Nine Months Old (Last Week)

Ellie turned nine months old last weekend. She also happened to be 40 weeks old as well - the same length as my pregnancy (okay, it was technically 41 weeks). Ellie has officially been a part of the world for the same length of time that I carried her in my body. Pretty amazing! I can't believe that 18 months ago the beginnings of what would be our little girl were just starting to form. How far she has come!

How Ellie has changed over the past month:

• Crawling!!! Ellie is mobile, and into everything. Nothing is safe anymore!
• Clapping. All we have to say is, "yea!" and the clapping begins.
• Waving "hi" and "bye-bye" to everyone, it makes the grocery store take a long time.
• Still babbling tons, adding sounds everyday. She still only says "Mama" or "Mom" consistently, but she seems to be saying something that sounds a little like"Baba" for Daddy. She also says "hi" sometimes when you wave at her, but I don't know if it is just a coincidence. She is constantly talking, so it can be hard to know if she really said a word, or if she was just stringing a bunch of sounds together and happened to make a recognizable word.
• Pulling up on everything. Ellie loves to stand and tries to climb on things. She has a lot of fun climbing up stairs.
• She won't sit in her Exersaucer for very long anymore, so we have started putting her in a playpen while we get ready in the morning. She tolerates this much better, since she can crawl around in there.
• Finally back to only two nursings at night. It took us a long time to get back down from three after our trips last month.
• Ellie can sometimes be put to bed or down for nap awake now and get herself off to sleep. This is a major milestone for our not-so-great sleeper!

Events of the last month:

• We bought Ellie's first pair of "walking" shoes. Tim and I have a bet going about when she will walk. I say by December 11th (one month away) and Tim says January 1st. We'll see who wins!
• Ellie's first flu shot.
• First major "boo-boo" from falling after pulling herself up on her toy box. She cut her lip and got a small bruise over her eye. I'm sure it is the first of many bumps to come.
• Trick-or-treating for the first time.
• Carving her first pumpkin (pictures will be coming).

Ellie saw the pediatrician for her nine month check-up last week. Here are the stats:

• 16 pounds, 3.5 ounces (10th percentile)
• 27.25 inches long (50th percentile)
• I forget what her head measured, bu it was the 40h percentile

The percentiles have remained fairly consistent since she was born, always near the bottom in weight and about average for length and head circumference.