Hello Again

Alright. I know. It's been a while. Probably the longest span of time, since the babe was born that I have not posted. I apologize. Really I do. It's just that I have not had the time, nor the energy to put my thoughts in writing, let alone pictures on the computer. But, tonight, I went to bunco leaving husband and baby here alone together and when I came home the house was dark and silent. An environment I have come to forget. I am so tired, but the thought of savoring a few peaceful moments to myself, and to get something done that has een looming over my thoughts sounds too tempting. My pillow can wait tonight.

The last month at work has been so trying. In all my nursing career, I have never seen such an amount of craziness and tragedy on our unit. I am emotionally and physically exhausted. I am really hoping that we are out of the woods and things can get back to normal.

Ellie keeps becoming more and more of a handful. I feel like I could put her in a padded room with nothing in it and she would still figure out how to get in to trouble. She truly is the energizer bunny. I am lucky if she takes a second nap now days. At least for the most part, she sleeps through the night. If only I could figure out how to fall asleep quickly and stay asleep.

So at 9 months, Ellie can stand up and cruise around the couches and ottoman. She's been able to let go and stand on her own really well the last few days. She learned how to clap her hands together and say "Yay". I think her favorite word to say is "ebar" or "ber" for Ember. She loves, loves, loves the dogs. She even growls like one, thanks to her dad teaching her. She gets a kick out of playing tug-a-war with Ember and she loves to crawl all over Recon. One of her most favorite things is the bath. We have to keep the bathroom door shut, cause she will constantly crawl in there and try to climb into the tub. Every time I start to fill the tub for bath time, she literally sprints and shrieks with excitment from whereever she is in the house the whole way there. Then she will stand there and bounce up and down in excitment watching the water, trying to climb in. She also loves to shred the toilet paper up into tiny pieces, put them in her mouth and then spit them out. She's had her first encounter with toilet water, I walked out for two seconds and came back in to find her skimming her fingers along the water! So we have learned to be extra careful about keeping the bathroom door shut. She also loves the dog food bowls. Any time I put them down to feed the dogs, it is another a dead out sprint to them as she gasps with excitment trying to beat me. Another one of hers and my favorite things that she does is blowing raspberries on any skin she can find of ours. She'll do it on arms, hands, chest, shoulders, legs and if we are lying on the floor, she will crawl up to us, pull up our shirts and blow big ol ones on our stomaches. It is quite hilarious and she will laugh and laugh as she does it. I just think it is such a cute role reversal and love that she has figured out how to do it. She hates diaper changes and getting dressed as well as nap time. She hates being confined, she always has to be wriggling around and doing something stimulating. The older she gets, the more I see how independent she is. She always wants to do everything on her own and if I try to help her, she gets mad. If I feed her a piece of food, she will immediately spit it out and then pick it right back up, put it in her mouth and eat it. I am terrified that she is going to be just like me. Heaven help us.

So at her 9 month appointment, she weighed 19.13 lbs, coming in around 77th percentile. She is still a little above average for height. We are going to have to switch to a regular car seat here soon, which I have no idea which one I should get. Aparently the recommendations now are to stay rear facing until two years if at all possible.

Ellie's finally popped out another tooth, on her bottom, next to her two she already has. For the last month, she has been miserable and I felt so bad for her. I hope that it gets better with each one, cause it is was pretty rough. She actually has weaned herself off of her binky. I think that it was too painful. She will not take it now at all. I guess that this is a good thing though in the long run, even though it's harder to get her down for a nap without one now.

Here's a few pictures from the last month or so...

 

 

 

And of course, her 9 month photos