8 Months Old

Every month that goes by, the next one goes by faster!  I cannot believe my little baby is already 8 months old!  She has become such a big girl!!!  She is so happy and just makes Matt and I fill joy every time we look at her!  In the past month, she has gone from army crawling to REAL crawling, from having to be put in the sitting position to doing it ALL BY HERSELF!!  The first day that she sat up on her own, I was going to get her up from her nap and she was sitting in her crib with a HUGE smile on her face.  I laughed and cheered her on and told her what a big girl she was.  And she was just glowing with pride in herself.  It might have been one of the cutest things I have ever seen.  In the past week, I started noticing that at the 3 hour mark when I would nurse her, she wasn't all that hungry or interested.  So I moved it back to around 4 hours.  This schedule has worked awesome, and she has adjusted without skipping a beat!  It is so nice for me to not feel like I am constantly nursing her and we are in a much better daily rhythm.  She still sleeps from around 8pm to 8am and we are still so thankful for that!  Since the new eating schedule, she has been taking 2 great naps a day!  She sleeps between 1.5 to 2 hours both in the morning and the afternoon, and has even given me a couple 2.5 hour naps!!! We've been going to the YMCA in the mornings during the week and Hannah has been doing GREAT in the child care.  It is such a blessing and relief to me, to walk in there after 30-45 minutes and seeing Hannah either playing happily on the floor or happily being held by one of the workers.  She doesn't even immediately reach for me anymore!  This has been a huge concern for me, feeling uncomfortable leaving her because she would basically scream the whole time!  Although I didn't want Hannah to be upset, I knew it was good for both of us, but mostly I didn't want to subject the child care workers to her screaming!!  We are also heading to Utah in a couple weeks and while Matt and I ski, Hannah will be childcare, so I hope that that goes as well as the YMCA has been going!  Hannah babbles all the time!  Her most favorite sounds are mama or mom, and dada, but is also known to say baba and yaya.  She still squeals often and makes other sweet non consonant sounds.  She is playing much more independently which is really helpful for me.  She loves to bounce in the exersaucer and dig through her toy box.  She especially loves balls and things that make noise.  And of course her favorite things to play with are remote controls and cell phones!  She loves a dryer sheet too!  She has gotten much more interested in books lately and will occupy herself for a little while trying to turn the pages.  Hannah loves water and has gotten really good at drinking from her sippy cup.  She has a traditional sippy cup and a new one that has a straw and she does so well from both!    She still eats like a champ!  She eats 3 meals of solid food a day.  Avocados remain her favorite and she also loves mangos.  I think she could give or take apples, but she seems to really like pears.  She still eats well from a spoon, but also likes to try to feed herself more.  A few new things she has tried (and liked!) are chicken, tomatoes, broccoli, and black beans.  I plan on giving her yogurt and cheese in the next few days as she is now a big 8 month old!!  She still loves cheerios too and teething biscuits are a new fun thing we've tried.  Again, we don't know her height and weight, but she is mostly wearing 9-12 month clothes as this point.  So I would think she is over 20 lbs and around 28 inches.  She can still fit into some of her 6-9 month clothes, but they are a little short in the arms and legs!!

I took her little "8 month photo shoot" in a new swimsuit I got her at a buy 1 get 1 free sale at Carter's.  I think it's super cute, and Hannah LOVED wearing it!!  I think we have a little girl that is going to LOVE LOVE summertime!!