Baby and the kitty

For most of her short life, Madeline has been fascinated by our cat, Saki. Ever since Madeline started to become more aware of her surroundings she would perk up whenever the cat would walk by. Often she would be completely engrossed in something else, only to freeze and stare wide-eyed as Saki passed.

As Madeline grew more vocal she would start to make noise at the cat, and often smiled when she saw it. Now she'll look and point at Saki when we say "kitty" and she even makes the same whispery "tuh" sound whenever she sees the cat, as if she's trying to say it.

On the other hand, Saki has been mostly dismissive and incurious about Madeline - she's just never taken an interest in the baby other than a quick sniff or two. But now that Madeline can move - and move fast - the cat has had to become more evasive, which, of course, cats are good at. Most of the time Saki will remove herself from the situation when Madeline comes too close, but other times she'll stay put and even allow Madeline to pet her. And, surprisingly, Madeline is mostly gentle with her.

Family Christmas

For all of my life, our family trip to Roanoke to visit relatives has been just as big a part of the season as Christmas itself. And this year, of course, we had an extra package to bring along with us (plus the diaper bag, the pack-n-play, the Cheerios and the bag of toys for the 3-hour car ride).

Madeline had a great time this weekend, and it seemed like everyone was happy to see her, too. It was the first time some of our relatives had ever seen her apart from pictures. Even though she didn't nap much because of all the excitement, she managed to put on her best attitude, soaking up the attention for two days.

By Monday afternoon she had used up her second wind (and her third and fourth) and was completely exhausted, as we all were. She was happy to get home and quietly play with all of her new acquisitions, from touch-and-feel books to stuffed animals to the band-in-a-box noisemaking kit. And the evening ended a little earlier than usual when she couldn't even make it to her regular bed time.

The forty-first week

This week we've found ourselves re-evaluating many of our old routines. Just a couple weeks ago I wrote that Madeline's sleep schedule was "as regular as clockwork" - and it had been for months. But this week we've thrown all that out the window.

It happened suddenly - on Tuesday she napped normally and then on Wednesday she revolted. No more putting her down at the regular time. Now she protested forcefully - crying, squirming and being generally disagreeable (to put it mildly). And if we just put her in the crib to work it out on her own, as we usually would do, she would just stand up and cry. Once she was standing in her crib there was no hope that she would sleep.

The perplexing thing is that she was mostly fine when she wasn't being put down for a nap - she's been otherwise happy and friendly this week (and, thank goodness, she still goes to bed well at night). We extended the time between naps to make sure she was good and tired. So, while she's already tired at the "regular" nap time, she's really tired after an extra hour.

We did a little research and discovered that a disruption in sleep routines at this age is actually somewhat common - even babies who have been sound sleepers suddenly have trouble napping. There's even a name for it - "nine-month sleep regression." It could be related to all that's going on in their brains and bodies - they know how to do so much that it's hard for them to settle, even if they're tired. Kind of like when you want to go to sleep but something is weighing on your mind.

So, for now, we're letting go of the old schedule and just flying by instrument, as the pilots say. Just like everything else, we know this is just a phase. Hopefully it won't be a long one!

She's got a point

Madeline is becoming more expressive with her hands these days, and the latest fads are waving and pointing. She's been doing these things for a while, but it seems as if recently she's associating the gestures with concepts.

She often waves in response to someone waving at her, even to the point where she'll mimic the number of hands you're using - wave with one hand and she'll do the same; wave with two and she copies.

Her pointing is generally directed at something she's interested in, and not random. There have been a few surprising occasions when I've asked her to locate something - a specific toy or the cat - and she'll point right to it.

For a while it seemed as if her gestures were limited to certain hands - she would only wave with her left and would point with her right, sometimes at the same time. But in recent days she's shown that she is ambidextrous when it comes to these particular skills (and others, too - she always seems to have two fistfulls of Cheerios at the same time!).

Tough love

As Madeline becomes more mobile and adventurous, she has exponentially more opportunities to injure herself. There are so many times during the day when I see her reaching out for something to pull up on but not quite paying attention to the task at hand. Suddenly images race through my head of her losing her balance and cracking her face on the table or ledge, or worse.

So far her most common issue occurs when she's standing next to a table. Once she's up, she might find something on the table that captures her attention. When she reaches for or grabs the object, well, she's not holding the table anymore, and she occasionally ends up toppling over. She's not quick enough to put her hands out to break the fall, which means she's experienced a few faceplants onto the living room floor.

