9 Months

Brody is 9 Months Old!

(sorry for the godawful color/picture quality of this months photo.  this was probably my least favorite monthly photo shoot to date.  see below for more details).

Here is what he is up to these days:

-Wearing mostly 12 month clothing, with the exception of some 9 month size shorts.  Still in size 3 diapers.

- He is crawling all over the place and can now move around on all fours, although he seems to prefer his army crawl.

- He sits up on his own with ease and we frequently find him sitting in his crib playing with his doggy stuffed animal when he wakes up in the morning and from naps.

- He learned how to pull himself up using the ottoman that houses all his toys.  He tries pulling up on other things (random furniture and our legs), but he still hasn't quite mastered that yet.



This is my newest most favoritest (that's a word...look it up) photo of him.
I love that I didn't do a lot of editing to it either, with the exception of
some cheetos face removal...he's just THAT cute.  :)



- He also grabs for your hands to pull himself up but still can't stand on his own.  We think his head is too big and that makes him too wobbly.  :)

- He is eating all kinds of food and loves to try new things.  Such as green beans, bananas, watermelon, cheese, noodles, cooked carrots, yogurt, ground beef, and all his favorite random Gerber foods like puffs, crunchies (which we call cheetos), yogurt bites, dried fruits, and baby cookies.  He so far seems to like everything and eats like a champ. 

- He is now only getting 3 bottles a day...one in the morning when he wakes up, one after his morning nap, and the last right before bed.  He eats two meals (lunch and dinner), with a small snack after his afternoon nap.

- He takes 2 naps a day, one around 8:30 AM and another around 1:30 PM.  He generally sleeps for 1.5 to 2 hours each time.

- He babbles and screams and squeals and squawks, but still no actual words.  He said dada a few times but really doesn't say it much anymore.  He doesn't seem interested in repeating any words we say even when we try to get him to, either.

- He started making silly little noises with his mouth by using his toungue and teeth.  I can't even explain it, but it's Cuuuuute!

- He loves his little stuffed doggy that Pam got him when he was born.  But also likes pretty much any toy.  And he loves to roll a ball back and forth with us.

- He simply LOVES Gus.  I don't think I posted about this, but I'm an awful dog momma and Gus went to live with my parents for a while.  He is just happier over there and I'll leave it at that.  However, Gus has been back home with us more recently and Brody just thinks he is hilarious.  They like to play together and Brody will almost always giggle at him.  It's very cute to see Gus playing with his little brother so well.

-Brody still sleeps very well and for approximately 11 hours a night - from 7:30PM to 6:30AM.

- When Brody started sitting on his own (getting up from laying down), we decided to drop the mattress in his crib.  This milestone made me a little sad for some reason...he's growing up so fast!

- We also finally put in the big car seat and stopped using his carrier.  He had looooong outgrown that thing so this was way overdue on our part, but it's all good and he's much safer now. 

- He has two more teeth!  On his 8 Month post he had just recently gotten his front top two teeth, but he now also has the two on either side of those too!  6 teeth!  Sheesh!

- I think Brody had his first temper tantrum with me the other day.  I don't know if that's really what I would call it but I can't think of what else it would be called.  I had set him down on the floor to play after his afternoon nap.  I turned around to go get him a snack ready from the kitchen and he starting crying.  Bottom lip out, face all scrunched up, turning red, tears in his eyes, full-on CRY.  He has not ever done this before.  I know some other moms probably want to throw things at my face for saying that, but he has honestly not ever cried like that before.  Since I know that is not his normal behavior, and I know he was perfectly fine...maybe just a little hungry...I let him cry for a bit while I continued to prepare his snack all the while talking and smiling at him like nothing was even happening.  I'm sure I have no idea what I'm in for once he gets a bit older and starts having more temper tantrums, but I figure it's best to not react to that behavior from the get-go, to help him understand that acting that way is not going to make me react any differently.  Is that absurd to think my 9 month old might actually understand this??  All you moms of older children can laugh in my face now if you want...I can take it. 

- On a lighter note, one of my favorite new Brody things this month is that I started noticing a few days ago that whenever I play music, or one of his musical toys turns on, or even sometimes when I sing to him, he will stop what he is doing and look at the musical source and start rocking side to side.  He is DANCING!  I think it's especially cute.  Before Jeff and I started dating we used to dance together at the bars.  And we still continue to dance together (at weddings and even at home).  I also used to dance around the house when I was pregnant too.  And danced A LOT with him when he was a little baby.  Heck, we even still dance together at home sometimes.  Plus Jeff and I like to goofy-dance in front of Brody a lot to try and get him to laugh.  So I think it's so cute that he has taken a liking to dance as well.  Or at least that's what I am going to tell myself.  :)

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Well, as a side note, Brody (as I'm sure most 9 month olds are) is into EVERYTHING.  These monthly photo shoots are getting extremely difficult for me to pull off anymore.  He just doesn't want to lay still for even a second.  This is what he would rather do instead...



Found your toes, Mommy!




Oooh tape!  This is new. It's crinkly and sticky and different!




I think I'll pull it off.




Working hard at destroying my makeshift "set".



 Another reason this shoot was disappointing for me was because this was the first time in 9 months that I wasn't able to do his picture on his actual monthly birthday.  :(  Tear.  I don't know why that matters because it's not like anyone but me would even know, but it just disappoints me.  I didn't have anyone home with me on Tuesday, but I attempted to do his picture anyway.  The four photos above show just what I was dealing with, and I decided it's just too dang hard for me to do these on my own. So, I tried again on Wednesday at my mom's house with the help of my mom and sister, but I still wasn't crazy about the results.  Ugh.  Here are some others from that session that were sorta cute...

Not too bad, but they are all a bit overexposed and it's really difficult to fix an overexposed photo.  Boo.

My camera has been on Fiiiyah lately (use your Arnold impression to say that...it's hilarious)and I've been one busy little amateur photog.  I'm hoping to get a Fourth of July post out on here soon with all the fun things we did over the long weekend!  But, I've been thinking about starting a separate photography blog....anyone have any opinions on that?  I kinda hope some day in the future I might be able to become a photographer and I was thinking it would be nice to have a separate site I can direct possible clients to for examples of my work.  Is this dumb?  I'm kinda embarrassed to even say any of this...