8 Months!!

My sweet Amaia,
Wow you are 8 months old!  Yet again, another month has gone by so quickly.  Your daddy and I love you so much.  We are always talking about how precious you are and how we are so, so thankful that we get to be your parents.  You are such a joy to us!  One of my favorite new developments is how you fall asleep on my shoulder.  You get very sleepy at the end of your nighttime feeding and after we are done I bring you up to my shoulder and we cuddle for a few minutes before putting you to bed.  You just lay your head on my shoulder and I rub your back and cuddle with you. I don't know if you love this time of day as much as I do, but I love it SO MUCH.  I love holding you and cuddling you and just thinking about how thankful I am to have you in my life.

You are still growing, growing, growing (17 lbs. 7 oz. now!) and your personality is emerging more and more all the time.  I am always trying to figure out your personality.  So far, you seem to be a very observant little girl.  You love to watch people and your eyes get so big when you are watching something.  Whenever we go somewhere new it seems that you like to sit back and observe before getting too comfortable.  After a few minutes your smiles come back and you are ready to play.  It just takes you a few minutes to warm up to new situations - much like your mommy.  You still love music.  I wonder if this means you will love music when you get older too.  You love "I'm a Little Teapot" and "You are my Sunshine" - those are our songs.  You also love to have daddy play his guitar for you.  If you are upset it is almost the only thing that is sure to help you calm down.   You also love the bath.   I get you clean as quick as I can and then I help you sit up and let you splash to your hearts content.

We have been working on eating a variety of foods this month.  You have come a long way in a month's time.  You are now eating rice cereal, oatmeal, green beans, peas, squash and applesauce.  Surprisingly you seem to really like your veggies, but are quite opposed to applesauce.  I am also trying to get you to try carrots, but you are not a fan of those right now either. You don't seem to like anything the first few times you try it - but you are very good sport about it.  I can tell that you don't like something when you make your "mom, this is disgusting" face and roll it around in your mouth.  However, you will usually take at least a few bites of something that I can tell you don't like before totally refusing it.

You are also getting so strong!  I am amazed by how sometimes it seems that you might be stronger than me!  Ha!  Is that even possible?? :)  You are getting close to crawling.  You get up on your hands and knees and rock back and forth.  You don't last too long yet.  I'm sure that is quite the big workout for you!  On the day you turned 8 months old your strength also got you into trouble.  I was holding you and you jerked yourself back so suddenly that I dropped you and rolled down the stairs.  It was truly the scariest moment of both your daddy and I's lives.  We are beyond thankful that you are okay.  I am still emotional about the whole ordeal.  Needless to say I am now very careful to hold onto you tightly now and we will be getting gates very soon in anticipation of you crawling!

You are so precious to us little girl.  I love spending my days with you and your daddy and I just love you so much.  Keep being cute and loveable, because you are awfully good at it!
Love,
Mommy