Letter 9

Sarah Girl,
I can't believe that officially you have been out more than you were in. Blows my mind.

I have started planning your first birthday party and have found that I need to reign in a little. I just want everything perfect for you, always. Party or not.

This perfect thing is leaching it's way in to everything that has to do with you. I want  you to be right where the "they" say you should be, I want your outfits and bedroom to be perfect and now your party.

The thing that I am slowly realizing, although I am ashamed to admit it, you are perfect.

No if ands or buts about it.

Anyway back to how you are growing.

Your naps have become much less stressful and I am so thankful for that. You are much more pleasant when you wake up if you didn't go through the screaming before hand.

The doc cleared you for table food and you L.O.V.E it, a little too much at times. You are doing great feeding yourself but you are a little to over zealous sometimes. We had a scary moment this month when you were choking on a yogurt melt and I had to grab you out of your high chair and lay you across my legs and strike your back to get it dislodged. You were scared, crying and taking deep breaths, I was scared, crying and taking deep breaths. Then you proceeded to throw up all over me, I didn't care I was just happy you were ok.

Honey, you are sooooooo close to crawling. It is happening as I predicted, you sit and then lean forward and then get on your knees and try to move your legs. Then you fall on your tummy and scream. It's a process but I am just happy that you are getting closer to being mobile.

Speaking of falling...

You fell off the couch... twice, on my watch. The first time, I set you on the couch and the dogs started going after each other, so I left you content, laying back drinking a bottle. I came back after being gone 30 seconds and you were sitting on the floor, with your bottle. No thud, no tears. The second time I caught you and lowered you gently to the ground but total mom fail.

You are trying to pull yourself up and I think that once you crawl, walking won't be to far behind.

You have a total of 5 teeth with two more making their way down but these smaller teeth have been a breeze compared to your front two.

Something that has been bothering me lately is how enamored you are with TV and how your daddy and I don't really deter it. It started with just a couple shows in the morning because, like your mommy you aren't a morning person. Then it transformed to about an hour, and then I just gave up.

I don't know how to interact with you and keep your attention and keep you engaged like the tv does. Now please don't think I just plop you down and let it babysit you. We sing, clap, count, look at shapes and colors. You love to dance with me when the songs play and you grab at my fingers when we count.

I know I need to cut back on your screen time but I have come to the realization that if the worst thing I do to you is overload you on educational programing that we both interact through. Than I am not doing to bad in my book.

You love the little songs I make up for you and you have started with your DA DA DA, BA BA BA, MA MA MA. And you have started screaming, sometimes because you feel ignored if I have to walk away and sometimes because you are just testing your vocal cords.

I read that at this age you are becoming more aware of the concept of me being around just not around you (aka separation anxiety) and you HATE when I leave the room or walk away from you. The tears and screams are real little one! Unfortunately I do have to leave you sometimes and just make sure you see me leave and then give you extra cuddles when I get back.

Well, little one that is about it for month 9. I can't believe we are getting in to double digits here in a few weeks. You are getting so big and growing up so fast. I miss when you were a baby and we just laid in bed cuddling all day. But this new chapter is going to be so much fun!

I love you love muffin,
Mommy.

Letter 8

Hello my love!
It is hard to believe that at the the beginning of next month you have officially been out for as long as you were in. Crazy huh? But that's next month lets look at this month shall we.

This month marked my first month of being home full time. We kind of have a schedule worked out and I love that we eased in to it and it is working... for the most part.

Guuuuuurl, you absoluetly hate nap time/being in your room/your crib.I mean once you stop screaming bloody murder you are a great napper but getting to that point is rough. You want to be with me 24/7 and as faltered as I am, I try to get stuff done while you nap. You could be dead to the world but when we cross that threshold you know and you start to cry. I have started giving you your bottle before and then laying you down, that way I know you aren't waking up because you are hungry. Most days you are down by 9:45, you cry for about 5-10 minutes and then are out for about an hour and a half.  Then you wake up all smiles and instead of whisking you out of your room I am trying to have a tiny bit of play time with you in there so you don't look at it as the room of abandonment.

You love food. I don't think that I have given you something that you haven't liked yet. Even the veggies you are eating like a champ. We have introduced you to juice and you are unsure about it, I think it is because it is cold and lets face it, warm juice is gross.

You are teething something fierce and your gums are getting more and more swollen everyday, me thinks you will have two more teefers soon! This however has made you SUPER cranky, which is understandable because I remember what teeth pain felt like and its no fun. We have been trying to self medicate with ice, teethers, teething tablets and I even broke down and bought an amber necklace.

Oh the amber necklace, I bought it on a desperate whim trying to help you and all it did was look cute. I know people swear by them and I can at least said I tried it right?

Anyway, you are sitting like a pro but are getting very frustrated that you can't join this fast paced world. You aren't crawling yet and it is freaking me out. Everyone says it will happen or it won't and the world will go on but I was so looking forward to this milestone that I am becoming impatient.

You are flirting with babbling but you only do it when you are mad. So hopefully next month, with some work we can get a full fledged momma or dada. I won't be too upset if you say dada first.

Love you bunches.
Momma

Letter 7

I can't believe that you are 7 months old... and that in 5 months you will be a year old.

Blows my mind.

Anyway month 7, was a pretty great month for you, the major development is that you, my dear can sit up by yourself! Your tumbles are getting few and far between but they scare you, which baffles me considering how much you LOVE to be tossed in the air.

You  are getting more and more in to food, one word for you young lady, PINEAPPLE.

I thought I was going to write about how much you liked pears, which you do, but the look on your face when we fed you pineapple was priceless. You couldn't believe your taste buds it was so good. You actually screamed at your father in protest when he wouldn't feed you fast enough. It made my night.

This was the month that I started my night shift at work, that means more time at home with you, and I have to say that I love being home with you. I was worried because you can be challenging but I think we are figuring each other out just fine.

We have been working on getting on some semblance of a schedule, which is hard. You like to wake up before any human should function (4 am) and take a bottle, then you fall back asleep until 8am. This kind of puts a damper on a morning and afternoon nap. You also like to make nap time in to mommy and Sarah cuddle time which is nice but I am trying to break you of sleeping in our bed with us cuddling you.You don't like this idea, at all.

You still hate tummy time, but very slowly, like no words for it slowly, are developing the muscles you need to be able to hold yourself up better, this is the next step to crawling babe. You want to move SO BADLY but just won't accept that it will have to stem from being on your tummy sometimes.

Remember last month when I said you were finding your voice, well you are actually starting to make mamamamamamama noises and dadadadadadadada noises. You can guess which one I want you to master first.

Your 7th month ended in sickness once again, tis the season I guess. You just woke up in the middle of the night with a fever, covered in snot. It has been a rough last week with the sleepless nights and trying to make you feel better, lots of hugs and kisses all around. We suspect that with the amount of drool you are expelling that your next set of teeth are coming in, but then again we have been saying this for about a month now.

I am absolutely loving this time with you honey bun, my love muffin, and I can't wait to see what all you will have accomplished next month.

Love,
Mommy