Cecelia at nine months

February 28 | Nine Months



Likes: solid foods, planking, drooling, peek-a-boo or 'chase' with her brother, social settings, being on the move, her mommy AND daddy;)

Dislikes: being dropped off at daycare, sleeping through the night, napping, laying on her back.





Biggest Achievement of the Month: cutting a tooth? Sorry, Cecelia---not a high-achieving month, I guess.

Biggest Challenge of the Month: naps, or the lack thereof.





The Mecca (aka Sleep): Meh. I don't care about this topic anymore. Naps are awful, she rarely takes one at all in the mornings for me. I have to fight her to take one in the afternoon and have recently taken to letting her cry-it-out during her nap when she wakes up after 30 minutes in a FIT of rage. Obviously, she is not well-rested if she wakes up freaking out. She will fall back to sleep in about 5 minutes and occasionally she will last almost 2 hours for her one nap per day, if I am tough and let her cry. This is just not acceptable to me so I'm going to stop talking about it. We need more daytime sleep with this child, yo.

Let it be said that she does nap twice per day for Lori, and each nap is at least 1.5 hours. Whatever.

Nighttime sleep is pretty consistent. She is usually up once around 2 or 3 and takes a bottle from her daddy, then falls back to sleep pretty easily. Then she wakes for the day around 6 am or so and I nurse her then. But of course, sometimes she is up twice or more a night and sometimes those wake ups last for an hour or more (ahem, last night). And sometimes she likes to wake for the day at 5. She slept through the night one time this month and because she likes to be EXTREME with her sleep habits, it was a 12 hour stretch of sleep she gifted to us. Of course that hasn't happened again but it was an amazing treat at the time.







Temperament/Personality: Cecelia is such a sweetheart and even if she is overtired she always seems to turn on the charm when we are in a public setting. She loves people watching, making eye contact, and flirting with random strangers. And okay, even at home she is just a doll 90% of the time and the other 10% can be mega-fussy (and we are blaming teething for this, FYI). This month she has definitely been a little more finicky and fussy but I will still call her 'laid back' for the most part. I think once she can officially crawl from room to room she might be a little happier, because she does seem frustrated when she can't get across the room as quickly as she hopes. She loves to be held but also enjoys being on the ground, exploring her brother's toys like a little sneakster. She is a mama's girl to the max but has really taken a liking to that big bald guy in our house, too.





Talking: Sister loves to hear her own voice! Still saying 'Dada', 'Mama', and other less exciting sounds pretty consistently. She loves to scream and shriek. Her newest sound is sucking in her lips to make a kissing sound and I just about die when she does it back to me on command. She will also do these really hilarious deep breaths through her nose whenever I do it first---I have a definite copycat on my hands and I forgot how much I love this stage when they are figuring out how to communicate.

Awesome video of her blowing kisses:

Eating: She loves feeding herself much more than being spoon fed. She eats three meals each day sometimes downing 4-5 oz of purees at a time in addition to her favorite finger foods. This month we've really tried a lot of different finger foods: blueberries, asparagus, broccoli (hated), turkey breast, pizza, chicken, rice, apples, eggs (obsessed), bacon, and parts of a turkey dog. I cut everything up into small pieces for her but she is doing an awesome job of handling bigger bites. So far the only thing she didn't love is the broccoli I steamed for her. Otherwise she is pretty easy to please!







Nursing is still going well. She nurses about 5 times per day (and still two 6 oz bottles at Lori's). But I will say that in the past week I've been worried about our nursing relationship for the first time ever. First of all, she definitely prefers my right 'big producer' side a lot more than lefty these days. But what makes me nervous is that she is getting super distracted at almost every nursing session, and just can't seem to focus on the boob. I know she is on the MOVE now and really intrigued with big brother/TV/the dog/etc/etc/etc--I know it's probably normal. Yes, she is growing and yes, she has a ton of wet diapers. But I really don't enjoy a quick 2 minute nursing session then constant pop-offs, and crying while pushing me away. I find if we go up to the nursery in the rocker it's a lot better but still not fabulous. Nursing when she is sleepy is still amazing but otherwise it's starting to feel like she is self-weaning a bit. She will even pull off and cry RIGHT after the milk lets down into her mouth---she hasn't done that since she was about 4 weeks old, wanting to nurse for comfort. What the eff? It's like she is mad that there is milk to drink because it takes SO much effort to gulp it down, or something. So I don't think it's a supply issue, since the milk is there and I'm pumping about the same as I've always gotten. I'm chalking it up to her being nine months old, easily-distractible, and a bit out of sorts lately with teething. Hope it's a phase that passes soon. Trying not to get ahead of myself, trying not to think about her weaning before a year, and trying not to be too dramatic about this.





