40 week old baby: 

• June 24:  Baby had her 9 month old checkup at the pediatrician.  We arrived early and the nurse weighed her and measured her height and head circumstance.  Bb actually sat right on the scale.  She used to have to lie down on the scale.  She’s so big now that she just sits there.  It’s kind of funny to see.
• The nurse jotted down her numbers and showed me.  I was briefly concerned that her weight was so light… she only gained 800ish grams since her last visit at 6 months old.  Even walking into the appointment, both DH and I were anticipating that perhaps the ped might chastise us for not feeding bb well enough to be on par for growth.
• Only one parent could enter the room again.  But why?  The cases in York Region are severely down these days.  It’s only in double digits.  And we are both partially vaccinated.  Hopefully by her one year old appointment both parents can be in the room together.  It’s so rare that daddy can have time off work to attend these appointments.  I was the one who entered the room again.
• We waited a long time in the room for the ped to come in.  I was afraid that bb would get restless and start crying.  It was also getting close to when she might be hungry again.  Luckily, she was pretty good sitting in my lap.  She reached for the keyboard on the doctor’s desk often and pressed them.  When she started to pluck at the keys, that’s when I stopped her.  Lol…
• The ped asked us a few key questions for her 9 month old checkup.  These included:
• Is she saying “da da, ma ma”?   Yes
• Does she reach out her arms to be held?   Yes
• Does she look behind us or under a blanket for a toy?  Looking under the carpet/play mat counts too
• Has she started to pull herself up on objects?   She’s started to pull up on me but not the whole body on objects yet
• Does she like playing peekaboo?  I answered “not really” because we don’t play it often with her but yes she does like it
•  Is she starting to develop a pincer grasp?  Yes, kinda.  She’s always been good at picking up small items with her fingers
• The ped was content with my answers and said that her growth rate was normal too.  I was pleasantly surprised.  I told him that she doesn’t eat too much these days in terms of solids and thought that her small weight gain wouldn’t be enough.  He explained to me that her rate of growth was consistent and the curve was moving in the correct direction.  He wasn’t worried at all.  Yay!
• He quickly checked her heart beat with his stethoscope.  He wanted to check her belly too but once she was put down on her back, she started to cry so he stopped lol.  Even the ped was afraid of getting her upset lol.
• He didn’t check her eyes which he did last time.
• He seemed a bit in a rush.  I had a few questions about her not really eating solids well, sometimes choking on them and vomiting milk right after, pooping only a few times a week but a lot in a day.  He wasn’t worried about her at all saying that she’s growing well and that when eating new foods, her intestines will take time to adjust to a normal routine.  He said that not all babies poop every day and it’s normal.  Oh, wow, that was news to me.  He said by 15 or 18 months, that’s when her digestive system will normalize more.
• And that was it!  The next appointment was 1 year old where she’s be getting more shots.  He also mentioned that this age, she’s still fairly cooperative.  At 1 year old, it’ll be a different story lol…
• After that, the appointment was done.  He rushed off to a different room to see another patient.  No wonder.  He must have been short on time that day.  I was really glad everything was normal.  I also asked if she could start dairy products yet and he said he still prefers her to wait until she’s closer to one year old first.  He said I could try to give her a little cheese at 10 months old but that it wasn’t really necessary.  I’ll wait.  I just wanted to ask just in case she was given the green light to start on those.
• He didn’t seem too familiar with “baby led weaning” when I mentioned her choking on bits of food.  I was surprised about that.  Maybe he didn’t hear me correctly…
• June 28:  Her tooth is gradually coming out.  She uses her finger to flick the tooth and we can actually hear her doing it… * face palm *
• She’s getting faster and faster.  She can crawl forward by dragging her body with both arms.  Her left leg kicks a little and her right leg is just lazy so far.  She drags herself around lol
• She is really fast at turning in a circle.  She’s move quickly and easily.  Seriously cannot leave her for more than a second on an elevated surface (bed).  She is safest on the floor, the crib, or the pack-and-play (she doesn’t like it in there anyway).
