Nine Months Old

Simon turned 9 months old last week! He's become such an interactive, inquisitive, and sometimes opinionated little boy. Here is an idea of what life is like for us these days...

Clothes galore!

Thanks to generous gifts (especially as a newborn), and hand-me-down donations from the family Jess used to nanny for, Simon's cousins Ben & Ellie, and most recently a classmate of Andy's at the seminary, we have only ever paid for about two outfits for Simon. Here he is sitting among 3 baskets full of 12-month sized boys clothes (his current size) that we were just given. We are so grateful to be able to give often hardly worn clothes (they tend to fit for only a month or so, after all!) a second, third, or fourth go-round, and to not have the financial burden of paying for baby clothes!

Everything you need for a diaper change: wipes, diapers, changing pad...baby...

Simon is no longer content to sit or lay still...ever, but especially for diaper changes and getting dressed. A few weeks ago he learned to get into a sitting position by himself, and what was already a challenge with continual rolling over has become nearly impossible with rolling over and then sitting up. We try to be patient, but seeing as he's often cranky going into a diaper change (or getting pjs on) anyway, this does tend to be a tense time of day for us...here, however, he is just thrilled because once he managed to get his little naked self off of the changer and into this little cubby, we thought it was so cute that we let him stay there for a while so we could take a picture :).

All ready for bed

I just love the slippers! And Ellie & Ben, do you recognize those jammies (and slippers)? We have a bucket or box of toys in most rooms in the house, so wherever we are we can set Simon down to play. In addition to the typical baby toys, we also like to supplement with empty boxes, clothespins, washed out yogurt, ice cream, and margarine tubs, and other random household items, like this ladle that Simon found just fascinating for about 10 minutes one night.

Hey! It's a camera!

Simon has become quite the little ham when a camera is in view. Its rather amusing, except for those times when you want to catch one of his other adorable expressions, and he instead whips out a big smile...but I guess we won't complain! We've spent a lot of time in cute little fleece jackets recently, as fall has arrived in Minnesota. Soon we'll need to break out the mittens and hats, too!

Look what I'm eating!

We continue to expand Simon's food repertoire...in addition to the pureed veggies and fruits we've been making and freezing, he's started in on a few finger foods. Here he's munching on a noodle. His favorite finger foods, so far, seem to be cheese chunks (cheddar is all he's tried) and cheerios, though pasta and bananas he's also deemed worthy of eating. He has seven teeth, and that eighth one has been taking a LONG time to make an appearance--we're not sure why, as previously they seemed to pop up in pairs. He's still breastfeeding, and I've discovered the 'joy' of pumping at work...makes me glad I don't work full time!

And what is Simon doing, you ask? Well, in the past month he's started several new and exciting behaviors. He now regularly does social referencing (where infants in an uncertain situation will look at their caregiver for an indicator of how they should respond/if its okay), and shows separation anxiety and other positive signs that he is developing well socially. Just recently he's started gesturing/pointing at things as well. His object permanence continues to develop, meaning we can no longer get away with hiding undesirable objects (e.g. our coffee) behind our back while we play on the floor with him--he now knows its there and will try to get at it even though its out of sight. Physically, as I said he's able to sit up on his own, and just Friday night he crawled for the first time--babyproofing, here we come!

Aunt Liz is visiting for the weekend. She kindly babysat for us while Jess went to a local conference Thursday & Friday, and was here to witness the transition to crawling, too. We'll have to post some pictures from the weekend soon...but that's all for now. Enjoy your Sundays everyone!