Dear Summer: 9 & 10 Months

Dear Summer,

      Yesterday you turned 10 months old!  Today I am sitting here on the couch with you asleep in my lap and I decided to look through some pictures of the day you were born.  Daddy asked what hat he was wearing when you were born, so that's how I ended up getting into the pictures.  In case you're wondering, it was his Yankees hat.  By the way, you're going to be a Yankees fan.  I'm sorry.

       The last time I visited this blog was when you were turning 9 months old.  I got as far as jotting down ten different things about you at that age before I was called away for a whole month.  I wrote the following things (with my current thoughts on the matter in parenthesis):

~ You love to pull the strings on Daddy's sweatshirt (when Daddy is holding you he is usually wearing his hooded sweatshirt, and you always go for his strings, putting them in your mouth and playing with them.  Sometimes at night when you're asleep in bed with Daddy I have to go around the bed to tuck his strings into his shirt so they don't get wrapped around your neck or anything).

~ Give kisses now (you were starting to give little open mouth kisses when I said "kiss" but I think that's kid of disappeared.  You do smack your mouth a lot, either for fun, or to tell me you want a drink or a bite of something in your mouth).

~ bbbb....ddddd (I guess you were making those sounds?)

~ Baby yoga (you started doing what we call Baby Yoga, on your hands and feet with you butt in the air and head pointed down.  If you were on the bed doing that, I'd flip you right over into a forward roll and you would crack up.  Come to think of it, you're not really doing Baby Yoga so much these days).

~ Cruising (you, you've been cruising on the furniture since about 8 months old.  You're getting ready to walk now.  You'll be standing there against the furniture, and then you take your hands off and just stand there on your own, thinking about walking, and then after a few seconds you drop down and rapidly crawl away.  You are fast!  And you climb everything.  If you're crawling around on the floor and there's something that's about 6-12 inches high, you'll go crawl over it just for the challenge of it.  You climb up the stairs in our house, all the way to the top, with someone behind you, of course.  You started this about 9 months old.  I'm teaching you how to go down the stairs, and I think you're getting it because yesterday you got down from the couch by yourself).

~ Putting things in your mouth (for the longest time you didn't mouth inappropriate things or put things in your mouth and I was so grateful for it.  But you picked it up in an instant and haven't stopped.  You hold something up and shake your head no and do your quacking thing "dah dah dah dah dah" or something like that, but it's high-pitched like a quack).

~ Clap your hands and shake your head when you hear music - "dancing" (You love music.  When it comes on you stop what you're doing to clap and shake yourself around.  Speaking of clapping, that's something that started in the last month.  You picked it up quickly and looove to clap whenever someone else is clapping or if you hear the word 'clap').

~loooove baths (So very much.  You love the water.  Splashing, smacking, putting your face in it, catching it, dumping it.  You go nuts in the bath tub, so much so that you crash all over the place and are constantly banging your head).

At 10 months old you've been saying hi and bye to people with a breathy 'H' sound and your right arm flapping wildly in the air.  You love to play peek-a-boo!  It started out with your hands at your temples with a blanket (or shirt, or hat, or cloth) clasped in them and you totally got the idea.  But now you'll do it even if you don't have an object in your possession.  You pull your hands up and there's your face for all the world to see, then your hands go down and we pretend something big happened anyway because it's still flipping cute.

Diaper changes continue to be a pain because you do not want to lay still on your back and all you do is flip over and scream to get away.  If Daddy or I are changing your diaper, and we're both home, we usually ask the other one to come help hold you down.  Sometimes I have Jacob help me.  Speaking of him, he loves you so much.  Sabine does too.  She is so jazzed to be a big sister, and you're more into her than you were in the past.  You love he hair and touching (smacking) her face.  Jacob takes really good care of you.  If either if your siblings are around, you want to be where they are, doing what they're doing, or at least watching every move they make.

You've become quite a good eater recently, eating a lot and eating really healthy foods.  You seem excited about all the new flavors and tastes and I'm really, really happy about that.  You still nurse, and get so excited to do so.  Nursing has always sort of been your 'reset' button.  You need to reconnect with me that way, and the you can go back your business in a much better mood.

No teeth for Summer yet.  We're kind of surprised because both Jacob and Sabine got their first tooth right after they turned 9 months.  But you were also a lot smaller than them at birth, so maybe your clock runs a little differently.

Even though you don't have teeth growing in yet, you hair is starting to get longer.  Some days you have little curls that form on the back of your head!  Your hair...I can't tell just what color it is, maybe because it's not long enough yet, but it seems like it may be blonde, for now, at least.  Whatever it is, it's cute!  And your lashes...that's one area in which you do take after your siblings.  You've got those long, dark, curly eye lashes that they both have, and people are noticing them a lot lately.

Just like when you were a tiny baby, you're still trying to get somewhere.  When you are with other people, you're always trying to get back to my arms.  You've been really clingy lately.  Sometimes you just need Mommy, but other times once I get out of sight, you're fine.  Still, other times you surprise us and let some special person hold you for a very long time.  When you're in your high chair, you're trying to get out, and you usually succeed in pushing through the straps and standing up.  Even though you love to be in the action, I've noticed the ability you have to entertain yourself quietly for a long time just playing with something on the ground.  But all bets are off if your adult walks out of the room.  You give a little screech/squeal that means for us to get back here and pick you up so you can go along for the ride.

You play around on the floor when we're all home, mostly the kitchen floor because that's where we always seem to be.  You go from room to room and take your time exploring things.  You have your own things and make your own messes.  When we all run around chasing each other, tickling and tackling, you're right there with us.  You're one of us, but you're your own person with your own looks, a tiny head, a tiny toosh, a little bit of light hair with a little curl in the back, a soft belly that I love to kiss, a signature move (back arch with arms above your head) that you were doing inside of me all those months ago.  You would think that my looking back at those pictures from the day you were born would cause me to sigh and exclaim, "Where did the time go!"  But they don't.  They make me feel like it was a million years ago and that you were always with us, and that the people in those pictures were simply coming home to one another at the end of a long day.