Nine months!

If it's the 28th, it must be Raggedy Ann time!

This month, Eliza learned how to crawl with her belly up, pulled up to standing, started eating more adult food, babbles constantly, including "dada" and "mama," took her first vacation (more on that later) and went swimming for the first time.

It's hard to believe I have a 9-month-old baby. She shouldn't be this old. For that matter, I shouldn't be this old.

She's the best thing to ever happen to us, though.

Vacation and the beginnings of cruising

This weekend we took a little break and headed down to the Smoky mountains with Brian's Mom and his sister Lee. We had some fun and Eliza got to swim for the first time.



Eliza was attempting to pull herself up in her pack n play all weekend, so I wasn't surprised at all when serious attempts to stand were made when we got home. We put her behind her baby gate to play for a bit, and within 15 minutes she was trying to stand up. She used her boppy for leverage, stood up, realized she didn't know how and pitched face forward onto some blocks. She had a block-shaped mark on her forehead for the rest of the night. This learning to stand/walk thing is going to be traumatic for me. I'm putting serious thought into buying her a helmet.

Then we played in the living room where we try to keep her away from dangerous furniture. She targeted the suitcase we hadn't carried upstairs yet. The first time, she crawled over, pulled herself up, and actually cruised a couple of steps. The second time she just pulled herself up, grabbed a shirt and fell. We did manage to catch her second attempt on video, though.



She's growing up so fast. She'll be 9 months on Thursday. Can you guys believe it?

Eliza stays put

I wanted Eliza to get mobile and learn to crawl, but I didn't think of the ramifications of Eliza actually crawling. It's sorta like when you vote for a local politician who promises to change some things and then he knocks down your house to build a road. Careful what you wish for.

In the past week, Eliza has gotten lightning fast. A can put her on the floor in the living room, spend 10 seconds in the kitchen and come back to newspapers all over the floor or Eliza attempting to move giant books from the bookshelf even though they weigh twice what she weighs. We went out and got all the babyproofing necessities like outlet covers, but I still needed a way to contain my adorable little monster without leaving her in a playpen half the day.

Enter: THE BABY CAGE

Basically it's just a hexagonal baby gate that keeps Eliza and her toys in a contained area. It totally looks like we're about to stage Oompa Loompa wrestling matches in Eliza's bedroom. We sorta felt guilty about this at first, but if I ever hope to get anything done again, I have to be able to keep her contained without keeping her too contained.

Here's some video of our new acquisition.

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Quiet Week

I'm sorry we've been so quiet over the the last week. Our happenings have sorta gotten in the way of daily blogging. I hope to get back to it this next week. I've tried my hand at baking a bit recently, and that's filling a lot of my time. This week I've managed to make 3 loaves of sandwich bread, gingerbread, biscuits, and a giant batch of fantastic chocolate chip cookies.

Eliza is getting bigger and has gotten so mobile that we're going shopping for a cage today. Not like a doggie kennel, but one of those octagonal baby gates that will allow her to be mobile, but keep her from tearing all the newspapers out from under the coffee table. Our living room will constantly look like we're hosting an Oompa Loompa wrestling competition.

Since Eliza now sits up at will, she takes that opportunity not to nap. As soon as I put her down, I can hear her shuffling around over the baby monitor. I go in her room and sure enough, she's sitting up playing with her glow worm. Even if she's only half awake, she's still sitting up doing something instead of napping. It's only a matter of time before she'll figure out how to pull herself to a standing position. Then we'll be in trouble.

We haven't really taken many pictures lately, so I thought I'd add a picture I really love that was taken the same night we took the bath splashing video. I want to get a video soon of her new bath routine. She likes to rub the side of the tub until it makes a squeaking noise. Then she laughs until her Daddy laughs and then she does it again. This will go on for 5 minutes or so until we finally have to take her out of the tub. It's adorable. Maybe next bath I'll try to get it on video. I love that she already has desire to make people laugh. She's mommy's girl.

Mother's Day at the Cincinnati Zoo

Yesterday morning, at the very last minute, I decided I'd like to spend Mother's Day at the Zoo. Since I was told I could do anything I wanted, Brian couldn't say no. We jumped in the car and headed up I-75 to Cincinnati. It's really not a bad drive at all. Eliza was extremely fussy on the way up, but one emergency diaper change later, we arrived in Cincinnati. Just as we were driving in, we learned that the Reds were playing the Cardinals. We almost ducked out on the zoo plan and went to the baseball game instead. Sadly, the game was 10 minutes in and I've heard parking for Great American is a challenge.

