9 months: little love letters

 -Growth: You had your 9 month "well-child" check up today (3/14/2012)

*You are weighing 18 lbs. 1 oz. 

*You are 29 inches long.

*You are in the 40th percentile for your weight.

*You are in the 93rd percentile for your height. 

*You're a big, growing girl. I, particularly, love your thick squishy thighs. They are so chubby and cute! You're hate it when your 17! HA! 

-Eating:

*You are taking only 3 bottles a day. Your, first, morning bottle is 8 oz. Then you have one before your afternoon nap and one before bed, both 6 oz.

*You eat rice cereal and baby food before your last bottle as well.

*You're mostly interested in "big people" food. Your current favorites are: (steamed) sweet potato cubes, green beans, peas, corn, strawberries, blueberries, and tomatoes.

2/29/2012: a collage picture of you eating your steamed veggies for the first time

-Sleeping:

*You start winding down for bed around 8/8:30 pm every night. To give you a bath, change your clothes, feed you a bottle, and get you to sleep - all takes about one hour.

*During the day, I've tried to eliminate your morning nap. When you don't take a morning nap you take a really good afternoon nap! :) Although, it seems your naps only last for about an hour and a half or two hours these days... 

*This past weekend time changed. Spring forward, so we lost an hour. The time change has really messed with all three of us. Just a few nights ago you took a nap until 7:15 pm and you weren't even really ready for bed until 10:30 pm! YIKES! Although, you slept until 11 am the next morning!

-Play time:

*You are very much into playing with your toys now. Some of your favorites are: the music table, your new Elmo, your cellphone, and anything that makes a "rattle" noise. 

*I used to put you down and get a few toys out for you. Now that you're pulling up and trying to walk, you prefer to pull up to your toy basket and pull out the toys you want, by yourself.

*Sometimes you so adamantly want a specific toy that you reach so far that you dive into your basket head first. The first time this happened you were scared and cried. Now, you lift your leg and reach in hopes that you get into the basket to play. You really enjoy sitting in there and throwing the toys out. 

2/22/2012: This is your digging through your toy basket. 

-Developments / Events: Now that you're movin' and groovin' you've been able to explore and discover new things. Here are a few picture examples: 

2/23/2012: After a day of shopping, I decided to take you to the park for the first time. I thought I'd let you try out the swing. Your face says it all - you HATED the swing. You started shaking and crying. I think you were scared. When I sat on a swing and held you, you loved swinging. You weren't ready to try it solo, I suppose. 

2/14/2012: For Valentine's day Mommy and Daddy went out to dinner to celebrate Valentine's Day and Mommy's birthday (which is 3 days later). Nammy watched you that night. Just as soon as I left, Nammy sent me this picture with text that said "Look who figured out how to crawl up the step!" 

2/14/2012: This is a picture of your first bath without the infant seat. You  had been trying to sit up from your infant seat for a few days, so Daddy decided you were big enough to sit in your little bath. You LOVED (and still do) splashing in the water. 

-Funny / cute moments:

*We think you're working on talking / saying more words. When you play you move your mouth like you are saying something, but you don't actually use your voice. 

*You've been shaking your head "yes" a lot. You say it when people ask you questions or when you like something. 

*You had an ear infection, took antibiotics, and still kept pulling at your ear. We took you to the doctor to have it checked. Your doctor was out of the office, but you were seen by another doctor. You seemed to like him, but when he handed you back to us you turned and looked at him and said "bye!" He responded, "Oh, ok. If you're ready, then I'm ready." 

*You've really developed a little attitude this past month as well. You now: give dirty looks, roll your eyes (usually only at Momma), and when you don't get your way or someone tells you "no" you ball up your fists, squeeze them, and shake them out of anger. Patience, my little friend. 

*The other day, Nanny Wanda let us borrow a toy from her house. It's a little push toy that you can sit and play with the front or stand behind the back and push around. Daddy stood you up behind it the other day and you took off! You kept going back and forth from either side of the living room to the other. I think Daddy was pretty excited that he was the first one to see you do this :) 

It's been such a fun month. I'm sure I say that every month, but I love watching you grow and change. I can't wait to see you learn to walk and talk more. You're going to be so short and cute walking around :) 

I'll love you forever and ever. I promise! 

Love, 

Mommy