Happy *NINE* Months

Issac and I are proud to announce that our beautiful, not so little anymore Emma, is now NINE months old! This is rather difficult for me to wrap my mind around due to the fact that time seems to have just flown by at the speed of light. In just three short months we will have a one year old child and will be past all of the many ups and downs that accompany the first year of a child's life. Hard to believe but it is true. The fact that my days of enjoying Emma as a baby will soon be over seems to be setting in more and more with each passing day. Though I believe every stage in her life with be equally as precious, there is just something so special about that first year. It is a momentous year for both parent and child and is a time of constant change and readjustment. This past month has certainly been a time of great change as I have watched Emma begin making the transition from infant to toddler. She is an incredible and beautiful child inside and out and I am so proud of her. Below is a list of all of the latest and greatest skills she has acquired over the past month.

1. Just as I predicted on Emma's 8 month blog, she has now began pulling up on furniture and even appears to be considering taking a few steps here and there (while holding onto the furniture).
2. She has now mastered the art of crawling and is able to get across the room and into something I would rather her not get into in .5 seconds. Lets just say that I am quite the tired Mommy these days!
3. Speech and vocabulary has drastically improved. She has now began saying a handful of words and appears to have a very advanced vocabulary for her age just as Issac and I both had as children. Her vocabulary now consists of, "Hi, Daddy, whoah, yay, and my all time favorite... Bad dog (as she points her finger and shakes her hand)." I wonder where on earth she learned that phrase?
4. Word recognition is now night and day compared to where she was at this time last month. She easily recognizes more words and phrases than I could possibly recall.
5. As in previous months, she is still healthy as can be and has yet to get sick for the first time. Much of her health I attribute to her extremely healthy diet which was begun by breastfeeding and continued by feeding her nothing but homemade, age appropriate, incredibly healthy organic foods. Though I do let her indulge in less healthy foods every now and then, her diet is something that I rarely am willing to bend on. Some of the foods that are staples in her normal diet include... Cranberries, blueberries, millet, wheat berry, ground flax seed, asparagus, avocado, beets, barely, soy beans, turkey and chicken breast, spinach, and tofu. All of her food is organic and is made from scratch by me. Since she is getting older I am now pureeing her food into a thicker more chunky consistency. Rather than switching her to the carbohydrate, sugar, and sodium filled finger foods that most children are switched to by the age of one year I plan on continuing to make her food from scratch so that her good nutrition is able to continue on. Did you know that proving your child with the healthiest diet possible can boost their IQ by more than FIVE points during the first year alone?!? A great reason to take the extra effort into proving your child with excellent nutrition if you ask me!
6. One of her favorite past times is playing in our dogs water bowl and then dumping it out all over her freshly changed outfit. How is that for fun?
7. Emma still loves to read and is now able to sit through longer reading sessions due to her increased attention span.
8. One of my favorite milestones this month... Blowing kisses! This is oh so sweet and oh so adorable and is something that I absolutely love!
9. Cognitive skills pertaining to basic mechanics have really shown improvement throughout the course this month. She is fascinated by the opening and closing of drawers, door, and really any type of container. She has loved blocks since she was about 5 months old so the fact that she is so impressed by simple mechanics does not at all surprise me.

This past month has been wonderful, and just like all previous months, has truly been an adventure! I am anxious to what the tenth month has in store for our sweet girl and am even more excited to be able to share all of these upcoming changes with Emma's wonderful Daddy. We love you our little baby bear! You bring color to our world and are the light of our lives! Your Daddy and I love you more than words could ever possibly describe and are so incredibly proud of you and of everything you have accomplished this month!