When we arrived at the zoo, we found out that Moms and babies get in free! Yay! Sadly, we also learned that this particular zoo is not at all stroller-friendly. In fact, the Rhino exhibit is down several flights of stairs. There are also several exhibit buildings (including the noturnal animal house) that do not allow strollers at all. We honestly didn't see much. At the exhibits that didn't allow strollers, I sent Brian in to take pictures for us. Eliza was below viewing level most of the day, so the only animal she really saw was the tail end of the Great North American Sweaty Redneck Guy.

We still had fun walking around and we did see some cool giraffes and a very hungry cheetah. Here are some of the better pictures Brian took. I was extremely disappointed that the Polar Bears weren't enjoying an ice cold Coca-Cola. I guess they only drink Coke in an arctic environment.

Eliza Crawled (like, a real crawl)

At 7 months, Eliza did this really awkward crawl that looked like an army crawl/slide on her face. Today, she crawled nice and proper. In an attempt to get it on video, I set up a camera on the floor on the opposite side of her room and tempted her with toys. This video was originally 12 minutes long, but here are the last two minutes when she finally makes her away across the room to grab a toy she couldn't resist. There wasn't a lot of distance for her to crawl, but she does it for sure.




Also, Eliza learned to wave "bye-bye" yesterday. She waved to my Mom as we were leaving her apartment. Brian claims she'd done it before, but I hadn't seen it. Yesterday is the date entered in the official baby book.

Hooray for milestones. Let's hope these don't fall out of her head like the last set.

Tonight we're going to dinner with Brian's Dad and Stepmom. We haven't seen them since Easter, so we're looking forward to it. I'm sure Eliza will be thrilled, too.

Eliza splashes and laughs at her first joke

I know I'm on a huge video kick lately, but I couldn't help sharing these. First, Eliza laughed in the appropriate place at a knock knock joke on TV. I couldn't believe it, so I played it for her again today. Sure enough, she laughed at the same place.



And just for fun, here's some video of Eliza splashing around in the tub.

Parenting platitudes ring true.

Have you ever heard anyone say that you shouldn't buy expensive toys for kids because they'll end up having more fun with the box? I used to think that was a complete crock. An excuse for parents to avoid ponying up for the high dollar toys.

Meet Eliza. Human proof that we should all listen to ancient parenting advice.

Eliza's Swing: a Tribute

From time to time, I was putting Eliza in her baby swing when I needed to work on our bedroom. Last week, while I was dealing with all the burglary nonsense, I noticed Eliza was grabbing the support bars as she was swinging back and forth. I'm all for newer developmental milestones, but since this seemed really dangerous, I decided it was time to retire the swing. She's only 3 lbs. away from the max weight limit anyway. Now the swing is living in her closet until we can figure out what to do with it.

We've had a lot of good times with Eliza's baby swing. So here, for your viewing pleasure (and an excuse for me to play around with Windows Movie Maker's goofy transition effects), Eliza's Swing: A Tribute.



In other news: I actually saw Eliza go from crawling position to sitting position THREE times today. I guess she can officially do this. So exciting. Now if she'd just get the proper crawl together, she'd be right on target with her milestones. She's showing absolutely zero interest in trying to pull up using furniture. You know what? I'm okay with that. That'll probably delay the risk of stitches. I'm okay with that, too.

Derby Day

After an otherwise horrible week, we found ourselves having a good time in the rain at Keeneland for Derby Day. Here's some video of Brian, Eliza and myself hanging out between races and a few of our misguided picks. For the record, however, my horse in the 9th TIED for 3rd and I won about $5.30. Since I bet $6 total on that race, I lost $.70. But it was still fun!



In other news, I came to get Eliza after a nap the other day and she was sitting up in her crib. So we know she CAN get into a sitting position, we just haven't actually seen her do it.

In other, other news, Foxglove finally changed our locks after three days of begging them to do so. We had two detectives from RPD take over the case at roughly the same time, so we find the timing more than a bit "coincidental". Who cares. We'll take any help we need to feel safer and catch our crook.