Lily’s Ninth Month

Lily, you have now been in this world as long as it took you to grow in Mommy’s tummy. I tell you what, that pregnancy seemed to last a lot longer than your first 9 months of life! It continues to amaze me how much a baby learns in such a short amount of time. You are so mobile now and are wanting to rock less and less. That makes our hearts sad. We miss the days that we could hold you in our arms all day long and you never wanted to get up and play. Now if we try to rock you or hold you, you treat us like a climbing wall and move all over the place.

Firsts: nursery stay at Christ City Church; commissioning service for TBone and Nona (who, by the way, is also referred to as Side Salad now, ha!) ; big girl pajamas; playing the piano with TBone; Hoover football game to see Uncle Ryan play in the half time show; wedding invitation with your name on it; taste of sweet tea and pink lemonade; playing peek a boo by yourself; clapping your hands and playing patty cake.

News Headlines: Nothing really worth mentioning other than an undefeated season so far for Auburn.

Favorite Toy: The pillow from the desk chair and the Minnie Mouse your Aunt Katie got you from Disney World back in April. Who knew that the pillow Mommy bought from Pier 1 her freshman year at Auburn would become one of your favorite toys?

Mommy and Daddy’s Favorite: Three favorites: 1) Your new face (pic of it below) that you make all the time! 2) Daddy dropping you on the count of three. You think it is HILARIOUS!
3) Jumping in Daddy’s lap.

Milestones: You have the cutest smile now (not that it wasn’t cute before, it’s just cuter now). You have finally cut 2 bottom teeth. You are still scooting everywhere. You can get on all fours and even up on your tippy toes, but you prefer scooting. Your elbows and knees are always red and I’m surprised you don’t have callouses. I try to keep them lathered in lotion. You have started pulling up on things. One of your favorite things to do is to stand on the couch, hold on to the back cushions, and bounce up and down.

Weight/Length: 18.14 pounds (between 50-75%) and almost 28 inches long (75%). Your weight has slowed down, obviously, but you sure are getting long. Are you going to be taller than Mommy and Daddy? Because of your little waist, you can still wear some 6 month clothes. However, because of your length, you are wearing some 9-12 month clothes. You are in a size 3 diaper.

Like Mommy: You aren’t a big fan of cold things. We’ve given you ice water and tea a few times, and you’ve made an awful face every time. I think you like the taste, but you can’t stand the coldness in your mouth. This makes Daddy sad because he won’t have anyone to take on ice cream dates!

Like Daddy: You like fruit more than veggies. You’ll eat your veggies with no problem, but you scarf down your fruits!

Best Memory: Mommy has two best memories from this month. You have been talking ALOT lately. You and Mommy have conversations on the way to school. You usually start the conversation with “nana” and Mommy repeats and you keep it going. Sometimes the conversation literally goes on the entire time you are in the car. One afternoon after school, you were playing in the den and Mommy walked down the hall to another room. You started scooting after her saying, “mama, mama.” OH MY how that warmed her heart!!! Daddy’s favorite memory is from the day he stayed at home with you when you were sick. You had an ear infection and were not acting like yourself (very fussy, which is something you never do!). He took very good care of you that morning and took you to the doctor to get you started on some amoxicillin.

Biggest Challenge: Bath Time…you loathe it! The bath is usually tolerable if Mommy and Daddy are fast enough and don’t get ANY water in your face (like that is possible). The part you really hate is the diaper, lotion, PJ’s, and hair brushing afterward. You are very uncooperative. It’s only because you are worn out from your busy day of playing at daycare and just want to go to sleep. I don’t blame you, I wouldn’t want to be messed with either.

How We Spend the Day: You wake up around 6:30 and are fed, dressed, and out the door by 7. Mommy always prays out loud on her way to work, so you talk along voicing your own concerns to the Lord. I have no idea what you are saying, but I know He does 🙂 You play HARD at daycare with your friends. You are smiling when I drop you off and when I pick you up, so I know you enjoy your day. We are usually home by 4:15-4:30 and we play on the floor until it’s time to start dinner. At that point, you usually play on the kitchen floor, crawling under the table, and beating on the refrigerator/dishwasher door until Daddy gets home. You’ve started eating dinner and going to bed earlier than you have been. Most nights, you have already eaten dinner by the time Daddy gets home at 6. When Daddy gets home, you play in your high chair while we eat dinner, then it’s bath time, story time, and bed time. And it all begins again the next day… We really enjoy Saturday. We try to not make definite plans so that we can relax and hang out as a family. Saturdays have been full of football games and Sundays we go to church and take a good afternoon nap!

Funniest Moment: You like to talk. And I think once you start saying words, you are never going to stop. You talk to your toys in baby talk and it’s really funny when you get going saying all kinds of things at all different volumes. It sounds like a real conversation, minus the real words of course. You love to look at books. One day you opened your nursery rhyme book, “read” it out loud, and laughed at what you said. Must have been a good nursery rhyme! Another funny moment was watching you belly laugh at Sanibel playing with the soccer ball. You love that dog!

