9 Months

I'm a bit behind on this, but Claire is now 9 months old. Still, it doesn't seem like much has changed. She seems like the same baby today as she was when she was born. She is still our little cuddly, love-bug who has a perpetual smile. She will give anyone a smile and it is the most heartwarming thing to see. Or maybe the most heartwarming thing is her hugs. She gives the absolute best hugs. She will lay her sweet little head on your shoulder, wrap her arms around you, and hold tight. I love waking her up and immediately getting a smile plus a hug. Oh, if only she can keep this temperament forever....

Sam and Nathanael still fight over who gets to hold her, who gets to play with her, who gets to talk to her, who her highchair is closer to at the dinner table, and so on and so forth. I suppose I should be thankful they adore her, even if the arguing gets REALLY old. And she still adores them. She gets excited to see them. She squeals with delight when they entertain her. But from time to time she does get a bit frustrated with the constant invasion of her personal space.
She loves to eat cheerios or little bits of bread. She also loves bits of banana and other soft foods, including most recently, tiny bites of baked chicken. But she has a little trouble mashing up and swallowing many things, so we are still keeping the real food to a minimum. She still loves most of her pureed foods, but I can tell she's getting bored with it.
The girl loves playing in the bath, just as she loves swimming. She enjoys feeling the water as it pours from the faucet and she loves splashing, too. She also just enjoys being in the bathroom in general. It's one of her favorite places to try to sneak off to explore, though I like to keep her out of there because it's just gross.
Now that Claire is so mobile, she loves to explore EVERYTHING. She loves looking at books. Board books are fun to listen to stories from, chew on the pages of, and she particularly likes feeling the "touch and feel" board books. Regular books would be great for ripping to pieces if she were given the chance. We generally like to limit that activity to just magazines.
Claire follows me around the house like a little puppy dog, even with her tongue hanging out of her mouth sometimes. And, according to Paul, she goes around searching for me when I'm not home. It's all super cute until I'm trying to fix dinner and she's tired, so she starts fussing and clinging to my leg.
A couple of weeks ago, she started pulling up on things. She does it with complete ease now and has started to even manage to get herself back down when she doesn't want to stand anymore.
I love her to bits and pieces, but I just wish she'd slow down her growing up just a tad.