a little more on O-N-E

WARNING: This post has a lot going on. 

Noah's birthday went on without a hitch.  We had a blast and had so many friends join in on all the fun.

The theme of his birthday party was Eric Carle's The Very Hungry Caterpillar.   I spent FOREVER working on the decorations and was really lucky to have my parents in town to help set everything up.  Unfortunately, I was running around like a chicken with my head cut off and didn't get nearly as many pictures of the party decorations as I would like.  My friend, Dan, was able to snap a ton for us which was really helpful and my friend, Rachel, video taped everyone singing happy birthday.  It was really nice to have help from so many people.  Noah received quite the bounty of gifts... This kid was spoiled rotten! But he is loving ALL the toys.  I need to figure out a toy rotation so that he doesn't get tired of all the toys at the same time, but that's a whole separate post entirely. ;-)

Noah also had his 1 year doctors appointment on Monday.  As always, he was weighed and measured. I was pretty disappointed because I seriously thought that he had grown so much but then the doctor expressed a little concern that he has, in fact, not grown much at all.

12 month stats:
19 lbs....14.81percentile
28.5 inches....7.33 percentile
20 inches.... 95 percentile

9 month stats:
18.56 lbs.... 29.3 percentile
27.75 inches.... 22.8 percentile
18.1 inches....77.7 percentile

The doctor said that his high energy probably accounts for the lower weight and having shortie parents probably doesn't help in the length department, but I took appointment really hard.  Being told that your baby is underweight makes you feel like you are doing something wrong, especially when you are trying your best to feed your kid ANYTHING and EVERYTHING under the sun.  I waited a while to introduce dairy, eggs and several other high allergy foods because that was what the doctor had advised us in the beginning, well now she is suggesting a high fat (good fat) and protein diet for Noah.  Is feeding children really this exhausting?  He doesn't want to eat this much. He will eat a lot one meal and then fight me the others and he will nurse ALL day long, then some days he will eat every meal like its no problem?  I just feel a little overwhelmed, but I am trying really hard to just constantly keep food nearby so that Noah is constantly reminded to eat and so that hopefully the doctor (or anyone else) won't think that I am starving Noah.  But really? This kid does not look starving to me...

The rest of the appointment was fairly standard.  She said Noah was doing fine cognitively and then he was given his next set of vaccinations.  So I guess I should be thankful that the weight issue was the only problem, but again... I'm a mama and I worry.  

Anyways, I am going to change the subject slightly and try to end on a more positive note. I want to share with you something I put together for Noah's birthday... it's the Weekly Noah Composite.  I know it's totally cheesy, but hey... it's for a baby and the things we do for a baby is often pretty cheesy!