Ten Months

Dear Samantha,

I can't believe you are already 10 months old! You are getting so big now. This month has been a busy one full of learning for you. You have definitely mastered the skill of crawling (and you are getting FAST!), and you are getting so close to walking. You are able to walk while only holding onto Mom or Dad (or the furniture) with one hand, and even then you barely hold on. You take off so fast when you want to walk somewhere! It's only a matter of time before you realize that you can do it without our help. You can stand for a few second on your now now, and you are cruising all around the room along the furniture now.

Your new favorite things are BALLOONS. You discovered them at a birthday party, and now they make you happier than any other thing. Whenever you see a balloon, you start waving your arms around and making excited noises. We got you a few balloons for the house, and every morning you were thrilled to see them still there, waiting for you. You carry your balloon around all over the house!

We are still trying to get you to wave, or point, or sign, but you don't seem to be too interested in using your hands to communicate. Walking is still your number 1 goal. You are very good at imitating what we say though. You definitely communicate your irritation with your furious face. You get all red like you're going to explode as soon as you are done eating. I think it would be easier to sign "all done," but so far you seem to prefer the fury. I have a feeling you are going to be a handful!

You are so much fun at playdates now. You don't cling to Mommy anymore; as soon as we arrive, you want to get down and you take off crawling and playing with toys. You are becoming so independent!

You are a very good eater. You don't want to have much to do with baby food purees anymore, and mostly you prefer to feed yourself finger foods. You LOVE pizza and spaghetti (my kind of girl, for sure!), and you still love pears. We just discovered that you are a huge fan of green peas. They are the perfect finger food for you! You shovel them in as fast as you can. You also learned how to suck the food out of the little baby food packets, and you can go through them in just a few seconds now. You are getting to be so big! We are starting to wean you off the bottle now, so we give you your milk in a sippy cup most of the time now. You still prefer mommy milk before naps and bedtime, but you do great with a sippy cup of formula during the day. Just a couple more months and we can see how you like cow's milk!

You are doing much better with sleeping now, too. We hated to do it, but we started letting you cry for about 5 minutes at a time now to teach you to soother yourself. After just one night we started seeing improvements. You went from waking 6-10 times a night to waking only 1-2 times! And it's actually been with very minimal crying, too. You are doing very well with us putting you down awake, and you soothe yourself back to sleep most of the time when you do wake. You have been sleeping in 9 hour stretches, and Mommy and Daddy are THRILLED. Some nights Daddy is able to put you to bed without you needed Mommy and her milk. You are really growing up fast.

Your first birthday is just 2 short months away, and Mommy is working on your party plans! It's going to be so much fun to celebrate with all of our friends. We love you SO very much!

Love,
Mommy