• We need to get the gate up soon so she can have a dedicated space to place in.  She’s moving off of the play mat and scooting all over the floors.  The floors aren’t always the cleanest and we don’t always have time to clean and mop them daily.  There’s so much dust and hairs on the floors… she’s like a human mop.  Ick.
• She can stand by herself at the crib or holding on to something!  She’s not steady yet though so we still have to hold her or keep her at a safe distance but this little girl likes to climb and stand up so often now.
• She really likes to touch EVERYTHING.  Luckily she doesn’t put everything into her mouth but she is so curious about everything.  Even the beads on the blinds are so fun to her.  Looking at life through the eyes of a baby is interesting.  They see every little thing.
• She loves climbing on us and pushing up.  She’s “climbed” on me a couple of times too.
• My breastmilk supply continues to drop.  My average is not only 600 ml these days.  It’s more like 500 ml each day…
• I get my second COVID-19 vaccine shot this coming Friday!  Yay!
• She saw her cousin for the second time this past weekend on a stroller walk.  They haven’t seen each other for 7 months.  She cried so much when seeing her aunt and uncles for the first time in 7 months.  “Poor baby” that she hasn’t seen so many people outside of the home but also “safe baby” because we adhered to all the social distancing and lockdown rules.  She’ll eventually learn to be around people/strangers without crying so much.  But then again, she was crying so much because it was her nap time lol.
• She is learning to fall asleep by herself.  Finally!!!  This is a skill that we take for granted as adults but everyone had to learn how to fall asleep by themselves as babies.  She took both naps today by falling asleep by herself in the crib.  So, so great to not have to soothe her with the bottle or by rocking her.  Saves us so much energy and she is learning this lifelong skill!  We never did the Cry It Out method.
• She’s still not a big eater.  Not a big fan of solids still.  She’s really good at holding food and putting it in her mouth but she doesn’t always swallow everything.  She likely spits it up, which is normal.
• We are teaching her now to use an open cup.  She actually drinks quite well from the small plastic cup we gave her.  Guides recommend that babies start learning how to use an open cup at 6 months old so obviously we are a little late in starting this with her, but we’re still learning too.
• June 30:  Something new today:  She lifted her ab area when crawling so that at one point, she was actually on all fours.  That’s new.
• She is able to crawl around the floors.  She liked playing with the door stopper.  It’s a natural and easy toy.  She touches it and it makes a loud sound when flipping back and forth.
• The entire contents of what we have in the house are toys to her.  Again, this brings home my point that babies do not need toys.  Anything they encounter at this stage is a toy.
• Whereas her dad and grandma tend not to let her crawl freely to touch everything because of supposed germs, I let her touch everything.  I just make sure she doesn’t put things in her mouth but otherwise I want her to explore her soundings and touch everything.  I think it’s good for her.
•  When putting her to nap, I let her hold and stand against the crib slates.  She can hold on really well for more than a couple of seconds.  She likes it too.  I just can’t stand too far away in case she does fall and fits her head on the slates.
• The secret to ensuring I make enough milk is keeping hydrated and eating enough foods.  I drink so much water these days.  I always was a big water drinker but these days I drink even more than before.
• She can fall asleep by herself much easier than before!  On Tuesday, she fell asleep by herself both times for her naps.  It’s wonderful.  She also was able to sleep longer too.  She averaged between 1.5 and 2 and a bit hours for her naps.  Two hours of her napping is gold to us.
•  She gave me my first scratch on the left cheek yesterday.  She is so strong.
•  Her hair continues to grow.  It’s grown over the bald spot she had in the back of her head.  She has so much more hair in comparison to when she was four months, let’s say.  Silly comment to make as it’s natural for her to grow more hair now, but it’s just fascinating to see the hair growth.
• When sitting on the play mat, she likes to crawl over to me and start climbing to a standing position.  And then I just hug her.  But then where does she want to go next?  So I’ll usually put her down to crawl again or take her up to walk around.
• I had her stand on the bathroom counter and look at her reflection standing up.  She was smiling and giggling.
• She tends to like eating “wet” things more.  So her baby oatmeal should be more wet than dry.  Sometimes when eating, she’ll cry.  Then after we give her a bit of water, she’s okay again.  So she must like having moist and wet food.