Flipped a learning switch

I really believe there is some sort of internal switch that flips at 1 year, when all the sudden they go from being babies to little people. In the last week, Jenna has changed so much. All the sudden she's this litte person, who listens to us, clearly thinks before she acts, expresses herself much more clearly than before, etc. She is talking up a storm, pointing to Josh and saying "dada", looking at me and babbling "mamamama", making all sorts of connections (if you just say hi or bye, without waiving, she immediately waves. While waiving, she makes a noise that sounds like "hi" but isn't quite there yet).

If you ask her where her nose is, she points to her nose, same with her mouth. If I ask her "where's Mommy's nose?" she points to and touches my nose. If we're reading a book and I ask her where elmo is, she not only points to elmo, but leans in to kiss him. She always looks up at me for approval before she does anything she's not sure of, like she's waiting for me to tell her it's okay.

She also no longer takes bottles during the day. She has two sippy cups, her milk sippy cup and her water sippy. She MUCH prefers the water one, but we try to force some milk in every once and a while. At night she still has a bottle of warm milk, but she'll even push that away from time to time. In the morning, we bring her into our room, put on a "baby genius" video, and she watches with rapt attention as we get ready for work. If we walk past the TV and block her vision, she moves to the side so she can see better. I can almost picture her saying "mom, get outta my way!!" She LOVES doggies, and always goes right up to them with no fear. In fact, the dogs are usually the ones backing away from her!

This is just such a fun age, and I know it's just going to get better, the more she understands and is able to communicate. One is fun!

Here are two more party pictures that were on my dads camera, plus a labor day weekend picture of my dad with his two babies!