Growing a Little Schulze: 9 months

Our sweet girl turned 9 months old on April 26th.

It was a big month for her! She took her first steps!!

She began the month by upping the ante on cruising and started lunging from one piece of furniture to the next (or kind of throwing her body towards the desired location and grabbing on). Then in the early weeks of May she started taking a step or two to get one from furniture item to the next or from the coffee table to a person nearby. But she wasn't really interested in walking holding onto our hands. She'd just whine and sit down. Then on May 21st she decided she was ready to walk! And she strung together multiple steps to cross the playroom.

Here's a link to the video on facebook.
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10201900738469186&l=8401276020223167146

In other exciting news, Ellie got her second tooth! On April 30th, we could finally feel it. It had been lurking just under the gum for weeks. And on May 8th we finally moved her out of the infant seat into a big girl car seat.

Some of her verbal utterances this month include:
Uh dut uh duh
Uh dai yee
Dai dai
Dah dah dah

She's still in size 2 diapers (Pampers Swaddlers) for the moment. She's in 9 months clothes and has moved into 12 month pajamas for the length. And those are none too long either.
She's sleeping pretty well for us. Most nights she will sleep through the night. She goes in bed between 7:15 and 7:45 and cries for 5-10 minutes before conking out. Then she is up between 6:45 and 7:30. She's taking two naps totaling about 3 hours a day. The morning nap starts around 10-10:30 and the afternoon nap starts around 2:30 or 3.

She nurses in the morning and then gets topped off with a bottle. She gets 3 more bottles throughout the day. So bottle times are usually 7/8, 11/12, 4, and 7, give or take depending on sleep.

She loves solid foods. She's usually getting 3 meals a day unless she sleeps through lunch time. She loves meat and gobbles up any put in front of her. She wasn't a big fan of the piece of my dad's halibut but it had been grilled and was pretty firm so maybe she didn't like the grilled taste. With only the 1 and half teeth, she can't manage really crunchy stuff yet but she will eat most anything else we give her. Fruit, soft vegetables, meat, yogurt, beans, rice, pasta. We are pretty much done with purees. She really seems to enjoy well seasoned food, eating it more quickly than something that is plain. And she can pack the food away, impressing everyone, even us, with how much she eats. Since Claire has pulled back on how much she eats, there are many meals where it seems Ellie eats more than Claire.