Growth/ development
Charlotte is about 30 inches tall. She was close at her nine month doctors visit, and I'm guessing she's grown since then.
Since last month Charlotte has become an incredibly proficient crawler and has mastered pulling herself up to standing on all sorts of things (coffee table, open dresser drawers, baby gate, ottoman, etc.) She can sort of cruise along the edge of sturdy surfaces but isn't confident. She can also "walk" holding onto our hands for a few steps. One of her favorite tricks is to pull herself up, then slowly lower herself down and crawl somewhere new. :)
Charlotte's communication skills have developed this month, too. She says "dada dada" a lot, as well as babbling and sometimes calling out "nananana." She understands the word "water" and immediately looks at her glass when sitting at the table. She also recently starting waving her arm, which we think is a greeting because she does it at appropriate times to say hello (like when Joel gets her up and brings her to our room and she sees me for the first time that morning). So cute!!
Health
Charlotte got her two top middle teeth this month. She top right has taken quite a while and has caused us some trouble. There were many nights and naps where falling asleep was a a big production, but overall I would say Charlotte handled it well. She is still wearing her Amber teething necklace and we have a bottle of Hylands teething tablets on hand to help with the pain. She likes the tablets and happily sucks on them until they dissolve under her tongue. She also likes to shake the plastic bottle they come in, but that's another story :)
This month also brought a pretty bad cold, which happened to show up the morning after Charlotte got her flu shot. Argh. We discovered anew that our girl HATES the NoseFrida snot sucker as well as getting her runny nose wiped. A couple of days I would walk in to find her standing in her crib crying and with her nose flowing like crazy. Poor, pitiful babe.
Sleep/schedule
Charlotte can FINALLY stay awake a little longer before her first nap! We are glad to see this transition happening. She usually wakes up around 6:30 and nurses, then eats breakfast around 7:15. Then 1.5 to 1.75 hours after waking up, she's ready to start prepping for her first nap. She nurses again and sleeps for roughly 1.5 hours.
In the late morning we have a nice big window of awake time! We often go for a walk, run errands, or visit friends between the hours of 10:30 and 1:00pm. Charlotte eats solids for lunch and takes her afternoon nap at roughly 2pm. Sometimes it's more like 3pm.
This month we successfully dropped the 4:30 nursing session and I am SO glad! When I was teaching last spring, I always wanted to feed her as soon as I got home, but lately have been finding it very tricky to navigate welcoming Joel home from work, making dinner, and nursing Charlotte at that time of day. One day I decided to feed her at 3:30 and see if she could go until dinner without nursing again. Guess what-- she could and she did and she has ever since! Yay! She is hungry at dinner time, and eats her meal well, then nurses around 6:30 before going to bed.
We noticed recently that Charlotte has been playing in her crib for a while after we put her to bed, so we're wondering if bedtime should be pushed back a little bit. We do like having that quiet time to ourselves around 7pm, but it's pointless to put her down then if she isn't quite tired. We shall see how things progress with that.
Many nights Charlotte sleeps from about 7:30pm to 6:30pm without waking up, but we still regularly hear her transitioning between sleep cycles in the early morning (2-4am ish) and sometimes she wakes up fully and cries, so I feed her in the dark and put her back in her crib where she puts herself to sleep very quickly.
Awesome stuff!
Charlotte is a friendly, happy girl and we love her so much. She loves: crawling, exploring, hanging out with people, taking everything out of a basket/drawer/box, eating, nursing, being outside, listening to music, drumming on anything & everything, waving (so cute!!!), animals, big kids, babies, opening/closing doors, splashing in the bath, toys that make noise when shaken, and her family.
Parenting
This month required more "discipline" than ever before. We had about two weeks where Charlotte was constantly trying to grab our two big house plants. We debated moving the plants or getting rid of them, but we decided to try just redirecting Charlotte and telling her no. At first she would look at us, then immediately reach for the plant again, almost as if she was being defiant. After about two weeks, though, she would either stop when we said no or just ignore the plants and crawl right past them. We'll see how things continue from here.
This month required more "discipline" than ever before. We had about two weeks where Charlotte was constantly trying to grab our two big house plants. We debated moving the plants or getting rid of them, but we decided to try just redirecting Charlotte and telling her no. At first she would look at us, then immediately reach for the plant again, almost as if she was being defiant. After about two weeks, though, she would either stop when we said no or just ignore the plants and crawl right past them. We'll see how things continue from here.
I'm finding myself emotional sometimes about how fast our girl is growing up. I am so proud of her and so excited for every single milestone and new adventure. But it's bittersweet, knowing that she won't ever be a tiny little thing again. In my sad moments, I recommit myself to being present and intentional and engaging. In my happy moments, I just sit down on the floor and play play play.
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