Eight Months

CB, you're officially 2/3 of a year old! Let's look at what you've been up to:

Likes:

• Being tickled
• Being tossed in the air (carefully)
• Any food you can feed yourself, especially the Little Puffs (baby cheerios) that you can sort of pick up and feed yourself. (Quite a few end up on the floor.)
• Mommy (oh my gosh, the separation anxiety has set in with a vengeance)
• Daddy (but occasionally that changes the second you see Mommy - but then he throws you up in the air a bit and you're back to being his buddy)
• Chewing on things (boots, toys, hands, hair . . .)
• Knocking over towers of blocks
• Snuggles
• Crinkly noises like bags of potato chips
• Things that squeak (still)

Dislikes:

• Being taken from or in any way separated from Mommy (not all the time, but quite a lot of the time especially when you're tired)
• Crawling on the short shag carpet in the living room
• Pureed broccoli (need to try this again, but the gas was so stinky I haven't been able to)
• Sitting still, especially for any terribly long length of time (i.e. church)
• Being put down on your changing table right after I've retrieved you from your crib - even if your diaper is extremely soiled. (I think you don't realize I'm going to pick you right back up.)

What our photoshoots actually look like now - this happened while I was seeing if I had enough good shots.

Accomplishments:

• You grew two teeth this month! They came in about two weeks apart, and having them break through has not lessened your insane drooling. I cannot dress you without a bib or I have to dress you again in 5 minutes.
• You are creeping and army crawling all over the place, but only when you really want something. It's not graceful, but it's getting more and more functional. Occasionally you go up on your knees and rock a bit, but you usually go down on your belly again pretty quickly. You're finally figuring out that alternating arms is more effective than just pushing with one until it flips you over. 
• Switched from bathing in the sink to bathing in the bathtub - although still in the baby bathtub. It was just too hard to move everything out of your reach, and you are climbing too much to let me feel safe with you up that high.

• You love to stand up against the couch. You don't even hold on, you just lean and play with things. In church yesterday, you let go of the bench completely to reach for the hymnbooks behind you - and didn't fall! I'll be interested to see if you get coordinated enough to walk early, because you are really quite good at the first part.
• I'm just starting to transition you to three solid meals a day, but you still nurse quite a lot.
• You're getting better and better at picking up small things and sticking them in your mouth. Awesome for eating cheerios, terrifying otherwise.

CB, your really do get more fun each month. You have become quite ticklish, especially your armpits. When I told your daddy to try it out and you let out a shrieking giggle, the look on his face was the most delightful mixture of amazement and humor. I wish I had it captured on camera, because it's a moment I never want to get. I think you like it when I kiss your cheeks too, but I don't know if it's because you're figuring out it means I love you, or if it's because it tickles too. (I have received a few pretty wet "kisses" from you though - but it seemed more like you were trying to eat my face.)

You've become pretty clingy this month (starting around the time you picked up a cold at Great-Grandma Winegar's funeral, I think), and it can be a little exhausting. I'm told this is a developmental milestone, but it coincided with a time when your dad had a lot of late jobs, and you have really become a Mama's girl. You'll be playing happily with your dad, and then I walk in and you immediately start to cry for me. I love that you love to be with me, but I hope you go back to loving everyone again sometime. 

You love it when I give you whole pieces of food to gnaw on, like broccoli, cucumbers, and kiwi. It scares me to death because I'm afraid you're going to choke, but so far it seems like I'm picking good sizes. Sometimes I even let you play with your mushed up peas, and you try to pick them up as well. 

You still love to explore, even from my lap. I feel like I'm holding a wiggly puppy when I go to church. In fact, you've become pretty puppy-like all around. You chew on my shoes if I don't stop you (and you go to TOWN on your own shoes). You beg for our food. You scratch me while you're climbing all over me trying to explore. The other day I heard your dad saying, "Come on, CB, come on!" and as I walked in I saw you knocking over a tower of blocks, and your dad rubbing your head and saying, "Good girl!" Yeah. That happened. 

I love you, puppy daughter, 

Mama