Cole Turned 9 Months!

Last week Cole turned 9 months old!  It's hard to believe.  We had his obligatory "9 Month Photo Shoot".

 

So much for the paper label taped to his shirt!  I wish this picture wasn't blurry, but this is so typical of him.  So curious and active.  I like it.

 

For posterity sake...

It seems to both Marc and me that Cole is literally changing overnight.  Like, yesterday he couldn't do this and today he can.  Here he is sitting on his knees.  Sitting on his knees!  My baby...who was a stationery blob just 9 months ago is sitting on his knees (and got to that position on his own)!

 

 

He has gotten so good at pulling himself up.  It's crazy how fast he can just pop right up...on the couch, hanging onto our legs, holding on General, and of course his cool new toy.

 

He is crawling all over the place and even sometimes on his hands and knees instead of his elbows and knees.  And, he's mastered pushing himself to a seated position from his tummy, which he seems to practice all the time, now that he can do it.

 

He's been eating anything we're willing to give him--lots of pears and bananas, peas, cooked carrots, sweet potatoes, butternut squash, broccoli, black beans, zuchinni, cucumber, apple, avocado, bread, puffs, even bits of meat on occasion. 

 

I find it hard to think of what to feed him.  The past few weeks I've been roasting vegetables at the beginning of the week and putting them in the fridge for later to munch on.  We've had success taking these types of foods to a restaurant for him to eat.  The other day we were out after church and Cole was munching on peas and carrots and our friends we were with were so surprised.  I was proud of him and glad I am learning to bring it along.  We usually end up going for the puffs by the time our meal is over, but it gives us a healthy alternative for a while.

 

It is easy to get him to laugh and it's fun to laugh at him and the funny things he does.  He'll keep doing it to get us to laugh.  He repeats the noises we say or we repeat his and the conversation goes back and forth.

 

I often wonder if he's waving hi or bye or doing the sign for "more" or "all done", though he hasn't been consistent enough to know for sure.  That'll be such a neat thing!

 

Our biggest challenge right now is getting him to sleep at other people's houses.  It seems like that kind of changed overnight too.  It's like he became more aware of his surroundings and all of a sudden isn't ok with not being in his own room and own bed.  We've been working on sleeping over at Al and Shirley's.  They have a crib set up just for him.  We've had some success and some tough times.

 

He lights up when Marc walks in the room or comes home from work.  I love seeing that.  He loves to be perched on his daddy's tall shoulder.  I think he thinks he owns the entire room up there and nothing can touch him.

 

What a joy!