Austin Scott: 9-10 Months

Let's talk about how 9-10 months is practically the best baby age ever? Austin is so sweet, funny, active, independent, and darling. He giggles when you catch him doing something he's not supposed to be doing and he loves to cuddle. With each month that goes by this little boy captures our hearts more and more with his happy personality and his contagious sense of humor. 

Stats: 

(We didn't get into the doctor at 9 months so these ten month stats are actually the official stats from the doctor.) 

Weight: 17 lbs 12 oz (10%)

Length: 27.8 in (15%) 

Head Circ: 46 cm (70%)

Size 9 month clothes, size 3 shoes, size 3 diapers. No teeth. A tiny bit of hair coming in (so cute).

Some things to remember this month: 

--He's still a champ in the baby carrier. He seems to love it and so do I. We are splitting the time pretty evenly between front wearing and back wearing. It's so nice that he still likes being worn.  

--He's started clapping and waving hi/bye. It's adorable.

 (I love summer because you get to see those baby legs! Onsies are my best friends)

--Started saying Mom (mah-mmm) followed shortly by Dad (da). It secretly makes my heart happy that he said Mom first. Sometimes it just seems like he's babbling mamamama. But you can tell when he's saying it TO me. Usually when he's tired or upset and he really wants my attention. 

--He's a great eater. I have a hard time keeping up with him. He eats pretty much everything that we eat. His favorites: grapes (cut in half), raisins, frozen mixed vegetables, potatoes of any variety (like his dad), pasta (like his mom), cheese, and fruit-fruit-fruit (like his sister). His least favorite: cheerios. Seriously, every time I put him in his high chair and give him some cheerios (which used to merit lots of happy eating) he yells his displeasure and looks at me like I'm losing my mind. Then he's more likely to push them off the tray than to put them in his mouth. Also, on the feeding front this month- he's figured out how to hold the little fruit pouches and feed himself. I feel like this is a milestone, but mostly because I looooove having them when we are out and about and it's nice that he can manage mostly by himself.

--Also on the topic of food, he's started signing "more" and "all done". It's awesome. Oh, and he will sign "milk", too. He's even figured out that if he signs "more" while he's sitting on the floor playing, that I'll realize he's hungry and give him food, or if he signs "all done" in the bathtub I'll understand that he's ready to get out. Obviously I'm biased, but I think he's so smart.

--He loves balls. His absolute favorite thing to play with is one of our little balls from Target that light up when you bounce them. He will hold it in one hand and hit it on the floor to make it light up. That usually does it. But if it doesn't light up, he'll throw it at the ground to get it to light then crawl over to it.  Again, he's so smart. He loves the light-up balls the most, but he loves all balls. One of the notes that I have in my planner is that he can palm balls the size of a softball. It's impressive! 

-- He's big enough now to really play with Lydia and we all love it. She plays with him in the family room, bounces him on the trampoline (which he can climb up on and loves sitting on), and crawls around with him. My favorite game that they play is hide and seek. Lydia will run into the living room and hide, then yell "Austin - come find me!" As soon as she yells, he'll start crawling as fast as he can and head into the room where she was to find her. It. is. so. darling. He's really good at finding her, and once he does they will both laugh and laugh. 

-Austin's got a little troublemaking streak in him. He loves nothing more than to try to touch the water in the toilet and pull the toilet paper off the roll. He knows that he's not supposed to do it, because if you see him crawling toward the open bathroom and say "Austinnnnnnn", he'll giggle and start crawling faster - trying to get to the bathroom because you can catch him. Also, the stairs. I have to be careful to keep the gate shut all the time. If he sees it open he will head toward it, alternating between crawling as fast as possible and sneakily checking behind him to see if we have noticed where he's headed. He's fast at stairs and can often get up the first half-flight before I can catch him. When I come up behind him and say "Austinnn, what are you doing?" He'll giggle and try to climb faster, often getting so excited/worked up that he can't get his leg over the next stair. It's the funniest thing, ever. I love it, so I sometimes leave the gate open just so I can chase him up the stairs.

