8 months

I have an 8 month old which blows my mind. So close to a year. Seems crazy. The past month has been so fun since she plays and interacts and has also found a bit of independence. Just today her top tooth came through. Its been poking through the gums for days but now we can actually see and feel tooth. I see the other top one as well but it hasn't poked through, I can only see the white in the gums. She hasn't been super fussy but she does have moments where you can tell that it hurts but a little Hylands teething gel seems to do the trick. Once her bottom teeth sprung we've been brushing her teeth and it's pretty much the cutest thing ever. She loves it and she just opens up and lets up brush away. I'm sure it feels pretty good on the teeth coming in.

She is crawling around like crazy and pulls herself up on everything. She is trying so hard to stand from a crawling position and she is so so close. I can stand her up and let go and she can stand there for a second. If I hold her hands and have her walk in between my legs she totally does the walking motion so she gets it but isn't quite there yet. I know its close. She has started to respond pretty well when we tell her not to touch things and I think she gets it for the most part. If you say "Sierra" she will look for her so she is starting to associate names and people for sure. She hasn't really said anything besides mama, dada, baba, and fafa but she will talk and talk now repeating those words over and over. When I sing to her she will try and sing along and make little babbling noises which is pretty darn adorable. Her favorite song is "itsy bitsy spider." I sing it every time I change her and she thinks its the funniest thing in the world when I make the motions of the spider crawling up her. Also it's the only way to keep her still. Changing her takes some major skills and speed cause she will flip and toss herself around super quickly so distraction is a must these days.

She is obsessed with throwing this one ball. She has a hell of an arm on her too and she can aim which blows my mind. We play a lot of toss. She also loves when I clap her blocks together. The sound makes her pretty excited. She also just started clapping the other day. It isn't palm opening clapping but she puts her hands together and does it. Today she was clapping like crazy for some reason. She also waves too but its super uncoordinated and very sporadic. She is still learning these fun little skills. I find if I keep repeating things she is pretty quick to pick up on things. Especially noises. She will copy me whenever I make noises with my mouth. If I click she will click and if I make spitting noises she will do the same. Cracks me up.

Besides her laughing her snuggles are my favorite. Today we were playing on the ground and she gets so happy when I crawl on my stomach and put my head down. She immediately crawls up my back and dances. I was rubbing my nose on her stomach (cause it makes her laugh) and we were just laughing and playing on the ground. It was one of those moments that made me realize for all the stress and craziness we are dealing with financially having me (sorta) stay home that it's worth every second that I get to spend nose to nose with her on the floor. If only I could explain that to my credit cards bills.

I only feed her solids for two meals a day. I'm not sure if I'm supposed to add another meal yet but I think I may wait another month. I'm still slowly trying more foods and letting her get the hang of food. We still can't get a solid schedule down since as soon as we get comfortable something throws us for a loop but I'm learning that is just kinda the way it goes. She still isn't consistent with her naps. Some days she takes 30 min naps and will require 3-4 naps and other days she will sleep anywhere from an hour to two hours so it just kinda depends. Her night time routine also changes but for the most part she is up two times to eat. It's hard cause most people tell me at this point their baby sleeps through the night and they have a consistent nap schedule but she seems to be happy so I guess I can't complain.

I have noticed in the last week that she isn't fitting into her 6 month size pj's anymore and the foot is way too small. It's almost like it happened overnight. Big ol growth spurt combined with new front teeth. Being a baby must be really painful.

I feel like I could go on and on but I write so many little details about her in all my other posts that I'm sure I didn't miss anything.

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