The Superficial: Bangs = still rockin'. Big blue eyes = still stunning. I've been getting a lot of comments about how 'dainty' and 'petite' she is, which automatically makes me defensive. Like, 'No, she isn't too small or unhealthy, thank you very much.' Not sure why I let it bother me to have people comment on her size---maybe because I am used to having a giant/fatty first-born that got a lot of comments for being so huge. I suppose being 'dainty' and feminine is a good thing and she is definitely growing and healthy, so whatever. I kind of think it's because her head is smallish (was 33rd percentile) and a lot of babies this age have giant melons, so her smaller one makes her entire body seem small. How is that for overanalyzing? ;)





Still wearing 12 month clothing, some 12-18s are starting to fit, too. At her well-child appointment she weighed 18lbs 1oz (34%) and was 27.75in (54%). Pretty sure she didn't just grow 0.75 inches in 3 months, so I'm blowing off the height measurement as being too short. And I guess she is a little bit on the dainty side for her weight! The Pediatrician said at nine months he really sees the breastfed babies dip on the charts, but he expects she will be back up in the 75th percentiles again by 15 months. Whatever, he wasn't concerned at all so I will try not to be, either.





Teeth: finally cut her third tooth this month, the upper left. I am shocked that the upper right is not yet through as well. It's been a rough month of teething, my friends, and I'm ready for some visual evidence of this misery.



Motor Milestones: On all fours all of the time, rocking and trying to coordinate some 'real' crawling. She isn't truly crawling but she scoots and pushes backwards all of the time, still getting stuck under furniture frequently. Her favorite pastime is performing rock solid planks like a boss. She can move from sitting to her tummy with ease now, and is really close to getting into sitting from her tummy. She's just starting to think about pulling up to stand but she is usually too busy planking to really consider anything else in the motor department. No idea what she thinks she can do from that position, other than make her mom look like a weakling;)



Out and About: She is sitting in the front of shopping carts now for our errand-running and she loves it to death. I'm usually keeping the infant car seat in the car, pulling her in and out once we get to our destination. I suppose it's time to think about a convertible car seat but I just don't wanna. (pay for it, admit that she is that big, etc) ;)



Firsts: lots of first foods, first time grocery shopping for a legit weekly list, first ice cream cone (in said grocery store), first mommy and baby yoga class (technically AFTER her nine month birthday but I'm including it here since I'm late on this post).





Favorite Baby Gear: Hmmmm, all of her brother's old toys we have revived from the attic? I'd really like a new highchair and am trying to justify the purchase to myself and Nate right now.

Little Sister and Big Brother:


Truman's nine month post was fun for me to read, yet again, because I'm obviously losing my mind and forgetting everything about this stage from the first time. Had no idea that I EVER pumped in the middle of the freaking night, when Nate gave Truman a bottle. Wow. Literally, no idea. I don't think that lasted long. But I do remember Truman starting to sleep better now that we were giving a LOT of bottles and cutting back on nursing. He was getting distracted while breastfeeding (sounds familiar) and it was so bad that I felt I had to give bottles after each nursing session. I'm not there yet with Cecelia, as she still has some good nursing sessions and she is sleeping better than Truman did at this point. T wasn't truly crawling yet either, and he was loving finger foods. But they are different in that T was 20+ pounds and he wasn't even up on all fours. So miss C is very similar to her brother but she is more 'dainty' and maybe a bit more mobile/into motor milestones.

Present day brother and sister are still in love with each other. They really seem to speak their own language with each other and I can forsee a time when us parents are the outsiders and the kids are in a world of their own. Can't wait for them to be bombing around the house together.



I love you so much, Cecelia.