9 Months

Well, it is February 5 and our baby girl is 9 months old today. Time sure flies by, but we can honestly say that we have treasured every single day and every little moment with Caroline. She is definitely the entertainment in our house.

Here is a glimpse of CAW at 9 months old… Just a warning. This is long.

1) Sleeps 12 hours every night (6pm-6am). Sometimes we can stretch it 6:30pm-6am. I have to wake her up at 6am to get her to daycare by 7am. So, on the weekends Little Miss Sunshine is still awake at 6am! Mommy loves it when she says “dadadada” into the monitor. Dada gets up and gets her!

2) Says “DaDa” ALL the time. I will look at her and say “MaMa”, and she’ll simply smile and say “DaDa”. Eric laughs, but is probably gloating on the inside. I am pretty sure it’s just the only babbling she knows how to do at this moment in time.

3) Is a good eater! We have just started giving her some small pieces of table food. I pinched up my broccoli last night and gave her a few pieces. She gummed them down and swallowed. She has had mashed up banana and some cheese. However, she really just likes the jars of baby food; so that is the main food she gets! She LOVES feeding herself. She eats little crackers and banana puffs. They dissolve pretty quickly in her mouth.

4) Rolls, scoots, reaches, and maneuvers her little self all over the place. She gets up onto all fours and rocks back and forth. She is crawling backward, but not quite forward. Any day now I bet she’ll start crawling.

5) Puts EVERYTHING in her mouth. We mean everything. The other day she leaned over to Shiloh and tried to put Shiloh’s face in her mouth.

6) Bailey and Shiloh. Caroline loves these dogs. She just stares at them and smiles. They walk by, she grabs on and pets them. She loves to hang on to Shiloh’s curly tail. The dogs love her, too. They are always right in the middle of the action.

7) Is not quite clapping yet, which momma is working very hard to do, but she loves clapping two objects together to make loud noise. She takes blocks and smashes them together. She thinks that is very fun.

8) Caroline thinks her daddy is the funniest person in the world. Anything and Everything he does is absolutely hilarious to her. She just laughs and giggles at him.

9) Is very, very clingy to me. Cries. No, screams when I leave her at daycare every morning. I hope she forgets about me 1 minute after I leave b/c it absolutely breaks my heart. With that being said….

10) She is very independent. She will jump in her Jumperoo, play in her Exersaucer, or just play on a quilt with her toys for an hour at a time.

11) Loves toys that make noise and light up. Loves toys that open and close.

12) Sleeps with the afghan that her Great Grandma Davis made her. EVERY. SINGLE. Night! She pulls it up close to her face and snuggles it, rolls over, and falls asleep. Very cute.

13) Still loves it when Momma sings to her. Anything and Everything. Sometimes I just sing whatever it is I have to say to her. She thinks it’s funny.

14) LOVES, LOVES, LOVES the song Sweet Caroline. Yes, our daughter is very vain.

15) Loves to listen to her animated momma read books to her. She really enjoys Five Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed and The Napping House. I think it’s the rhythm of the story and the way I pronounce the words (that’s the 2nd grade teacher coming out in me). She loves all books. She’ll look up at me, look at the book, look at me and smile. It’s pretty precious. Of course it is very, very important to me that our daughter loves to read. Modeling how to read is the best thing you can do for your little one (ok, ok the 2nd grade teacher comes out again!).

16) Bath time might be her favorite time of the day. We put her in the bath seat and she starts splashing all around. She loves to play with the water cup that we use to wash her hair. She also loves all of her bath books. Pulling her out of the bath tub and drying her off is her least favorite time of the day. She’d stay in the tub all night long.

17) Starting around 6 months Caroline started touching our face. We thought it was very, very sweet….but NOW when she grabs our face, she claws us. IT HURTS! We have to be really careful when she reaches up b/c yesterday she grabbed my eye and left a big red mark right underneath it. OUCH! She’s trying to be sweet, so you can’t get upset at her.

18) Spits everywhere. Now what I mean by this is if she’s not interested in any more food she will blow bubbles back at you. We need some advice on how to discipline a 9 month old. I tried to put my hand over her mouth and say “no”, but she thought that was absolutely hilarious and started giggling. I couldn’t let her see me laugh so I had to turn around. Now she blows these “bubbles” all the time. Even just sitting on our laps she’ll blow the bubbles and then giggle. Oh boy. We think she’s going to be a stinker!

19) I think that was more than a glimpse, I have filled you in on EVERYTHING going on with Caroline right now.