Fortunately the living room is carpeted, but I worry more when she's in the rooms with hardwood flooring, or that her face might catch the edge of the table as she zooms past on her way to horizontality.

My instinct is to stay next to her at all times, ready to catch her at the first sign of imbalance. Or, if she falls, I want to sweep her up and comfort her through her cries (I think she cries because of surprise rather than pain). But is this the right approach? Does she need to experience a few tumbles as she learns to stand and walk? I want her to learn self-confidence and self-reliance, but is it too early to worry about those lessons?

My gut tells me that a few tumbles are OK, as long as we're keeping her away from the stairs and other highly dangerous areas. And, while I don't leave her unattended when she's crawling around, maybe I don't need to hover immediately next to her. And I can redirect her if she's flirting with a situation that's likely to lead to injury. (But it doesn't help that my mind's eye can imagine injury in just about every situation!)

On a tear

Madeline enjoys the magazines that populate our living room, but not for the articles as you might expect. No, she loves tearing the pages out, then ripping those pages into ever smaller pieces until they are scattered in finger-sized shreds all over the floor.

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Tonight Madeline stood by herself for a good 15 seconds (go ahead, count it out. . .). She was holding onto my knee and she just let go and stood there, grasping her toy Stanley in one hand.

I'm in awe of how quickly she has progressed since her first crawl just a few weeks ago. Once she realized that she could get around, she just hasn't stopped. And she's getting so much more confident - she's climbing on top of objects and she's wandering from room to room without hesitation. A few weeks ago I thought baby gates were not an imminent necessity, but now it's obvious that we need them.

The fortieth week

Over the past week Madeline's top teeth have really become visible (though not necessarily easy to photograph). And she's now getting more chances to use them for their intended purpose.

This week we gave Madeline Cheerios - her first small finger food. Initially she wasn't quite sure what to do with them. She enjoyed picking them up and holding them tightly in her hands, but she didn't catch on that she could put them in her mouth (a surprising bit of restraint for a kid who seems to put everything else in there). Even though she wouldn't feed herself, she would readily eat one if we put it in her mouth for her.

But after a few tries she was putting them in her mouth as soon as we would present them. She chews them around until they're soft and then swallows. Now she'll even bite them in half with her new teeth, chew the first half and then eat the second half when she's done.

But even though Madeline is growing adept at eating them, we still lose an occasional Cheerio. I feel like Lacey and I are arriving at a parenthood milestone now that we can say we've found Cheerios in the weirdest places!

Laundry

Lacey was folding laundry recently and Madeline, using a couple of her new skills, crawled over to the basket, pulled up on the side and began inspecting the freshly laundered apparel. Now if she could just learn to fold . . .

Ho, ho, holidays!

Ah, Christmas. This weekend we unpacked the fake tree from the attic, unwrapped the Santa Claus salt and pepper shakers and welcomed the season into our home.

I've always been a Christmas nut, although after I left college and entered "adulthood" the season began to lose its luster. It's almost as if making it through the holidays was becoming more of a chore and less of the carefree pleasure it once was.

But now Madeline's here and I'm discovering that there's no better way to reawaken those dormant holiday memories than to have a child of your own. Sure, she's a bit young to understand anything that's going on, but she sure knows that a glowing tree is fascinating to look at, that shiny ornaments are fun to grab, and that tearing wrapping paper can be the highlight of her day.

I know it's wrong to project your own expectations onto your child, but there's a part of me that hopes Madeline one day feels the same excitement about the season that I once felt. The only thing I can do is make sure her holidays are filled with family, fun and lots of gaudy lights and hope it catches on.

(I think Lacey, on the other hand, would prefer a month-long power outage every December over a husband AND a daughter who want to outline the roof in colored lights!)

Nine-month check-in

Today we took Madeline to the pediatrician for her scheduled nine-month check in. There were no vaccinations today but there was a hemoglobin test, which was just a prick on the finger.

Today Madeline weighed 20 pounds, 9 ounces and is 27.5 inches long (last month she was measured at 27.75 inches - I suspect there will always be a little variance with different scales, different nurses and a squirmy baby). She's put on 10 ounces since her last weigh-in. That's about a quarter-ounce a day over the last 33 days.

Today we got the go-ahead to introduce some meat and dairy products (but still not straight milk) into Madeline's diet. We also will consider eliminating one of her four bottles a day as she gets more of her nutrition from regular foods.