Your ninth month!

Dear Madelyn,

Your ninth month has been my favorite month yet.  You are a crawler and a climber!  It all started with a couple of cautious crawls on your hands as long as your bottom didn't move and it gradually became a couple more cautious crawls on your hands and then sitting after four crawls or so to seeing something across the room and crawling to it.  You have just started to realize that not only can you crawl but it can get you places you want to go.  You have become quite the explorer and thus Daddy and I will be baby proofing even moreso and putting up baby gates.  You were a sick baby again this month and your Daddy and I were at a few more Dr. appointments and on the phone with nurses from Children's Hospital but you finished the month out strong and feeling good and I am grateful for that.
Here are your updates this month!

Teeth:   Two, but we are expecting two more.  We see a little puffiness where your top two teeth will be.

Sleep: You learned at the beginning of this month how to go from your stomach to sitting up and ever since then putting you to sleep has been a little different.  I used to lay you down and you would roll to your side or stomach and go to sleep but since you have learned a new trick (sitting up on your own) you immediately roll over when I lay you down and sit up and cry.  It takes a few more trips up and down the stairs to get you to sleep but you have broken us in after a month of this.  When you are really tired you lay down and sleep but most of the time you get up, pull up to your knees and explore your crib.  You play with your lovey bunny and your seahorse and even push the buttons on your mobile. 

Night time Routine:  Still easy, although you wake up a few times a night for your paci.  Daddy or I have to go in your room and put it in your mouth.  You have also started waking up at 5:30 or 5:45 and refusing to go back to bed.  Sometimes you sit up and play and talk to yourself but that eventually turns into crying and whining until we come get you.  When Miss Maddie is ready to rise Mommy or Daddy better be too!  The first thing you do in the morning is smile as we lifty you out of your crib and then smile at Wilson who is always there to greet you.

Food: You were really sick this month with a stomach bug that made you vomit for seven days in a row.  You wouldn't eat much and I really worried about your eating.  You lost weight and went back to taking almost nothing but bottles and cheerios.  I am glad to say you are eating normally again.  You still love cheerios over any other food.

Crawling:  You just started crawling for sport a few days before you turned ten months.  You are a mover and a shaker and you don't like being placed in your bouncy seats so much anymore, you would rather sit on the floor and explore than be in your bouncers.  I love it when you pull up and your cute little toes poke out from the back!

Talking: Still only ma-ma and da-da but you are combining more consonants with vowels now and immitating sounds your Daddy and I make.  You love to wave.  You can wave up and down and side to side.  When  I say "ni-ni" and carry you up the stairs to bed, you wave too.  It's so incredibly cute, I love it.  You wave hello and bye-bye when people leave and enter the room.  You definitely associate waving with coming and going...and bed time!
Shoes:  I am happy to report that you are wearing your shoes more now.  Maybe it's because you are so busy exploring that you aren't just sitting and staring at them anymore.
General Temperament: Loving, easy going and a girl with an ATTITUDE, especially when you are sick or being changed on the changing table.  You want nothing more than to turn over and sit when we change your diaper and we want nothing more than for you to stay still so we can change you!  When we try and keep you on your back or hold you still, you grunt and cry, everytime.

Health:  You have had four ear infections in 9 months.  Each time the Doctor looks at your ears they are bad.  As a result we need to get tubes in your ears.  We went to Children's Hospital when you were 9 months and four weeks and you have been scheduled for tubes on Dec. 16th.  I am terrified for you to be in pain of any sort and especially to be put under anesthesia at such a young age.  I hope they help you though as I think your ears cause you a lot of pain.

Here you are during your stomach flu, after a nap...you didn't feel well.  So sad.

Daddy reading you "The hungry catepillar" at the ENT office while waiting to see the Doctor.

Playtime:  I think you actually prefer your books to toys for the first time.  You will crawl across the floor to read certain books you love.  "Peekaboo kisses" is your very very favorite.  You bounce up and down and laugh when you see it.


You and Wilson watching the Wonder Pets.  I love this picture!

Playing on the floor in your room.

Reading is fun!

 

Weight:  

9 months:  21 lbs 5 oz

Length:

At birth: 20.25 inches

2 weeks: 19 3/4 inches (26th percentile) 

Not sure how you shrunk since birth!

2 months:  22.75 inches (67th percentile)

3 months: Not sure
6 months:  27.8 (94th percentile)

7 months:  Not sure
8 months:  Not sure
9 months:  Not sure

Diaper Size:

Size 3/4 .

Clothes Size:

9 month outfits!  Some 6-12 and some 12 month!


Hair Color:

At birth: dark brown

2 months: light brown 

3 months: lighter brown 
4 months: dirty blonde - so beautiful!  Mommy is jealous!
6 months: Blonde 
7 months:  Blondy!
8 months:  Blonde.  Like gold strands.  So pretty.
9 months:  Your hair is still blonde, it's getting so thick and pretty.  It lays beautifully.  We spray "no more tangles" on it after baths now.

Eye color:

At birth: dark blue

2 months: blue

3 months: lighter blue
4 months:  the prettiest blue I have ever seen.  Your Daddy says your eyes are prettier than his!  Now that's something!
6 months: Blue 
7 months: Blue/gray
8 months: bright blue
9 months:  dark blue

Firsts-
Crawling
Sitting from laying down position
Flu
Visit to ENT

It was a difficult month with the stomach flu but we had fun anyway and you made a lot of progress bugaboo.

I love you so much,

Mama