balooga Bear she yelled out "kitty, kitty, kitty"!

Once we got to the park, she even rode a few rides! :) She rode Dumbo with Dad and Uncle Ian, Storybook with all of us, Buzz Lightyear with Mom (she was asleep in the carrier for this one), and It's a Small World with Mom and Dad. She had SOOO much fun! She didnt really know what to think of flying high on Dumbo, but she didnt cry or look scared at all, she was just checking out the view! :) She didnt like the Storybook ride AT ALL! This is the one in the boat that goes past all of the mini houses of the Disney characters, Kayli just wanted to touch the water and get in the water, so she was miserable the whole time. I just wanted to get her off that boat! Small World was definately her favorite! We were in the first row of the boat and Kayli just stood up in between Pete and I and held onto the bar for the entire ride. She was sooo intrigued by all of the moving dolls and it was a BLAST to watch her dancing to the music! :) She was laughing and having a GREAT time! The last ride of the day was Buzz Lightyear, and well Im sure she would have LOVED it, but she was tired from a LONG day at the Park and slept through all of the commotion!

Disneyland was a BLAST and we really cannot wait to take her again!

Boy Kayli sure is picking up signs quicker and quicker! :) She loves to be outside, so I take her out in the backyard and put her up on the trampoline with a few balls and she has a blast chasing them around and watching them chase her. Today I was up there playing with her and I showed her the sign for ball, and she did it right back! Everytime she got the ball after that, she would stop and sign ball! So cute, so smart, and soo much fun!

Kayli still LOVES watching the signing time DVDs and she even sings along to the CDs in the car! In fact, she has us all singing along to them! :) She signs milk, dog, all done, eat, come, baby, and is still trying to figure out when to use her sign for "more". She recognizes signs as well. I will sign bath, but not say it and she gets really excited and starts crawling towards the bathroom. If I sign Mom she will say "Mum". If we sign drink she will pick up her sippy cup! So I think she is really picking up on the signs for sure! The doctor was soo impressed when we told her that she was already combining her speaking with her signing! :)

Kayli is talking up a storm, well a baby size storm, but a storm nonetheless! :) Most of her talking is purely jibberish, well to us anyways, but she does say a few words! Mom (mum mum mum), Dad (Da), Kitty (titty), and sometimes dog, although she usually signs this one! :) She also tries to repeat what we say which is REALLY fun! Ill say a whole sentence to her and she will repeat (well try to) the last word of my sentence! One of my favorites is when we say "Big Girl" or "Smart Girl" she says "urrrrl". She is also combining her words with her sign language. She will say "Mum" and then sign "milk" or say "Da" and then sign come. She sure is a smart little girl! :)

Kayli had her 12 month well baby visit this week and she weighs 23lbs, is 30 1/2 inches long and has hit all of the 12 month milestones! She still is not walking, but LOVES to cruise and is a pretty fast crawler! She does LOVE to walk while we hold her hand or hands, but she hasnt braved it on her own yet! She will take a step and throw herself into our arms as she takes the step, but that is about it! She has 5 teeth, and is really mostly eating table foods now. She LOVES bread (Olive Garden breadsticks are her favorite), and mashed potatoes!

She does have to have some follow up tests due to the bladder infection that she had a few weeks ago. The Doctor ordered her to have a renal ultrasound to check anatomy, specifically to make sure she has 2 kidneys (being born with 1 kidney is a genetic disorder seen a few generations back on my Dad's side of the family). She also has to have some blood drawn for a cbc (complete blood count) and a few other things. And Last, but not least, she also has to have a NASTY test done where they insert a cathader and inject dye using an IV and then watch the dye travel through her kidneys and bladder to determine if everything is functioning properly. They are specifically looking for what they call "reflux". She will have the ultrasound and blood work done in the next week or 2 and then the dye test will be done in about 4 weeks. Hopefully everything will come back normal and she wont have anymore bladder infections, and wont require anymore tests!

Kayli LOVES watching the Baby Signing Time DVDs and is really picking up the signs pretty fast! She has been signing "milk" for about 2 weeks and just started signing "dog" yesterday! Its so cute when she does it, she uses both hands and pats both thighs, or sometimes she will even pat the dog instead of her thigh! :) She also signs "eat" and "more" but really hasnt associated them correctly yet, but we know its only a matter of time!

Its been so long since Ive updated anything here! She is crawling like crazy, loves going up the stairs and figured out how to safely go down them on her tummy feet first this week! She can stand all by herself, but is VERY hesitant to do it and usually only does when she is distracted and not realizing it. No real steps yet, but I'm really not in any big hurry for her to be running me in circles! :) She LOVES to play on the slide in my parents backyard and really enjoys playing with the dogs and cats there too! She is eating more and more people food all the time and so far she is liking it, especially french fries, cinnamon toast, and cheetos! :) We cant believe she is going to be 1 in just a few more weeks, time really has flown by too fast!

Kayli got her first tooth yesterday!! :) She was knawing on my finger like she LOVES and I thought I felt something different, so I started feeling her bottom gums and sure enough a lil sharp tooth was poking through!! Its her bottom left one and the right one will be along in another day or so it looks like! She wont let me pull her lip down and look at her gums, she sticks her tongue out, so I havent actually SEEN it yet, but I guess once its in a lil further Ill be able to see it all the time!! :)

She is also trying sooo hard to crawl...she often ends up on her face and then rolls onto her back, but she is still trying. She gets one leg out and on that knee, but then has NO IDEA how to get the other one out from underneath of her! :) She has figured out how to get around to some degree though. She sits on her bum, throws her arms up and propels herself forward a little and then does it again...she "butt scooted/hopped" across my parents family room the other day! It was fun to watch, but i told her that she cant butt scoot because we pay too much for her cloth dipaers for that!! She also gets around by rolling onto her back and pushing herself forward with her legs, so she is kinda "getting around".