The Simple Life: 10 months

We've made it into the double digits which means we are just a couple of months away from the big O-N-E! Eeek! I know I say this a lot but I really feel like we are in a sweet spot with her right now. Ellie is eating well, sleeping well and is so much fun to be around. She is starting to get really vocal. She still calls most everything mama but has expanded her vocabulary to baba, nana, dada, yaya and now knows how to click her tongue. She also sometimes sounds like she's saying papa (not enough for Tom's liking), heya and she has started saying bara, which makes me feel like one of these days she'll bust out with Barack Obama! We do listen to a lot of NPR so maybe it's not too far fetched. Even with all these new words her favorite mode of communication is still by kicking her legs and turning in circles. It's her signature move!

She is really cruising around with a lot of ease. She can pull herself up onto anything and doesn't hardly have to hold on. She can stand on her own for a few seconds if I set her down flat on her feet, but once she realizes she's flying solo, she sinks to the ground. Her favorite place to stand is between me and the counter when I am trying to do the dishes. She sometimes crawls between my legs like they are an obstacle course. It makes doing dishes interesting for sure! She's been trying to lift herself up from the ground with momentum but can't quite get there. One of her new favorite tricks is to push herself up into Downward Dog, like a triangle. She does it a lot in her crib when she doesn't want to sleep but also to move around when she's playing. She has also learned to wave hello which is really cute. She sometimes gets it backwards and waves to herself (!). We are still working on waving goodbye (it's trickier). We can usually get her to wave hello when we FaceTime with family but she is still a little slow with goodbye and will sometimes wave only after they have been gone for a few minutes. He he.

She has been eating a ton lately and is very independent about doing it herself. I have almost given up giving her purees because she would rather eat on her own, even though it's harder. She has a low tolerance for the spoon or pouches (unless it's really good) but is really patient when trying to pick up food. She has really good find motor control because of it. She now has two teeth (bottom front) which makes her smile super cute. And despite only having two teeth she can eat almost anything we give her. She pretty much just eats what we eat unless it's really spicy. If I had to choose for her, I would say her favorites right now are chicken, raspberries, avocado and watermelon. We have raspberry bushes in our backyard and for a long time she didn't like them and would spit them out. But one day she just couldn't get enough. She was eating them so greedily I couldn't pick them fast enough for her! Now when we get near the raspberry busy, she starts whining in anticipation. She's my berry girl!

I would swear she's gained at least 5 lbs because she is so heavy, but the scale says it's only a pound. She is still very tall and I feel like everyday she is finding new things we have to baby proof, things that she couldn't reach the day before (obviously it's in my head). Here are her stats for this month:

Head circumference: 43.5 cm
Height: 29''
Weight: 19lb 3oz

One of the most exciting developments (for us) is that she's mostly sleeping through the night! Horrah! She goes to bed at 8:00pm and wakes up at 6:30am. Occasionally she'll wake up at 5:00am and need to eat or be rocked to sleep, but it's becoming an exception to the rule. I think it's helped that we've dropped down to two naps per day so she is really tired by the time bedtime rolls around. Nap time is also easier because she exhausted after four hours of being awake. It's really made life a lot simpler now that we are only doing two naps a day. It's a lot easier to get things done with a longer block of time. We don't have to rush back home between errands for fear of falling asleep in the car seat.

She is such a little human now and I feel like she is just speeding through her infancy. Her personality is starting to emerge in full force and it's so fun for us to see who is growing into. We have so much fun with her during the day (and don't slap me for saying this) but I miss her at night and I look forward to her waking up in the mornings. Ahhhh, yes, I'm a mommy. I can't help myself. ;) We are looking forward to her first birthday party in a few months. We've decided to have a BBQ party in my grandma's backyard. I remember lots of my own birthday parties being held there so it will certainly be bittersweet for me. More to come on that later!