New Explorations: Goodness gracious, you are a little explorer! You love a challenge. You like to crawl in places that are too small for you then scream because you can’t get out. You’ve figured out how to turn around (most of the time) and it’s almost like you crawl into tiny places just to prove to yourself and others that you can get out. Your favorite places are the between the end table and entertainment center, under the exersaucer, and under the kitchen table. You do this at daycare too. The bad thing is, if you get yourself stuck there, your teachers can’t always get you out immediately if they are feeding/changing/caring for another baby!

Food: Well, we’ve attempted to give you more and more of “real” food, but you are so weird about your textures that it has been difficult. You have finally gotten to the point where you don’t make a face every time you eat a Gerber puff. You like to share bananas with Mommy after school. You don’t like real mashed potatoes, green beans, or carrots. You finally figured out that the nipple on the sippy cup goes in your mouth. However, instead of sucking on it, you chew it and VERY slowly get liquid out. Haha…I think the transition from baby food to real food is going to be interesting!

Words: A NEW category this month! Consonants: b, d, g, k, l, m, p and I’m sure some others that I can’t think of; Vowels: short a and o, and something that sounds like short e/o mixed. You say “dada”, “mama”, and something a little like “uh oh”. You say the words at the right time and to the right person, but not consistently, so we don’t think you really know what they mean yet. You are learning what “no” means. Every time you lift up the rug to chew on it or crawl towards Sanibel’s food bowls, we say “no” and you stop most of the time!

How We Celebrated: We had plans to go out to eat for your 9 month birthday, but you ate dinner and went to sleep pretty early. Mommy and Daddy went through the drive-thru at Zaxby’s while you slept in the car.

Here are some pictures of your 9th month:

You love to read…so much that you read Uncle Ryan’s high school textbooks!

Playing the piano with TBone

You won’t find a better piano player. Maybe Mommy is biased, but TBone ranks up there with Billy Joel and Elton John.

Crawling under the piano at Granny Rosie’s house. I can’t even begin to count the memories I have of eating burgers every Saturday night at Granny Rosie and Pop Pop’s, then dancing around the room while TBone played the piano.

Your first taste of sweet tea. Mom and Pop gave Mommy her first taste at 4 months, so it was only right that they were present to witness this occasion. You didn’t like it! That HAS to change!

You and Aunt Krissy Poo at Nona’s reception at Philly

Eating real bananas for the first time. Fail! But you love them now. We share a banana for afternoon snack almost every day.

Cutie Pie

Miss Priss! Look at those pointed toes!

LOVE it!

You and Beth, a teacher at Mommy’s school. She is due in January with baby Samuel 🙂

You and Granddaddy at the Hoover vs. Spain Park game to see Uncle Ryan march at half time. Daddy was proud of the outfit he picked out for you…black pants and orange top for the Hoover Bucs.

You and Daddy’s cousin, Brandy. She came up to Birmingham on Labor Day weekend and we took you over to Grandma and Papa’s to meet her!

You and Danielle, Brandy’s daughter. She brought you a beanie baby and you love it!

While at Grandma and Papa’s house, we looked through a bunch of old pictures and you fell asleep in the middle of the action!

One of your favorite things…listening to Uncle Ben play the guitar

Hanging out at TBone and Side Salad’s house

You and your BFF Minnie Mouse

Thankful for a happy girl 🙂

Haha…you locked Mommy in the hallway!

This is that face I was talking about earlier…you do this all the time now!

Funny Lily faces 🙂

Crawling into the corner where you like to hang out

Wedding invitation for Grace Collins with your name on it 🙂

Under your exersaucer. You don’t really play in it anymore, but we haven’t put it away because you play on it A LOT.

My two favorite people. Ready for the Auburn game in your new dress. Thanks Grandma Reese!

A prune covered face!

Your favorite pillow!

Jumping in your “Julie Jump Up”

Waiting on Daddy to get home from work

A serious conversation…

…about how to sneak some dog food.

Playing under the kitchen table

Playing on Daddy’s shoulders

Seriously considering some dog food. Now I have everyone thinking I let my child eat dog food…I don’t! She’s never touched the food and only splashed in the water once. I leave the bowls on the floor just long enough to get a picture 🙂
One night after drinking your bottle Daddy tried to burp you and you wiggled your way into this position and fell right asleep. Reminds me of when you were an infant and would fall asleep drinking your bottles.

Clean girl after a bath

In your big girl pajamas with Minnie Mouse. You don’t look like a baby anymore in these PJ’s 😦

God gave you a beautiful smile and beautiful eyes!

I really wish this pic was focused!

This is the face you make when you don’t like what you are eating…not sure why you are making that face in this picture!