9 months

Timothy is now 9 months old. We kind of like him, so we've decided the trial period is over and we'll keep him. Especially now that he's back to sleeping through the night...most of the time.

This whole parent thing definitely doesn't come easily to me, but I'm still trying and I hope I'm doing an ok job. All I know is that when I'm the most frustrated, that's when he seems to give me this look that melts my heart and helps me remember I'll get through it...eventually. Plus he's so darn cute. Here's a look at how he's grown:

And I think Lily likes him, too. Of course, the sharing is very one way. What's Timothy's is hers and what's hers is hers. But for the most part she's a good helper and I think there's already a pretty strong bond...which I think is fantastic.

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Wherein Timothy makes things interesting

I've heard the stories. From so many people. Some I've known and some I only know through hearsay. Mommy puts her adorable baby down for a nap. A couple hours later, that adorable baby lets Mommy know they're awake and ready to party. Mommy walks into the room to find her so-called adorable baby has removed their diaper and created a masterpiece on the wall, on the crib, on their clothes, and (gasp!) maybe even all over their face. Lily, fortunately, never did that. The worst thing I found when I went into get her after a nap was a mess of diaper liners that I had left too close to the crib.

 

I definitely counted myself lucky. (Side note...ohmigosh, doesn't she look just like Timothy in that picture?!?!?)

This morning, however, I learned I may not get off so easy with Timothy. When I was getting him ready for bed last night, I grabbed a pair of pajamas he hadn't worn in a while. Usually, he rocks comfy fleece footie jammies and I had totally planned on doing our usual, but then I saw the cute pair I bought him for Christmas. They were a little on the big side at the time and since it was a shirt and pants instead of one piece, the pants kept falling down. So he only wore them a couple times before I decided we needed to wait just a bit. Last night, I decided it was time to give them another go.

After feeding him this morning at 6:30, I laid him back down and hoped he'd be content enough to give me at least a half hour more sleep...maybe even 45 minutes. That would be divine. I crawled back into bed and was surprised to wake up 2 hours later! I haven't been able to sleep in like that for a while and it was great. Erik had set Lily up with Bambi before he left for work so she'd been completely entertained and Timothy had finally slept in like a normal person. Timothy was still sound asleep, or so I thought since no sounds were coming from his room. But it wasn't long before I heard him rustling. I finished my breakfast and checked my email before I went in to get him.

He may have been quiet, but I'm pretty sure he wasn't asleep, because there he was with no pants on. And his diaper unfastened. And you totally thought I was going to say that he'd smeared poop everywhere. Luckily he hadn't...yet. But yes, the diaper was poopy, so I'm sure that if I'd had one or two more emails, I would have had a very different morning.

There's no picture...sorry. I didn't want to risk what would happen while I went to grab the camera. But I'm pretty sure this is one kid we will need to watch like a hawk. He wants to have everything he knows we don't want him to. You can pile a million toys up in front of him, and he'll zoom in on the remote or itsy, bitsy, tiny piece of paper you never noticed. And if you take it away? What were you thinking, woman?!?!? Let me tell you how I feel about that! This could get very interesting...

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Ugly Babies and Old Maids

The thought process of a 4-year-old can be....interesting. Here are two examples from just the last week. For her birthday, Lily was given the card game, Old Maid. Most games we'd played up to this point had a single winner (Memory, Candy Land, etc.). Old Maid, on the other hand, is really more about not being the loser. So the other day, she and I sat down for a game of Old Maid. I dealt out the cards and we started. As we had fewer and fewer cards in our hands, I realized there was still an even number of cards in play. Now think about this for a second: Old Maid is all about making matches and the one with the Old Maid loses. An even number of cards means they should all match up. I knew I didn't have the Old Maid, so I cheated a little and asked Lily to see her cards.

Me: Lily, where's the Old Maid?

Lily: I took her out.

Me: Why?

Lily: If you have that one, you lose, so I took her out before we started.

So no loser means everyone wins, right? She's so diplomatic.

The second venture into Lily's mind is a little less diplomatic, and I hope I don't have to explain to some poor mother why my kid just said that. When we first brought Timothy home, we said something along the lines of "He's pretty cute. Do you think we should keep him?" The answer was always yes, of course, and now she says a variation of it at least once a day. "Should we keep him?" "Are we going to keep Timothy? He sure is cute." But out of the blue on Saturday, Lily confronted me with this question:

What do people do with the babies that aren't so cute?

Trying my hardest not to laugh, I asked what she thought people did with them. Apparently, they get rid of them. See where I could have problems if we run into someone with a not-so-cute baby? Luckily, there's no such thing as an ugly baby, right? Then again, maybe it's time to introduce her to the word, breathtaking.

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