Judah at 8 and 9 months

First birthday party plans are beginnning to spin in my head....it seems strange this mileston is closer and closer, but it brings me joy to think about celebrating Judah's first year. I'll never ever get tired of telling anyone who'll listen that this boy's life was in God's hands and God handed him to us.
I say this and look up to see him destroying a book. Ah, me. Boys are boys. The book is now in two pieces.

At 8 months, he was thoroughly entertaining, occupying, and enjoyable. At 9, he is on a constant adventure. His eyes demand, "What's next?" as he searches out yet something else to investigate. I watch him and feel my eyebrows creep up at the mere glimpses of the years ahead. As he gets the johnny jump up going to the point he's practically swinging from the doorframe, I picture him swinging from tall trees. As he propels himself up with his feet off the side of the bathtub like he's Spiderman, I shutter at the thought of foot prints five feet up the wall. When he pulls up and turns around and grins, I can see him on the side of a cliff grinning down at me. When he crawls up us trying to get feet up to our shoulders, I accept this child will climb out of his crib, over the gates.....and take my heart with him on all his adventures.

What I am still trying to wrap my head around is his uncanny ability to use his feet like they are hands. It is a direct genetic connection to his daddy, though as that daddy laments, "Mama's trained me not to do that so much anymore." It is absolutely normal to see him hold, pick up, or manuever something between his feet while his hands are doing a separate task. It's cool. And weird.

I am so thankful he's beginning to understand he's his own person and not really attached to me. He doesn't lose it when he gets passed to someone else and he's more and more willing to be on his own--so long as he can see me or crawl to me. Truly I can appreciate God's design that babies and mamas bond tightly by physical proximity, and have done my best to foster that deep, lifelong, internal security, yet I'll admit it can be taxing, so it is good to see him becoming more confident he's ok and I'll be back.

This month he was home every night for a week without Mama for VBS at church. We both survived. We're both better for it.

The week before he finally, finally accepted a bottle and formula. We had an excellent 8 months of nursing, and I'm glad he finally agreed with me to be done!

At his 9 month well-baby exam, his stats surprised me. 19 lb. 8 oz. (40th percentile) and 28 1/2" (50th percentile) made him quite average....yet he's wearing 18 month clothes? The doctor came in and said, "But look at him! Look at that long torso! Look at those legs! He's gonna be a big boy!"

I might need to invest in Happy Baby because he is an insatiable puff eater. The fresh food feeder is a necessity to keep him happy long enough for me to get his other food ready. He likes bananas and cantaloupe--kiwi and strawberries are no good! He loves small, peeled grapes pieces, but literally turns his head away unless they are on a spoon!

J Mac is our boy and we adore him!