like a hand out the window in the wind: Nola is 8 months old!

Oh my goodness, how in the world can it be eight months already?!

But it is, and I must get some acceptance.

The best part about today was that she began to crawl - really crawl. No army crawling or scooting or rolling required. This girl was crawling. I had a brilliant idea to catch her crawling on video, but she didn't take the gimme. I placed my laptop on the floor with the webcam recording thinking for sure she would make a beeline right for it, but she sat where she was playing with the straps on my backpack. Oh my children...ever unpredictable.

Here's the rundown for Nola's 8th month...

Size: Pretty sure we're getting close to 18 lbs. She was weighed when we had to go in for thrush again this month, and she was over 17 lbs then. Theresa said she looks fantastic and her weight gain is right on track. I never knew what the actual "normal" rate of growth was, but I found out that at this age it is a half an ounce a day. So by that calculation, she should be a few ounces over 19 lbs by the time her 9 month appointment rolls around in November. This was fascinating to me since I'm a number freak.

Clothes: Funny story. She's grown THREE sizes this month. Started out the month in brand new 9 months stuff and grew out of it way too quickly. Same thing happened with the 12 months stuff, so now we're in 18 months. The sleeves are a little long, but the legs are just right. Hopefully she'll make those last for a little while!

Eating: Still primarily nursing. I am so not in a hurry to cut down on the nursing since Nola is my first exclusively breastfed baby. And everything I'm reading and hearing from the lactation consultant and the WIC peer counselor says that I could give her nothing but breastmilk for a whole year and she'd be perfectly fine. But since she shows so much interest in what we're eating, I've gotten more in the habit of including her at mealtimes -- especially supper. She loves her puffs. And she's also eaten pizza crust, carrots, squash, applesauce, and peas. She's sampled a little chicken, ice cream with strawberries, and last night she ate spaghetti. Pretty much everything I give her are things that she picks up and puts in her mouth on her own, but she does pretty well when I offer her something on a spoon. We have started working on learning how to use a sippy. I have heard that the straw sippy cups work particularly well for breastfed babies, so that's what we're trying. She still prefers to chew on the straw, but I'm sure she'll get it in the next few weeks.

Sleeping: I'm going to type this really small so that she doesn't pick up on the fact that I'm acknowledging her incredible progress. This month we have gone from 4-5 wakes at night and no predictable nap to 2 wakes at night and 2 predictable naps. I will credit moving her into her own room and nursing in a chair instead of the bed. This is absolutely amazing, and I really really really hope it continues!!!

What she's doing: Babbling - a lot. Her favorite thing to say is "da-da-da-da-da," and sometimes she seems to refer to Kevin when doing so. Of course this makes his day. She will also say "mama" and "mum-num-mum-nummmm" when she's eating. At night when I'm giving her a bath, she says "na-na-na-na" which I interpret as night night. She loves to bang toys or her hands on anything and everything. She gets a kick out of splashing in her bath. She can go from a sitting position to a crawling position to her belly and all the way back to sitting. As I mentioned before, she began officially crawling today. She's close to clapping her hands because she brings them together but they're usually not all the way open. She loves her brother and sister and is pleased when they provide her with entertainment and toys.

Overall this was a very exciting month for Nola. She's so fun now for everybody in the household and we all get a kick out of waiting to see what she'll do next. Time really needs to slow down so we can really soak up all the cuteness before it passes.

And now for some pictures!