So we're really late to the party here. Two weeks after the fact is a new record, I think, but it'll be documented nonetheless. This delay has been brought to you by a heaping dose of traveling with a baby, to be recapped in the near future. Hold on to your glutes.

9-month-old Elise is lots of fun. One day she woke up and started pushing her walking cart, stood for a moment by herself without holding on to anything, and figured out how to climb the stairs all within the span of a couple of hours. We bought a gate for the stairs that weekend, because if she's left to her own devices, she'll find her way there within minutes and make her way up.

She is infinitely curious, and loves exploring details, often on things I'm wearing. Buttons, necklaces, and (rather unfortunately for me) glasses are items of particular interest, and she'll spend many a minute poking at them with her pointer finger.

She continues try new foods in the form of whatever is on my plate, and seems to be particularly fond of eggs of and oatmeal. She also continues to be the most talkative member of the family, and has expanded her consonant sounds beyond mamamama, dadadada, and babababa to include nananana (we're still working on BATMAN). She also enjoys clicking her tongue and opening her mouth over and over, which almost makes a whispery papapapa sound.

When she's especially excited, she inhales with a raspy sort of gasp that sounds like a mix between hyperventilation and wheezing, which seems somewhat alarming, but really she's just so thrilled with whatever she's come across that she can't help herself.

She's started to think that toots are funny and giggles whenever they occur, and she also cut her top two teeth. We're up to four! All her developments this month have come with a side of separation anxiety, most often evident when she needs to sleep in her bed, so we're working on that. She very much has opinions about how things should be, and isn't afraid to show some displeasure when they don't go the way she expects. I think that will be a good quality later in life, but right now it's going to keep us on our toes.

I really can't believe that we're already approaching her first birthday. This year has gone by in the blink of an eye, and even though everyone tells you that ahead of time, there's no way to know what it feels like until it's happening. But I guess we still have a couple of months before we get to that point, so I suppose I'll savor these last couple of months before her first birthday as much as I can.

And that's all there is for this month!

Woodstock Writings