Nine Months

Dear Miles,

You turned nine months old last week and for the past week I have been trying to write about the stage you are at now. But I am finding it so hard to encapsulate your emerging personality.



You are beginning to leave babyhood behind and taking small steps to independence, which both warms my heart and leaves me a bit sad.

Active doesn't even begin to describe you. When you are awake you are constantly on the go. You walk along all the furniture and have taken your first tentative steps without holding on to anything. You race around the house, bent over at the waist, hands and feet on the ground, crawling almost as fast as the rest of us can walk. And while you do this you "talk" constantly. There is no other way to describe it other than hooting like an owl, interspersed with bouts of spitting.



You don't even stay still when you are nursing, instead preferring to engage in something I call "nursing gymnastics" I have to hold you tightly to make you lay still, otherwise you try to stand, jump, and do handstands while nursing. And unfortunately, for you, my nipples are not detachable.

This past weekend we were at a baseball game, yes the baseball field is like your second home, and one of the mothers came up to me and remarked at how big you were getting. She couldn't believe how you were standing and walking around everything. She said, "Oh, my babies didn't do any of that until they were at least 14 months old because I just loved to hold them all the time. I'm sure you can't do that, but I just loved holding my babies." I want you to know that I do hold you, hug you, and carry you around as much as you will allow. I hope you never think that because you were seventh that you weren't as loved and cherished as those before you.




You hate my laptop with the fiery passion you previously only reserved for diaper changes and being strapped into your carseat. Right now as I am typing you are trying to slam my computer shut with one hand and reach around and bang on the keyboard with the other. It really is quite annoying. You keep hitting the caps lock key and I keep having to backspace and retype. I am not sure why you object so strenuously to having your diaper changed. Everyday, several times a day, for your entire life you have been having your diaper changed, why does it have to be a big deal now? Why? It would be so much easier on all of us if you would just lay still and deal with it.

You have a stubborn and independent streak, that makes me laugh in spite of myself. I know that by the time you are two years old I will be tearing my hair from my own head,and possibly yours, in frustration, but how can I not laugh when you collapse to the ground screaming as if you have been shot, just because I dared to wipe your nose.



You refuse to eat any sort of baby food or cereal or to let me spoon any food into your mouth. Your favorite foods are pasta with butter and grated cheese, raisins, cocoa puffs, toasted apple butter sandwiches, and any other random food bits that you find under the kitchen table. You just recently discovered the joys of drinking out of a sippy cup, though the term drinking is a bit disingenuous as you fill your mouth with water and then let it dribble out of your mouth and down your chin. Considering you still have no teeth, you do incredibly well in the eating department.

You do not like to sleep and avoid it at all costs, until you can not possibly carry on any longer. At that point you will just fall asleep wherever you are.



Sleeping through the night is just a dream at this point. You wake several times a night to nurse. And if there are going to be points given out for motherhood, I think I deserve a whole slew of them for being woken up every hour, every night for nine months. But I am really not complaining. I know from experience that this stage will eventually pass and that one day it will be a distant memory that I have trouble fully recalling. I promise though that I will never forget enough that I would tell your wife that my babies slept through the night from the day they were born.



Your latest passion is opening and closing cabinets and taking everything out of them that you can get your hands on. As soon as we open the dishwasher to unload it you get so excited you climb onto the open door and begin flinging silverware.



You smile at everyone and you think everything is worthy of a giggle. You recently learned to give high fives and so you frequently sit with your hand up in the air just waiting for someone to notice.

You are such a treasure and bring so much joy to our entire family. As much as I hate to fall back on tired old cliches, I have to say that time is passing so quickly and I feel the days, weeks, and months slipping by. I wish I could stop time and enjoy you at this moment for awhile longer. Well, maybe not this exact moment since you are screaming and hitting my keyboard, but you know what I mean.

Micey-Mouse, Mini-Man, PITA pocket...

I love you,
Mom