Eight Months Old!

Hey look! A monthly update that's not a month late! Woot!

Well, if you've been paying attention, you know now that Hannah is 8 whole months old. That's ridiculous. When I was 8 months preggers, I thought I was going to die before I met my baby. I feel like the first 8 months of her life have whizzed on by. She's humongous, and I know I say it each month, but she really is growing like crazy. I can't get over how much she's changed.

Month 1. Month 2. Month 3. Month 4. Month 5. Month 6. Month 7. Looking at her one-month photo session reminds me that I need to take a picture of her wearing her Baby Legs again. They don't fall off! She's got some thunder thighs holding those puppies up.

Speaking of thunder thighs, Hannah weighs approximately 17 lbs. It was hard to get a good reading at her last weigh in because she wouldn't stop scooting on the scale. Last week the closest they could get was 17 lbs. The week before, she weighed 16 lbs, 15 oz. The nurse weighing her tried for a few minutes and just called it a scratch at 17 lbs. Squirmy Wormy? Most definitely.

Hannah's world is still very small, but her level of curiosity is ridiculous. She wants to see and touch everything, and then shove it into her mouth. That, naturally, makes eating pretty easy. There's very little we feed her that she won't eat. Her favorite foods are sweet potatoes, apples, peaches, green beans, and BANANAS. Holy hell, does that kid love bananas.

We've also branched out into the world of self-feeding, or rather, Hannah's told us that she's moved on to self-feeding. She's been reaching for the spoon and grabbing at purees for quite a while, and now that we've introduced her to more textures, she's started eating/playing with different finger foods. Mum-mum is her favorite right now, probably because it's easy to manipulate and she can bite or nibble at it. She's been introduced to puffs but right now those are ending up on the floor, in her lap, in the high chair...pretty much everywhere except her mouth.

She's played with teething biscuits, but she mostly sucks on those. She likes the taste, but they're so hard that she never gets a good enough grip on them to bite down.

The last few days have been interesting because something clicked in her head and now she can push herself up on all fours. We were playing over the weekend and she went from laying down to the baby push-up to all fours all in one motion! Graham and I have to start moving things like the fish tank filter and the cat toys now that she's starting to figure out how to move all her limbs.

Not that she's got any trouble moving herself as it is. She loves to roll around and that's her preferred method of getting from Point A to Point B. She is very independent and explores everything in her world. When she wants something, she's very vocal about getting it. Sometimes she doesn't think she's done nursing--or more appropriately, when she just wants to use me as a human pacifier--and I move her to my shoulder, she's been known to throw herself around and worm herself back down to my boobs. This is far more difficult to manage and much less hysterical than when she was a newborn and would headbutt anyone and everyone until there was a boob in her mouth.

And, like most babies, she's crazy about her feet. She's especially fond of them when it's time to change her diaper or get her dressed for the day.

Her favorite toys? Anything that makes a crap ton of noise. She loves her stacking cups and just recently figured out how to bang them together repeatedly. She has a V-Tech nursery rhyme book that is annoying as hell--so naturally she loves it. She also loves her "smart phone", which was a gift from friends of ours.

Anything having to do with music, really, is a big favorite of hers. Maybe this is because I've always been a singer, and since the day she arrived I try to sing to her each day. Whatever the reason, she loves music! I'm not going to complain, because it's something that we'll be able to share as she grows--provided her tastes don't change.

We read to her each night, and lately our bedtime favorites include, "I Love You All The Time", "Wherever You Are, My Love Will Find You", "The Runaway Bunny", and "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?" (Hey, they can't all be sentimental!) She loves books, but that's just a side-effect of her love for paper. Anything that crinkles, snaps, crackles, or pops, and she's on it like white on rice.

Nanner continues to be incredibly easy-going and happy. I really can't get over it! She makes friends everywhere she goes--much like me--and she's a people person for certain. At church over the weekend, we saw some women we hadn't seen in quite some time (because we've been super bad about going to church) and they gushed over how big she's gotten and how alert she is. My kid? Oh, yeah, she ate it up.

Funnily enough, she knows more people at our parish than I do! Her babysitter was always taking her to and from school with her sons each day, so Hannah is well-acquainted with the principal, teachers, and families of St. Rene. I can't wait for the parish picnic in a few weeks so I can formally introduce myself as "Hannah's Mom" to some of these mystery families.

We couldn't have a month go by without everyone's favorite feline!