Jensyn – 9 Months

(written when Jensyn was 9 months, publishing when she’s almost 16 months…)

Oooh, boy.  Life is busy with 3 kids.  I missed 8 months.  I knew it, and I felt guilty, but sometimes it’s just so hard to sit down and blog.  Now Jensyn is halfway through the 9th month, so I better get to this before another month goes by!

And now, after loading the two pictures from 2012, I realized that I don’t have easy access to the 2011 pictures.  Perhaps I’ll do the words now, add the pictures later…

Jensyn now has 6 teeth – 4 on top and 2 on bottom.  She loves biting people’s fingers.  She’s a thumb sucker, and she bites her own thumb.  Ouch!  Thankfully, she doesn’t bite much while nursing.

Speaking of nursing, she generally nurses about 5 times a day now.  Sometimes, she’s so hungry she eats in a hurry.  Other times, she’s slow about it, stopping every once in a while to look right at me and babble some cute baby talk.  Often, she has to pause and check out what her brothers are doing.

Jensyn LOVES to eat!  Yes, she likes baby food.  She loves a bowl of rice cereal or oatmeal before bed.  She loves mashed banana, bits of bread, Gerber Puffs, and mashed potato.  But you know what she really loves?  Chili.  Stuffed Pepper Soup.  SPICES…and the more, the better.  I have never met a baby so in love with flavor and spice!

She really does a very good job with eating “big people food”.  As long as the bites are tiny, she will eat it.  We’re not sure it’s a word, but Jensyn almost always says, “MmmUH!” when she wants more.  Whether it’s a word or a noise, she’s making her point known.  The child wants more food, and you’d better hurry…’cuz she’s not going to wait patiently! ;)

She’s getting better all the time at feeding herself small bites of table food.  It’s nice, as I now have the freedom to feed myself from my own plate before my food is cold.

Since I mentioned her maybe-word, I’ll point out that she also seems to say “Mama”.  We’ve heard her look right at Keith and say “Dada”.  We know for sure that she says, “Yay!” when she’s clapping.  She might be saying, “Hi”, too…since she says “HA!” when waving.

I find it hard to believe that she would start talking at only 8.5 months old, and she would have five words by the time she’s a little over 9 months old.  It doesn’t really seem likely to me.  Yet, even with my doubt, she still seems to use these “words” in the correct context.

Jensyn is sitting up very well, she can roll both ways easily, and she can gently get herself from a sitting position to lying on her tummy.  What she can’t do is crawl.  Most of the time she doesn’t even care.  She doesn’t even get up on all fours yet.  She can sort-of spin in a circle when on her belly, so she can reach nearby toys.  Sometimes she scoots just a bit on her belly.  Sometimes, when sitting up, she bounces and scoots on her bottom.  Crawling, though, still seems to be a ways off.  Since she didn’t sit independently until almost 8 months, I’m not surprised.   And standing while holding onto furniture?  That’s probably a ways off yet.  Who knows, though, maybe she’ll surprise us one of these days and just do it.

As long as she has a full tummy and a dry diaper, Jensyn is content to sit and play with whatever is nearby during the day.  It’s different when we’re away from home or if she’s sleepy…then she wants nothing more than to be held.

She’s still a mama’s girl much of the time, but she is growing a little less leary of others.  Keith & I actually managed a date last weekend with both a movie and (quick) dinner, and Jensyn did just fine with Grandma & Papa the whole time we were out!  Even when we came home, it was a good ten minutes or more before she cried and reached for me.  Good girl!

Jensyn went REALLY backwards in the nighttime sleeping for a few weeks.  It got to the point where she was waking up every 2 – 3 hours to nurse.  I let it go for a few weeks in case it was just a growth spurt, but eventually I decided that we no longer have a newborn…and I missed my sleep!  It was time for some good ‘ol crying-it-out.  Little Miss put up a good fight, but now she’s often sleeping from 8:30 PM – 5ish AM, nursing, and then back to sleep until 8 AM.

(For me, crying it out means letting her go for 30 – 60 minutes, checking on her to make sure she’s not stuck in a crib slat or jammed in the corner, checking that her diaper isn’t dirty, cuddling her for a few minutes, and laying her back down.  No nursing until at least 5 AM.  Repeat until baby is asleep.)

She likes to babble now – lots of Nah, Nah, Ah-Bah-Dah talk going on around here!  She’s not a constant talker, though.  Jensyn really is good at sitting quietly with her toys for long periods of time.

After a while, she gets tired of sitting on her own, cries out to be held, and then she & Mama do chores together, sit together for a few minutes, or watch the big boys play.

She LOVES to watch her brothers play, watch the dog, or watch other kids when she’s in the nusery.  Speaking of nursery, she is getting VERY good about going to nursery at both our church and at my Tuesday morning Bible study.  She sits and happily plays with toys for the full 60 – 90 minutes…even when she’s sleepy from missing a nap!

She gives out grins somewhat stingily…unless it’s Daddy, who gets the BIGGEST GRINS EVER.

She waves.  That’s a new one in the past week or so.  It’s so cute!  At Costco last week, she was smiling and waving to everyone around us.  At home, she’ll usually wave AFTER people are already out of sight.

She likes to stand for short times on mama’s lap or with other people, but isn’t too interested in standing yet.

She likes the Jumperoo for short times, but she’s not a huge jumper like Max was.

She naps from 10/10:30 – 11:30 AM, sometimes until 12:30.  THen she naps again from 2:30/2:45 – 4:30/5 PM.  Even if she’s really sleep and naps until almost 6 PM, she is still ready for bed right on time.  She wants to have her cereal (with Daddy) around 8 PM, nurse (with Mommy, of course), and she happily goes to bed around 8:30 PM.

She is NOT a bedtime snuggler.  I’m rather disappointed about that.  I’d love to cuddle her, sing to her, read her a Bible story before bed.  Instead, she wants to be fed and lay down in her crib.  No snuggles.  No cuddles.  Just BED.  I’m glad she’s a good go-to-bedder; I’m sad that she won’t cuddle.  Usually, I stand next to her bed, hold her upright in my arms, and sing her a song before setting her in her crib.  She smiles while I sing, so I know she enjoys it.

Other than a few minor colds with runny noses and one bout with the stomach flu a few months ago, Jensyn has been a healthy girl!  So far, no ear infections!  By this age, both of her brothers had multiple ear infections.

We moved Jensyn to a (rear facing) big girl carseat a few weeks ago.  She may not be a huge baby, but I was tired of fighting the stuck handle on our infant seat, and she’s just too big to lug around in that carrier everywhere we go.  Since the straps don’t adjust well on our infant seat, we couldn’t easily and safely strap her in with puffy winter clothes.  So, it was time to move to the big girl seat.  

We’ve only bought ONE carseat for our three kids.  The infant seat and Alex’s big boy seat were baby shower gifts.  Max’s big boy seat was given to us (almost-new) from a friend who couldn’t use it with her special needs daughter.  Since we are finished having kids, I chose the safest girly seat I could find for under $150.  It might seem silly, but I love seeing her in her cute pink seat!