9 Months Old

9 months is one of those big milestones to me as Lucy's now been with us for as long as she was growing inside me.  Time is going by WAY too fast!

Our BIG girl's 9 months check up stats:
Weight 23 lbs. 5 oz. - 97th percentile (3 lbs bigger than Ella at this age)
Height 29.5 inches - 96th percentile (exactly the same as Ella)
Head circumference 17.9 inches - 90th percentile  (1/2 inch bigger than Ella)

Have I mentioned how sweet and smiley Lucy is!?  I mean, we see it on a daily basis, but people comment all the time on what a smiley, happy baby she is.  She continues to be super social - she constantly makes eye contact with strangers and gives them big smiles and always, always wants to be in on what's going on.  She does a cute little lean or will wiggle her way to where she can see what's going on and be part of the action. 

She's a pro at doing an army crawl but can't seem to manage getting that belly off the ground to do a more traditional crawl!  She has no problem getting what she wants across the room - it just takes a little crawling, rolling, pivoting, inching, and scooting to get it.  She's able to sit up by herself from a laying down position.

She is stubborn and determined (must take after her sister).  Little miss will rarely open her mouth to eat any sort of purees, rice cereal, or anything that is soft or mushy (maybe it's a texture thing??).  Every once in awhile she'll surprise us and eat a whole pouch since I continue to offer purees to her most days.  But more often she won't open her mouth to let a spoon near her mouth.  However, she'll gladly feed herself and enjoys trying to put noodles, cheese, fruit, puffs, mum-mums, peas, rice cakes, crackers, avocados, turkey, spaghetti or any other "real" food in her mouth.  I guess it's sort of nice that we can just bypass the "spoon feeding" phase, but she's still not getting the amount of solid foods most other babies her age are getting because not much actually makes it in.  Lily (yes, Lily still exists) loves hovering under her high chair and does a great job on clean up for us - at least Lily's earning her keep this way.  Lucy is certainly on her own time table and schedule.

She's started making more pronounced babbling noises - "dadada" and "nanana" are favorites.

Her top two middle teeth just cut through in the last few days!  Those ones are big guys and I'm sure so painful.  She's had some hard nights/naptimes that I attribute to teething, but for the most part it doesn't seem to bother her too much. She also gives the best slobbery kisses on our cheeks - Ella's somewhat terrified of her kisses because of those "sharp, sharp teeth!"

She is our "touch/tactile" baby.  If she's fussy or having a hard time sleeping, she's most easily soothed by us petting her head or back.  She will sit frozen still if we give her a back tickle and just enjoy it.  She always has to be holding one of my fingers while nursing and will flail her arms around until she finds a finger to hang onto.  She's been pretty cuddly lately, and will snuggle and lay her head down on my chest when she first wakes up in the morning and when she's going to sleep - love it!

After bath curls!

She's wanting to stand up a lot more to play with her toys but isn't too stable on her own for very long...

 She was entertaining us at dinner one night with her facial expressions and tongue tricks...

 Love her little dimple :)...

 Excited to get her hands on her sister's princess dress that was left out...

 I feel like she's starting to look more and more like a little girl rather than a baby...

Easily entertained by laundry baskets...

We just moved her to her big girl car seat...

She has an intense fascination with the vacuum - she gets really excited and starts flapping her hands wildly when she sees it.  She loves touching it and inspecting it up close...

Can't get enough of those cheeks...

 Her monthly pictures are getting a bit tricky - she is constantly on the move!

This video of Lucy's squeals makes us laugh every time - her sister is her constant source of entertainment and excitement ;)

And here is a little bit of her army crawl...

Preschool Pics

So excited for Ella to get her first school photo (back in November)!

 The Sunbeams Class...so cute!  8 boys and 4 girls:

A few things I want to remember about Ella at this age...

- It has been so fun to see her imagination blossom.  Her favorite thing is to pretend to be a Disney princess or a character from a movie or show.  Her favorites lately have been Ariel, Elsa and Anna from Frozen, and Clara from the Nutcracker.  She'll put on the appropriate dress-up outfit, tell the rest of us who we are, and have conversations with us in character.  There was one night recently when she woke up crying in the middle of the night and I went in to check on her.  I said, "Good-night Ella", and she said, "No, I'm Clara....good-night Clara".  Love that she stays in character even in the middle of the night ;).  I love watching her have pretend conversations with Scuddle, Flounder, and Sebastion.

- She is our girly girl!  Dress-up continues to be her favorite activity and before she even says good morning to me when she wakes up she asks if she can put on a dress.  She loves jewelry, lip gloss, bows in her hair, and wearing spinny dresses.  Playing with dolls, board games, and coloring are among her other favorite activities.  She also loves dancing - she'll dance around our house to music and loves going to her dance class.

- She is super sensitive.  She constantly gages mine and Cody's mood and often checks in with us, asking "Are you happy?"  She can tell if we get frustrated or upset about something and immediately becomes concerned asking if we need a snuggle.  She is very empathetic - her teacher tells me often how she will be the first to comfort a fellow classmate who is in tears or having a hard day with her hugs.  She is also really sensitive about what she sees on TV/movies, so we have to be really careful about what her little eyes take in.  She's been in tears over a Mickey Mouse Clubhouse show when Daisy and Minnie are having a disagreement.  She was also in tears during a preview of a movie we saw in theaters when a large dinosaur was chasing a smaller dinosaur and she was worried about the little one.  I love that she is so sensitive and aware of others' feelings but sometimes it feels as though she's a little overly sensitive.

- She continues to be strong-willed as she has been from day one.  She knows what she wants and is stubborn about holding out until she gets it.  While she's super sweet and listens to us the majority of the time, she definitely has her moments with fits and tantrums every once in awhile.

- She has recently been very into knowing what letter every word in the world starts with.  Her favorite car game is to look out the window, find a word, and say, "Mama, what does tree start with?"  I'll say, "Tah, tah, tree" and she'll tell me "T"!  She knows most of the alphabet sounds and is working on writing all her letters. 

Family Pictures

We had pictures taken of the girls and our family back in November for Christmas cards and wanted to make sure some of our favorites make it into our 2013 blog book. Photos by Gina Mazzaferro:

New Year's Eve

We had a wonderfully low key New Year's Eve celebration with the Ehrilchmans - couldn't have asked for a more perfect way to ring in the new year!  For the second year in a row, we've worn our "fancy tops" and "comfy pants".  Alison reminded me that we were pregnant last year when the idea originated and nothing sounded better than being comfy and still looking festive :).  We ordered pizza, drank wine, the babies went to sleep while Ella and Nathan played perfectly together for a few hours, and we watched the ball drop on East Coast time.  Thanks for a fun night Ehrlichmans (and thanks for some of these fun pics)!

James, Nathan, Lucy and Ella...

 Festive on top...

 ...while still being comfy in sweats/jammies/slippers :).

 Ella and Nathan put on a "concert" for us.  Ella was thrilled to have a "stage" to dance on (note: she couldn't handle being in comfy pants/slippers for too long and wanted to change back into tights and tappy shoes to go with her "spinny" dress - oh my)...

 Watching the ball drop on TV...

 ...while wrestling

 These two did awesome, especially for staying up way past bedtime!

Cheers to the new year!