Dear Baby - Month #9

Dear baby,

It doesn't seem like it was that long ago that I was writing the last one of these...

You're now 9 months old. Roughly, you've now been out and about for as long as you were growing inside me.  If we double the time you've been with us, and move backwards, we'd be at that last moment where I was just 'me'. Before I became your mum.

Apart from a one-off earlier this week, you've been remarkably well behaved. You're pretty easy going and happy most of the time, and even if you wake up on the wrong side of your cot, you're still pretty easy to work with. You were in a fantastic mood yesterday, and daddy commented on it more than once.

I forget that he doesn't get to hang out as much as we do. Whether we're doing stuff together, or doing stuff where you're with me, we're together. We spend a lot of time in each others company. We have an unspoken state of 'being'. You watch me make your lunch, you play with my hair while you feed, you grin from behind your dummy in your cot, you watch me while I change your nappy, you look up and smile while you sit in the bath. Your daddy doesn't get to have as many of these moments.

But. The time you do spend with him, you guys party hard. He chats more to you. He makes you laugh in a real way, that I just can't seem to do. He reads to you, he dresses you in his own special way, he reaches straight out to you when he comes home. And you light up when you realise he's home. You look around me to see what he is doing. You play with his stubble and study him in a way that you don't with me.

I had a dream the other night that you started to crawl. I missed your first attempt, and only just got to see you do it for a few 'steps' before you crouched like you were going to stand. And then you got up and just walked. Whether it means something or not, you were walking away from me. Perhaps it shows how excited I am about you learning to crawl (and walk), which I think will happen within the next month. But I think it also shows how I worry about missing things with you. And then how soon you will no longer be a baby.

Soon, you're going to be a toddler. Then a child, then a teen, then a young adult, then an adult. And then you're going to stay an adult, and not my baby, for 80 years or so. And you'll only have been my baby for less than a year, and that year is almost over.

A good friends baby turned 1 not long before you were born, and she had a cake in the shape of an owl from tv. She was (and still is!) obsessed with that owl. Will you have this soon? Will you have favourite things? I mean, you really, Really, REALLY love the dogs, so it makes sense. But the concept of you having favourite shows or songs right now just baffles me.

But then again, you've had a big month. Your first words (and the start of your baby talk which I just love - you sound like you're carrying on conversation with yourself, but you only have one word) and your top two teeth. You can roll both ways and you spin in circles on your mat, as well as moving backwards. You're getting up on your knees and you're starting to rock. You're starting to sleep more consistently too, which I love. You've been having occassionally longer naps too, which might help with your night sleep. You pull yourself up using the rocker or your toybox if I'm sitting with you, and you've mastered almost all the little tricks on your activity table and toy kitchen (lifting and closing the flap the table, and opening and closing the oven on the kitchen are both new talents).

Happy nine months, baby girl. Party on.

Friends and friends

In the lead-up to both mine and the husband's 30th birthdays, I found myself remembering going to an 'over the hill' party for one of my parents friends, years and years ago.

My parents have been friends with this couple for a long time - I think my mum went to school with one of them, but I know they worked together too.

I remember it always being fun when we would go there for dinner- we'd be set up in the next room, watching movies with our doonas that we brought from home while the adults sat at the table in the good room and laughed. When they came to our house for dinner, I remember the whole family helping to clean up. I remember there would be anchovy puffs for adults and puff pastry for kids, there would be top deck chocolate or after dinner mints, candles and the good tablecloth, and there would be wine and laughter and a late night.

As we've gotten older, they continue to be friends. They've been on that outer edge as we've grown up from kids to teenagers to adults and now to parents.

The husband and I have been together for more than eight years now, and we have a group of friends that have come together from going to the same college - there is a 2.5 year old, a 2.5 month old, and and an almost 10 month old in this group.

We are going to be 'those' people. We are going to be those adults that come over to visit, that always seem happy and excited, that laugh and talk loud and quickly, that ask what they learnt in school, that will set up the tv in a dim room so they can settle in to the couch with our daughter and watch movies until they fall asleep, carried out to the car for the long drive home.

Fantastic.

