Wednesday, October 1, 2014

eight months old!

Growth/Health
We don't know how tall or heavy Charlotte is right now so we'll have to update after her 9 month check-up. She doesn't seem to have gained a lot of weight this month; I wonder if her growth is slowing down.


Development
Charlotte can go from sitting to playing on her tummy to lounging on her back in about 3 seconds flat. She has totally mastered rolling in all directions and often ends up across the room from where I put her down. She can reach for toys and hold heavy items and grasp a lot of new foods.  One fun trick is to scoot backwards on her tummy. She has a harder time scooting forward and she isn't crawling, but I think it's in our near future.

Just a few days ago, Joel's mom watched Charlotte pull herself up on the living room coffee table. Looks like standing is a developing skill, too... Watch out, world!

We think there must be more teeth on the horizon because Charlotte has been clingy and fussy lately. There have been a few days with some tears and yelling (on her part!) before finally settling down for naps. She's also been waking up at night quite often... We were pretty sure those days were over, but they're back, so we're blaming the teeth.


Schedule/ Sleep
Charlotte wakes up between 6 and 7am and nurses. She stays awake for about an hour before nursing again and taking her morning nap. She usually sleeps 1.5 or 2 hours, then eats again at 9:30. Because we recently transitioned to two naps, the late morning/early afternoon window can be tricky. We often go for a walk or meet friends or run errands, then come home to eat lunch around 11:30.

Charlotte loves to play outside so we usually take a blanket and some toys to the shady spot in our backyard before she nurses again and takes her afternoon nap (anywhere between noon and 1pm). The afternoon nap lasts for about an hour (sometimes closer to two) and then we play, watch the cars go by, get dinner started, wait for Joel, etc. We eat dinner as a family around 5:30pm and get Charlotte ready for bed around 6:30. She's in bed around 7pm and usually falls asleep shortly after that.


Awesome stuff!
I can't even handle how much Charlotte loves to watch baseball with Joel! She and I don't watch TV during the day but when Joel comes home and turns on a game, Charlotte is mesmerized. Here they are, cheering on the Tigers together... #bestillmyheart

Charlotte also loves:
  • playing in her closet (see photo below! :))
  • being outside (doing anything and everything, as long as she's in the fresh air!)
  • eating delicious food
  • taking walks/runs in the stroller
  • snuggling with Mom & Dad
  • "reading" books (especially her favorites!)
  • showing off her new teeth 
  • scooting toward all sorts of interesting things in the house
  • playing with "toys" (cardboard boxes, plastic shovels, tags on blankets, snaps on her diapers, burp cloths, etc.) 
  • other babies- she gets the BIGGEST grin on her face and tries to give them open-mouth kisses (ha!)




Parenting
I started a whole blog post with the title "my child is not a robot." I planned to whine about how the inconsistency of our days is driving me crazy. But then the Lord changed my heart. And my daughter continued to blow me away by her awesome-ness. And our days started to have a bit of rhythm again. So I didn't finish the post.

All that to say, parenting this baby is a privilege. We have some hard days and some challenging moments and some long nights. But being this girl's mom and this man's wife bring me such great joy.

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