 --He's started yelling. Not crying. Not screaming. Yelling. It's mostly when he wants attention, but sometimes it's just because he wants to. Or if he wants something. Or if you've been playing with him and you get distracted. Or if you gave him something to eat and he wants something else. Or if you gave him something to eat and he wants more. Or if he's done eating. Or if he wants to do something other than what he's doing. So. much. yelling.

--He is like a little candy-detector. I don't know how, but he manages to find all sorts of sweet things to eat. Once I was holding him and he managed to grab a handful of peanut m&ms that I had  in a cup with my other hand without me noticing until I saw his shirt which had bright orange drool all over it.  We don't keep a lot of candy in the house, but if there is a piece of forgotten candy somewhere, he'll find it. His score: 1 rootbeer barrel (in wrapper, but still more than half gone), 1 skittle, 1 half-eaten otter pop, and the above mentioned m&ms.

-He looooooves music. And dancing. Each night we do a little routine called scripture-song-prayer and I think the song is one of his favorite times of the day. He loves when I turn on the children's station on pandora. Whenever he hears music that he likes he starts bouncing and waving his arms with a huge smile. This last Sunday he crawled away from me in Primary, headed across the front of the room toward the Piano, just as singing time was starting. As the piano started playing and the kids started singing he sat up, right on center stage and proceeded to bounce, wave his arms, and smile at all of the kids looking at him. This kid's got a future in the musical theatre.

--He is SO good at just going with the flow. We haven't had much of a schedule this summer and this little guy is so good to just come around with us wherever we need/want to go. Our nap schedule is so sporadic. If we are home all day, he still takes 3 naps: 9, 12, & 3ish. But we are almost never home all day. Most days he gets his first nap at 9. But he might only get one nap at 1-2 or maybe no real afternoon naps- just crashing in the car or baby carrier. I feel bad for his poor unstructured nap schedule, but he's still so happy everywhere we go - I feel better because he seems good with it.

--He loves playing with our cell phones. No games. Just looking at the lock screen. It's basically his favorite thing ever. 

--He plays with trains and cars by pushing them back and forth on their wheels. He can even line the little toy trains on the train tracks and push them back and forth. He likes them. 

--He loves exploring water. He doesn't like when I wash his face after dinner anymore, but he does like reaching out to touch the stream of water coming from the spout. He loves the bath! He loves splashing and kicking (and trying to stand up).  When Lydia is in the bath, he'll crawl over, stand at the edge and reach his little hands down to try to touch the water. He doesn't love love love the swimming pool, but he is always super interested in the water. 

--I love this stage of physical development. It's so fun. Some examples: 

-Pulls himself to a stand everywhere he can.

-Climbs stairs like he's getting paid for it. 

-Constantly has dirty toes and knees from all the places he crawls. 

-When he's sitting up and he wants to look in a different direction, he uses his legs to turn in a complete circle - bringing one ankle to the other, then pushing off to spread his legs apart to turn the way he wants, then repeating the process. It's hard to explain but it's so cute. He just pivots right around on his bum. I love it. 

--He does this cute thing what we call "speed crawling". At first we thought that it was an accident, but he totally does it on purpose. He will find something hard and fairly small like a cell phone or a small book and carefully put one hand on it, test it out and readjust if needed, then start crawling by sliding the hand on the phone/book and pushing off with the other. The result is that he slide/crawls super-fast all over the carpet. He loves it and it's so funny to watch him set himself up and then slide/crawl as long as he can keep control of it.

--He adores his big sister and no one can get as many laughs out of him as she can. Sometimes this is a problem because she'll do things like pull on his hand/arm and he'll laugh and laugh. And when I tell her not to, and that she needs to be soft, she'll say "but he likes it!" Which, he does - until it really is too hard and then he doesn't like it. It's so bad but funny, too.

--We super, super love this boy. Happy 10 months, baby!