Dear Kiki,

I had every intention of being on the ball and getting your nine month post up on time- just days after we got home. I figured there would be so many hands to hold you and play with you I’d have an abundance of free time to write. But, well, to be perfectly honest Target won out.

Its been nice being around so much family this past month because then there are that many more people to point out your milestones. You have 3 new teeth coming in up top. You are going to be sporting the quasi-sloth-from-Goonies look for a bit because only one of your front teeth is included in the new three. You are still so close to crawling but are not quite there yet. I think you are just cautious because we’ve seen you get onto all fours, but instead of taking a step you look around, look at us and push yourself back up to sitting. You’ve gotten very good at standing and holding yourself up- maybe you’ll sort of gloss over the crawling and move straight to walking.

You appetite has increased tremendously. On our way to the cabin you ate an entire McDonalds hamburger. You now eat pretty much everything we eat and it amazes me that you notice immediately if we have something you dont. Yesterday we were having apple pie and you were having some crackers or something at least close to the same COLOR as pie, yet you were able to detect a difference and started staring at the pie, looking at us, and looking at your food all while making your grunty-whining sound. Who says babies can’t communicate? You do a great job feeding yourself and I don’t know if you have a clear favorite food right now. Truly, you eat everything.

You have never been quite as chunky as Nathan was, but you are still a big girl. You are thinning out some and I know soon you will stretch out and all those sweet little rolls will be gone. You are fitting into some 12-18mo clothes but are moving right into 18-24mo. Its been so fun getting to shop for you with all! the! selection! I’ve gotten you lots of cute shoes, a big girl swimsuit, and  clothes…..but probably not enough (we lost our baby Gap- WTH?) Need to go get more.

Im just dreading what its going to be like once you are really really on the move because I’ve seen you put a small lego in your mouth, find some random broken piece of plastic and insert that in your mouth and hands down the scariest was when you put three of the “magic capsules” that I had given to Nathan (the kind that you dissolve in water and they expand into different shaped sponges) in your mouth. My mom caught you just as the capsules were dissolving in your mouth. Scary does not even begin to cover it. Needless to say Nathan will not be getting any legos for his birthday, or anything else with small pieces. I accept the fact that I’ll never be able to police it closely enough. Wheew its stressful.

You are a chatty chatty girl, coming up with all new sounds and tongue clicks, and smacking. You’ve given up sweet eyes which breaks my heart a little. I loved sweet eyes and so did everyone else. Thankfully lots of extended family members got to enjoy it.

Since coming to Iowa you’ve gotten to sit in real grass, walk in cornfields, see farm animals, pick and eat raspberries in the back yard (with the added bonus that the seeds don’t get stuck in your teeth), eat corn on the cob, go to the farmers market, stroll through Target,  go boating, kick your feet in the cool Minnesota lake, try all sorts of new foods, and have had all sorts of attention lavished on you.

Your sleep was totally messed up for a good week when we first got here and now its just slightly off. You wake up at least once, sometimes twice a night. Sometimes I try and ignore you (we’re sharing a room) and you go back to sleep, other times we have to pull out the secret weapon: the boob. You take two, sometimes three naps a day.

You continue to try and reach for the toys you shouldn’t play with ie- match box cars. We have lots of Little People and blocks and play food for you to play with and yet you will stretch and reach and scoot around with all your might to find one matchbox car- the forbidden fruit.

I can’t believe I only have two more months to write before you will be one. It doesn’t even seem possible an entire year can go this fast. Nathan tells me he will be my baby forever. I hope you will too.

Love,

Mama

Filed under: McSassy