9 months!

YEAH!!!! Iris is 9 months. I took her 9 month picture with as bottle for a reason--because she will actually take one now! Thank goodness! That was not a fun transition and I am very glad to have it behind us. We went to the Dr. on April 24th for her 9 month check-up and her stats were as follows:

Weight 17.12 lbs. (38%)

Height 29 in. (95%)

Head 17 1/2in. (71%)

We have told her to enjoy being in the 95th percentile for height because we highly doubt that will last. She is long and lean though. Although her major accomplishment lately has been mastering the bottle she is also doing all sorts of new and fun things. She enjoys feeding herself which is good but sometimes VERY messy. I have lots of "eating pix" that I will post shortly. Finger foods that she has mastered so far are cheerios, (they also cure everything --ie. boredom, temper tantrums etc.) strawberries, kiwi, bananas, mandarin oranges, shredded cheese, and she's doing pretty well with tiny shredded pieces of chicken. She likes to hold a spoon when you feed her. Sometimes this helps and keeps her distracted while you're spooning food into her mouth and other times she thinks it's funny to use hers to "sword fight" with the spoon you're using to feed her. That usually ends meal time pretty quickly.

She says "Mama" now which is adorable unless it's a high pitched "mamamamamamamamama!" If she sees or hears anyone clapping her face will light up and she will start clapping as well---also very adorable! She can give kisses too but only if she is in the mood and they are always open mouthed. She is still not crawling but she's working on it. She gets on her knees, rocks back and forth and then does a slow slide back down onto her belly. She is doing a lot of backwards scooting on her belly and can pretty much get wherever she wants to go--except sometimes I find her under our ottoman-like coffee table unable to find her way out. She seems to prefer to be standing. She is starting to pull up pretty well. She pulled herself up on the side of the tub the other day and stood. Not the ideal place for her to be practicing that but she did it twice perfectly. If I keep one hand on her for balance she'll walk around the side of the coffee table (or anything) and bang her hands on it and smile. She also likes to walk if you hold her hands. She doesn't have a lot of coordination with the one foot in front of the other quite yet and nowhere near enough balance but she will stand and attempt that all day instead of trying to crawl.

She is terrified of the vacuum cleaner. Not sure why but she will start screaming and crying if I try to vacuum while she's around. And last but not least, she pooped in the tub for the 2nd time! Oh what happy moments!