Handsy

The baby is getting a lot more handsy. And actually, a lot more active.

I noticed it earlier this week when we did the groceries - she was twisting and looking and reaching for things. I managed to subdue her with a bag of pine nuts (which, thankfully, she didn't manage to open).

She's using her pointer finger to touch everything she can. She tries to hook her finger in my mouth, behind my bottom teeth. She pulls at my hair and my earrings and my necklaces.

She's starting to twist more in my arms when I carry her - she likes to twist so she can face with her belly down against my arm.

She's getting even harder to feed too - the only 'decent' feed she gets is her overnight/early morning feed when she's half asleep, otherwise she just treats me like a drop in centre - she twists and looks around the room, she stops to sing and say 'bub bub bub', she drops back in for a few seconds and then off she goes again.

She's getting closer and closer to crawling - she's finally getting up on to her knees (previously, when we put her on her knees, she would just cry) and she has just started to rock back and forth over the past few days.

I am both excited and terrified by this!

Waking

Well, it didn't just pass - the baby woke up at 8pm, 10pm, midnight, 3am, 6am and 8am.

When she woke up she was still grumpy, so after breakfast she had some nurofen and went to bed - and napped for almost two hours.

After lunch, she had another two hour nap.

Had I known she would be sleeping so long, I would have had naps as well!

She is still in bed now, her third nap for the day.

I hope she sleeps well tonight!!!

Throwback

Today was the first day in a long time that I've had some uncontrollable crying from the baby.

We were out for a few hours in the middle of the day,so she didn't have a lunchtime nap, and only had a short nap in the car.

When we got home, she just wasn't happy. She wouldn't eat afternoon tea, she wouldn't play on the mat, she wouldn't lay on me and have a nap, she wouldn't keep her dummy in. She wouldn't feed properly. She wouldn't eat dinner. She was mostly happy in the bath, but whingey.

I noticed her grabbing at her bottom teeth, and the husband indicated that he saw the same thing yesterday.

But there was that moment where I stood in the middle of the family room, surrounded with crying baby and naughty dogs, that I was able to flash back to the early days. I could see how far we had come, but also can see a flash of the future baby - what a temper she will have!

I don't think I can feel or see any teeth coming through - I just hope that it passes.

Mum fit

This morning, I attended my first Mumfit class. It went really well, on a few different fronts.

It was the first time in nearly three years that I was actively doing something for exercise. It started with some running (me and a friend got to take the 'easy' option along with a few older ladies), and then a circuit of six or seven different exercises, twice through.

I loved that it was ladies-only. I've been part of a ladies only gym before, but I was fitter and stronger and healthier then. I'm feeling a bit more beat up, and I'm definitely not fit or strong or particularly healthy, so I was definitely able to appreciate it more this time.

It was also the first time that the baby was left in the car of someone other than a family member.

When the class finished and I went up to collect her, she was in the arms of the carer, with a pouty tear-stained face. Once she saw me, she started to cry loudly (the carer commented on her lungs), but I think that is because it was taking me too long to put on my jumper so that I could grab her (I didn't want to sweat on her clothes!). The carer said she liked the toys that made noise, but that she got upset when one of the other kids took her toy off her.

I guess this is pretty good for her - good to be socialising with other babies, as she doesn't really 'play' a lot at mothers group. Good for her to be with someone that's not family, and not giving her all of their undivided attention. Good for her to try new things in new environments.

And when I finished the class, I was happy that I would be able to go back, even if my friend couldn't come with me.

But I do wonder if it will be harder to leave her a second time?

Poop face

The baby has a pretty clear poop face - she glazes over, gets an internal focus, turns red in the cheeks, and grunts and pushes and strains as she gets her business done.

She was running us through this routine as we were waiting for our breakfast to arrive. We had her up on the table, trying to keep her entertained so she could stretch her legs before a big drive, and to combat the fact that she was hungry and tired.

I could smell it, so I took her in to the change table to sort her out. And then I had a mini freak out that she had terrible nappy rash - something really wasn't looking right in her nappy.

And then I realised that she was still pooping.

And what I saw next I can never un-see.

Hopefully, that's the only time in my life I need to see exactly how all that works...!