9 Months Old

Phaedra is so miserable right now. She came down with a cold during the night on Sunday, and she's had a stuffy, runny nose ever since. Nights have been rough, and she's so tired of me wiping her nose. Poor girl!

Besides our current woes, she's a growing, happy girl.

Nicknames:

Sister

Sissy

Phae Phae

Bug

Doodle Bug
Doodle Fritz
Noodle
Noodle roni

Phaedra has been pulling up on things and cruising for quite a while now. She even stands on her own now (the less she realizes it, the longer she lasts). She has so much control when she lets go of a support and squats to sit down.

Phaedra just wouldn't be satisfied without a little adventure, so she recently has taken up climbing. She can climb onto the brick shelf in front of either fireplace. When her grandpa was watching her, she climbed up some shelves (with him spotting her) and back down (Thanks, Grandpa, for letting her get a real taste of the thrill of climbing). One day, I caught her with both hands clinging desperately to the top of our entertainment system, one foot up on the first shelf, and the other foot waving around in the air, trying to find a place to step. Yikes!

She loves to play with Eleanor, tries to get involved in anything Eleanor is doing, and enjoys any little bit of attention she can get from her big sister. Their favorite thing is crawling after each other behind the love seat in the living room, and of course, they love to wrestle Daddy together.

Phaedra understands "no-no" now. If you tell her "no-no," she shakes her head and grins a big, one-toothed grin at you. Then, most times, she proceeds in doing a no-no. Sometimes, she'll actually decide to leave it alone and move on to something else, but not very often.

She is friendly to new faces, but she definitely knows and loves her family. It's so endearing to watch her light up when a family member walks into the room. She's still a serious mama's girl, but she recently has been getting really excited to see Grant come home from work. She notices when Eleanor isn't in the car with us. She knows her people, and she shows us her love any way she can.

She's still a great eater, preferring veggies over fruits most of the time. But she's still quite good about eating fruit. She loves to spread her food around in her hair most nights, which is so much fun to clean up (sarcasm).

She has discovered the drop it game. She thinks it's hilarious to drop something and watch you pick it up over and over. She mostly likes to do this with her water sippy when she's done eating.

She also has a new interest in my laundry baskets. She'll pull up on the side of one and happily pull things out. She especially likes to do this when I have the laundry folded and put in the basket to be put away. She'll stand there, grab a shirt, give a happy squeak like she's singing a song, and give it a little toss.

Our big legos are her other favorite thing to spread around a room. She pulls up to the lego bucket and pulls out legos one by one. She'll give them a little toss, or she'll grin at me as she holds one behind her head and drops it.

These are her stats from her 8 month check up:

weight: 13 lbs, 15 oz, putting her below the 3rd percentile

head: 16.5 inches, 25th percentile

length: 26 inches, 25th percentile

I was going to include Eleanor's 8 month stats, but I looked them up, and they're exactly the same! I kept thinking I would see some distance between their weight because Phaedra seems to be a better eater with solids, but apparently not. How funny!