eight months of gwennie girl

My Little Gwenna,

Here we are just past your big 8 month birthday and as always, time is zooming by faster than I am comfortable with. This has been a big, fun month for you.

You are a spitfire and your personality is beginning to shine through so clearly.

Case in point.

Our home scale says you weigh just over 17 pounds. You’re wearing 6-12 and 9 month clothes. Size 4 diapers, medium cloth diaper covers. Here’s a few glimpses of how you’ve looked this month.

You started the month off right by learning to pull yourself to a standing position holding on to furniture. And you haven’t sat down since. That’s almost not an exaggeration. Sitting on the floor to play with toys no longer interests you. You would much rather stand holding a chair, the couch, the coffee table – whatever you are close to – and watch what’s going on around you. This newly developed skill caused us all some grief over the past few weeks as you were far  more interested in standing up in your crib than sleeping for a good chunk of time. Also, baby learning to stand + hardwood flooring = disaster waiting to happen. I’m sorry for the head bonks you’ve experienced, little lady. But for real, just stay on your booty! Right at the same time that you started to figure out the standing thing, you also realized you didn’t have to lay down in the tub anymore. As soon as you sat yourself up, it was like you discovered a whole new world. Now bath time is filled with “Stay on your bottom. Sit down. Sit down. On your bottom” and other constant repetitions from Daddy and I.

You are a mischief maker. I cannot turn my back for five seconds without you getting into something. Your favorites are the stuff on the sofa table shelves, the DVDs and the dishwasher. You are also starting to figure out how to totally mutilate the toy shelves, which makes cleaning up so much fun for me! Along with standing, you’ve started to figure out a bit of the cruising business. Slow down, sweet baby girl, slow down. Although you are sometimes interested in walking around on your feet while holding our fingers, you mostly prefer to crawl. If there’s somewhere you need to be, you know how to get there. And fast. You don’t want to waste time trying to walk holding our hands when you know you could zoom there way faster by yourself.

You now have two teeth. Your first one popped through on February 13th and the second one came quickly after on the 16th. Based on your sleeping, napping and incessant whining lately, I’d guess there are more on the way.

Your Big Sisser is your very favourite friend. You love, love, love her. She makes you laugh all the time and you work real hard at keeping up with her. Of course, you clearly know that whatever she is playing with is where it’s at and always want in on the action. I love seeing you together. I love knowing that you’ll be best friends and worst enemies as you grow up. I am so blessed by your love for each other.

You are a chatter box. Mostly you shriek and scream (not a crying scream, just a “I AM HERE AND EVERYONE NEEDS TO KNOW IT” scream) but you also jabber away saying “Da da da da” and “Ah ba” and “Ya ya ya” all the time. You also love to smack your lips, blow raspberries and give kisses. I’m the only one you are usually totally forthcoming with the kisses with, and I don’t mind that at all. I know I’m your favourite. We have started focusing on some sign words with you since you’ve started to wave sometimes and food is becoming an integral part of our daily routine. You have definitely waved, signed cup, milk and eat. We are gradually working on more, all done, please, thank you and a few others. It’s so fun watching you learn to communicate. Let’s just try to stick with the signs instead of the super loud shrieks, how about it?

Sleep has been an issue this month. You are very inconsistent. So, knock it off, will ya? Typically you nap twice a day but the third one still sometimes sneaks in if your afternoon nap ends too early. You are in bed by 6:45-7 most nights. We have tried to push this a bit later, but you can’t seem to make it any later than that, no matter how hard we try. Some nights you’ll sleep peacefully until 4-5 am and then nurse and sleep a few more hours but some nights you’re up six hundred times. This too shall pass, I suppose. (It can pass as soon as you’d like, mkay?) It’s been a point of frustration lately but I am just trying to ride it out and remember that it won’t be forever. I keep telling myself this stage will pass quickly, and while I would love to sleep more, I don’t want this stage to pass too quickly because I just love how fun and inquisitive you are right now.

You’re still an eating machine and have been going to town on almost everything you have tried. I was going to make a list of the things you enjoy, but honestly, that list is just too long. You still nurse anywhere from 5-8 times in a 24 hour period, totally depending on how our night goes. You eat three meals and typically a few snacks during the day. The snacks are usually a by product of what Evalyn and I are doing because I have long since learned that we cannot have food in your presence without sharing. You make that more than clear.

You are a delight. A joy. A little spitfire. For your first few months we always talked about how it seemed as though you were going to turn out much more mellow and chill than your big sister. We take that right back. You have a temper and personality a mile long, there’s no question about that. This should make for some wildly interesting years ahead of us.

  It’s so hard to believe how quickly we’re slipping down the slope toward your first birthday. You’re growing up far too fast my dear, so just stop it right now.  

Love, Mumma