Ten!

Can you believe my baby was ten months old yesterday? No, nor can I :giggle: Ten whole months have gone by in a blur of Niamh-induced-sleep-deprivation (Finn’s latest ‘excuse’ for everything is “I’m too tired“. I wonder where he could possibly have picked that up?!)

She’s doing pretty wonderfully. She waves bye-bye, sometimes hello, and claps her hands, especially to music (and in time, what’s more!) She’s got the “baba-baba”, “mama-mama”, and “dada-dada”s down pat. She has four sharp teeth, and we’ve been expecting more for months. She likes to chew on everything, so mind your fingers (I had blood drawn just this morning). She loves water, and adores the great outdoors. She’s absolutely fearless and downright cheeky with a wonderful sense of humour. Whenever we turn our backs for just a moment, she gets very busy – unfolded laundry is removed from baskets with great speed, CDs are pulled from the rack, Finn’s bookshelves are emptied…

Two weeks ago she stood unaided for the first time 😮 Only for a couple of seconds, but a stand nonetheless. Since then she’s done it a few times, and progressed to 4 or 5 seconds at a go. We all know what that means…

But… and here’s the big one… she sleeps. Finally, she sleeps! A big round of applause please! Since coming back from Port Fairy a few weeks back, we moved her cot into Finn’s room. The preceding several weeks had been pretty dreadful, and the only way I was getting any rest was by co-sleeping half the night. Which was fine by us really (and I do kind of miss it), but possibly a little counter-productive. So we moved her in with Finn and got serious about settling her in her own bed, and allowed her a little bit of fussing (a very much gentle-ified version of “controlled comforting”). Anyway, the long story short is that most nights, she sleeps from 7pm to at least 2am – sometimes she needs a settling down around then, sometimes a little drink of water. Or even more lately, she sleeps through longer – to 4 or even 5am. Unfortunately, mornings don’t seem to start any later than 5.30am, ever. Which is kind of sucky (no, I’m not a morning person), but at least I’m frequently managing to get six hour stretches of sleep for myself. Hooray!

Have a happy Easter weekend – we’re off camping again tomorrow 🙂

PS. Thank you for all the kind thoughts following my grandmother’s death, I appreciate them very much.