Mothers Day, Milestones and More

Dear Lufin-

Let me start out by explaining why we call you this- we always said we would never have a "nickname" or feel the need to shorten your name in any way (believe me, we got asked this a lot when I was pregnant with you and continue to now).  You see, your good friend Beckam (one of mom's best friend's son) calls you this and it sounds outrageously cute when he does, so we kind of adopted it, against our will.  We'll see how long it lasts...

Also, once again I am so sorry it has been a month since I've written you!  So many things have happened and I'm sure I'll leave something out, but I'll do my best to outline for you now.

You had your 9 month pediatrician appointment fairly close to when you turned 10 months.  Mom was so excited to take you to the scale because she was sure you had gained a few pounds since the last visit.  After all, since you had learned to pick more things up with your fingers you had been eating better.  I was holding back the tears when the scale read a whopping 15 lbs and 11 oz!  This means you had gained less than 1 pound in the past month or so and were dropping lower and lower on the charts!  Luckily we met with a new pediatrician (same office) who was very encouraging about the whole thing, and far from worried.  After discussing a variety of things we concluded together that you are simply very independent and it's okay that you do not stand for sitting in one place being spoon-fed.  I know that your strong opinions and independent spirit can and will blossom into amazing qualities as you get older.  These are characteristics that I admire in your dad, we just have our work cut out for us now!  Since the appointment you continue to eat more and more things since we are not worried about giving you primarily finger foods now.  Thank you Luthien!

We signed you and dad up for a play/learn/exercise class with other babies and of course other moms.  I was very surprised to find out that you have had a hard time adjusting.  You are slowly getting less outgoing with other people, and even babies!  It may just be the larger group setting that freaked you out, but we have noticed that even your cousin Amelie is more interested in you now than you in her- must be another sign of your increasing independence :) I'm glad we signed you up when we did, the socialization is great for both you and dad, and I think they do a lot of great activities.

Concerning your development, as of this week you have started waving!  We need to catch it on video- you have the funniest floppy-wrist wave I've ever seen!  Your receptive knowledge continues to amaze me.  When we ask you "Where's the..." you either look or point in the right direction (still working on consistently pointing).  You sometimes will shout "ma!" or do a modified version of the sign for "more."  We are currently working on body parts- your favorite is "belly button."  You still don't show us your own body parts, but rather look or point at others'.  I won't list all the words you understand because there are getting to be so many- some of the newer ones are "frog," "bird," "fish," "uh-oh," "no," "kiss," "walk," "ball," "bath," and various body part names.  In terms of your language expression, all of the sudden everything has turned into "dog" which originally was your first and only word (very common for your age).  You do make some pretty close approximations to "book" and "ball" and I can hear a difference in the vowel sound when you are naming a dog vs. a cat.

You are definitely pulling yourself up on all the furniture but have not started actually cruising, but you love when we help support you and have you walk around the room or kick a ball.  When you hear music now you sometimes start to dance (something dad and I have been so excited for- baby dancing is our favorite), especially if we start dancing too.  One thing that you love to do is crawl around and then take "resting breaks" where you all of the sudden lay completely flat on your tummy as though you are going to sleep- so cute!  You love doing this on soft surfaces, so unfortunately your favorite place to do it is on the dog beds (needless to say these are now vacuumed every day)!

Mother's Day started out great because you and daddy made me breakfast in bed and let me sleep in a bit.  Shortly after dad got really sick, but you and I tried to enjoy our time together regardless.  I will have to write a separate letter to you as a belated Mothers' Day post.  I now have so many strong feelings about motherhood that I can't wait to share with you.  For now, I will leave you with some pictures:

Your new favorite thing to do is watch us while we are in the shower.  You just love anything to do with water so you don't care if it splashes all over your face, you just squeal with delight the whole time (or cry out in frustration if the water isn't touching you every second).

Of course this is the prime age for getting into everything.  The pantry is definitely a favorite of yours, and the dog treats in particular.  This pretty much sums up a typical morning while mom/dad are fixing your breakfast:

This was from a couple months ago but I thought it was important to document your first big spill.  Luckily Roofus was there to help clean up:

Here are a couple of pictures from the train park in Scottsdale.  You loved riding around on the train and relaxing with Mom.  Also note that you just learned how to hold your cup by yourself! If we let you, you would still have us hold it, but you are definitely capable of holding it yourself.

Lastly, here are a few pictures of a little fun we had fairly recently.  If there is one thing mom learned while working with kids during graduate school, it is how to turn regular tasks/every day events into language-learning opportunities.  Often times this involves making a mess (much to your dad's dismay), but that's all part of the process- there is so much to talk about when making a mess and cleaning it up!   I especially love having you around in the kitchen, where almost everything can lead to an opportunity for learning.  Here is what happened when we learned all about the magic of flour:

Good night sweet girl, and please try to sleep well tonight!

Love, 

Mom