9 months

Dear Ethan,

Happy 9 months!

 

You continue to change daily, and I'm reaching that point where I just want to stop time and make you stay put for a little while!!

You are officially on the move.  Yes, I know you've been on the move for a while now, but it has become constant and also a little bit troublesome.  That staircase that used to seem safely far away from your play space?  Now you're there in 30 seconds, no problem.  The floor beneath the kitchen table is your very own buffet.  You've switched almost entirely to a traditional crawl, and a fast one at that!  And you are pulling up on everything.  It's that phase of babyhood where you don't play with toys all that much, but just explore, explore, explore.

Your personality is developing too.  You have some definite opinions, and you're expressing them more and more.  But you're also still just as sweet as could be, giving bashful smiles to most people you meet, as long as you're safe in Mommy's arms.  And you give the best kisses and snuggles any Mommy could hope for!

Apparently you thought Mommy's birthday present was a good support.

You still babble a lot more than either of your brothers did at this age.  You might be our only early talker. 

You LOVE to eat.  It doesn't even have to be food.  You are constantly on the lookout for any and every tiny bit of leaf/lint/fuzz/crumb/whatever that you can find on the floor, and it immediately goes in your mouth.  It's a fight to get it out too - you'd think I didn't feed you 7 times a day, but I do!

Kaeden and Ryan are in a phase of eating whole raw carrots, and you do not like to be left out!  Apparently, it makes a good teether :)

You got another tooth this month, almost exactly one month after the first one showed up.  And your hair is picking up pace.  You're still not catching up to Ryan at this age, but you're far ahead of Kaeden :)

You hate loud noises that catch you off guard, especially when accompanied by other startling stimuli - for example, a large inflated balloon released to fly around the room - NOT a fan.  Or the time that we went to visit the horses in the neighborhood and one of them sneezed.  Tragic.  You cry almost every time we walk into your bedroom because you know it means I'm getting ready to put you down for a nap and every time we walk into the garage because I'm about to put you in the car.  But once you get settled in either place, you're generally fine.  You can't stand to be teased.  If I say I'm going to nurse you and walk anywhere close to the couch and then realize I forgot to do/grab something and turn around, you lose it.  Same goes for the bath.  You LOVE the bath.  If I say the word bath, walk into the bathroom with you, and then walk out, once again, you lose it.

You continue to adore Ryan and tolerate Kaeden for the most part.  It's definitely getting trickier to manage your interactions with them now that you are constantly getting in their way, knocking over their blocks, etc. but it's also fun to see your relationships develop.

A little reading time with Kaeden

This month, we traveled to CT/RI for Miss Abby's wedding, and you got lots of bonding time with Nana & Papa (and Uncle Kyle & Aunt Debbie!) while I ran around to various wedding events.  We also got to visit Mimi's amazing house on the shore of Rhode Island.  You would have liked to put every little rock and shell in your mouth, but we tried to avoid that!

Photographing this age is always challenging, because you so badly do not want to be still.   I had to resort to sticking you in a toy bin :)  But sometimes those turn out to be the best shots!