Dear Shenzie and Heaten,

It is so crazy that you are already nine months old. A year is just a hop, skip, and a jump away and I’m just not ready for that yet. The months are just speeding by at warp speed with barely any time to blink. Whoosh! There they went!!!!

You are both so much fun it is unreal. Your little personalities are exploding all over the place. We had a couple of rough weeks with naps and fussiness, but I am relieved to say you are both back to taking good naps, being happy, and not making my days so long.

You love to play with each other and now that you’re both rolling you roll on top of each other, roll and slap, push, pull, or tip each other over. Very cute until one of you cries…then I have to intervene with our new sign “gentle”. We’ve been signing for over a month now…we do eat, more, milk, gentle, mama, and daddy. I’ve also recently started book and night night. You don’t sign back and probably have no idea what those weird things I keep doing are, but one day it will all pay off.

We’ve started feeding you finger foods….so far puffs are your favorite. Anytime you are crying I just break those puppies out and Presto! quiet babies. It’s like magic. You are making great progress on feeding yourselves. One out of every ten puffs or so makes it into your mouth…then you just cry until I feed you the next one (see photo above). We got the ok from your Pediatrician today to start feeding you table foods. Let the fun begin!!! Tonight we had mushed pinto beans….they were a huge success. New and upcoming foods include rice, yogurt, cottage cheese, cheese, macaroni, and cut up fruit and veggies rather than pureed everything. Hopefully my days of steaming/pureeing everything are coming to an end.

Dear Shenzie Weather,

My little chunka whunka, how I love you so. A couple of months ago you were this quiet little mouse who barely said a thing. These days not so much. You scream in the highest pitch voice, laugh, giggle, babble, yell (very loudly), blow bubbles, and make me laugh every single day. You are so much fun and so full of energy. You are very curious. You want to touch everything that you see and will stretch as far as you can possibly stretch in order to get something. I’m hoping one of these days that the stretching becomes some sort of forward motion. Don’t get me wrong….you have motion, just not the crawling kind. You have rolling, scooting, falling, stretching, and backbending motion which is fun and all, but my back is going to say thank you when we have real motion that involves less bending, lifting, and carrying on my part.

You still have no hair and everywhere we go people make comments on how much hair Heaten has and how much hair you don’t have. Whatever….you’ll get hair when you’re good and ready! What you do have are the most beautiful eyes in the whole wide world. They are a blue/green, so big and round and pretty.

Your 9 months stats are:

Height - 25 1/2 inches which finally puts you on the chart at the 3rd percentile

Weight - 18.10 pounds which is the 50th percentile

So yes, you are still a short chunky monkey….but don’t worry, you’re the cutest chunky monkey I ever laid eyes on! You give me kisses all of the time. Daddy may have got the first word, but he doesn’t get the yummy, juicy, slobbery kisses I get…those are reserved for mommy and I love them to bits.

You now have two teeth and let me tell you, they are sharp! Along with your new teeth you now have a love for standing. You love to stand up…your favorite is standing outside the exersaucer while Heaten is in it. I’m sure it is not long now before you start cruising around the furniture which will certainly keep me on my toes!

You are my sweet precious Angel and I love you so much.
Love,

Mama.

Dear Heaten Grey,

My little man. You are such a happy, laughing, smiling baby. I know I say that every month, but it is true. You have three moods…you are either happy, tired/fussy, or angry/screaming. You love to throw temper tantrums. Your little face gets all red and you scream and scrunch your face up. Sorry to say, but it is the cutest thing.

This has been a big month for you. Last month you were content to watch Shenzie roll around and take your toys. This is said with all of my love, but you were kind of a lazy baby. You didn’t roll, scoot, reach, or sit. I can happily say that you not only roll, scoot, reach, and sit you also love to stand. You now stand on two flat feet (no tiptoes anymore). It has been so much fun to watch you go from lazy to crazy. You are now the toy stealer. If Shenzie is playing with a toy you want it. It doesn’t matter what the toy is, even if you are holding the EXACT same toy, you want hers. The funny thing is when you get the toy away from her you usually don’t want it anymore. Instead you want the new toy that she has. I can always tell when you want something…you stare at it like you are shooting laser beams from your eyes.

Today is a special day. Not because it is Fourth of July (yes, I know I’m two days late with this letter), but because you refused food for the first time EVER this morning. I gave you and Shenzie peaches mixed with yogurt. Apparently you HATE yogurt because you refused to open your mouth and turned your head away. Little boy, you LOVE you some food…any food, all food, except yogurt.

You have the biggest, prettiest bright blue eyes. I say you look like a little puppy dog with those eyes..Daddy doesn’t agree with me, but as we all know Mommy is always right! You have big chunky hands and feet that I love to gobble up. You are so ticklish and love when I “get” you. Your thighs, feet, and shoulders are the current hot spots of tickle. You love when we play peek-a-boo. Daddy will hold you and I’ll jump up from behind his back and get you. You whip your head from side to side trying to find me and laugh hysterically when I do, it is so much fun.

Your nine month stats:

Height - 26.5 inches putting you in the 5th percentile

Weight - 19.13 at the 40th percentile

Your first word may have been dada, but you will always be Mama’s little boy.

I love you little boy, more and more each day.

Love,

Mama