9 months!

She is 3/4 of a year old?! What?! I don't know what happened to make time go by so fast, but it did. I know I say this EVERY time, but this little girl is so much fun. She is the highlight of our lives. Lila has experienced quite a bit since she was only 6 months or even 8 months. Her numbers are so different than last time, but I'm talking about the percentiles. :) Her head was 17 in. last time and 17.5 in. this time moving her from the 79th percentile down to the 68th. Her weight went 17.28 lbs. to 19.03 lbs. moving her from the 73rd percentile to the 65th percentile. The funniest one though is her height! She went from 25.75 in. to 26.25 in. moving her from the 46th percentile to the 8 percentile! That's right our little girl only grew half an inch in 3 months. I was worried, but Micah said that the doctor wasn't worried at all, so I guess it's okay? She is very mobile and is apparently above average in that area, but I don't really know what that means. I love our little girl. She is full of surprises and brings joy to our lives every single day.

Some things about what Lila has done in the past month I hesitate to share as some people may see me as being a bad mom, but she is loving life. Let me start by saying that Lila will eat ANY food. We have not found a single thing that she doesn't like. We even gave her a little bit of grapefruit hoping for a bitter reaction, but she just wanted more! I'll have to try a lemon next time. :) So, she loves baby food, but food that isn't babyish that she likes is bananas, Indian food, grapefruit, grapes, potatoes, rice, bread, and there are a few more, but I can't think of them right now. We're thinking about her starting the sacrament next Sunday. The part that I'm thinking of with me being a bad mom is the Indian food. I figure though that in other countries they don't just give their babies really boring food, they often eat what the family is eating.

She can easily pull herself up and scoots along furniture. She also now stands on her own for a few seconds before she has to lower herself to the floor. She loves to go around in her walker, so she seems "close" to walking, but knowing how she was with crawling she'll probably take forever. :) She's very friendly and loves to smile, and now that she has TWO teeth she has the most adorable toothy grin. :) She also just barely tried a sippy cup for the first time. I know I'm a little behind, but she is pretty much a pro already. The first time, not so much, but she quickly got used to it. She has continued to sleep through the night. That's a lot to hear about my baby girl, but as you can tell we absolutely adore her. Here is a cute little video of her. It was just done on a phone so it's not the best quality, but it shows a little bit of our beautiful girl's personality.

Pictures

Crazy hair days, beautiful smiles, and moving past only headbands... our little girl is getting big.








On another note:
For Valentine's day we kept it low key. I made dinner of chicken rolls, (Micah LOVES these and does not like when I try a new recipe on a holiday :)) mashed potatoes, salad, and homemade chocolate pudding. It was really good. We were of course each other's Valentine, but Lila was also ours. I got a laminator... lame to many, but that is EXACTLY what I wanted. It's the dorky teacher in me. I also was REALLY spoiled by my students! Micah got a shotgun and Lila got this beautiful little quiet book. I'm already making her a few myself, but Micah and I saw this beautiful little one when I was just newly pregnant and I have been wanting it ever since! I'm so glad she got it and I like playing with it myself. It's only for Sunday's though. I love Valentine's Day and love expressing my love to my family.

8 months

Yesterday our little girl turned 8 months old. She is the light of our lives. She loves, in no particular order,...

... t.v., crawling, screaming, food, food, FOOD, books, MUSIC, dancing, pulling herself up, mommy, daddy, baths, Matilda, Jesus, going on walks, sitting in a cart without her car seat, her hands, hair, and the list could go on and on.

She is such a happy baby and has such a good nature. She will eat any baby food and I love that she isn't picky. She sleeps through the night usually from 8:30 until 6:30, but sometimes 7:00 until 6:30. It's been great getting sleep, but sometimes I still wake up worried that she may not be okay. I love the beautiful babe!

To anyone who likes education or thinks they know about education...

Ok, I'm really not political and I REALLY don't like arguing about it, but every once in while I find things that I love. I'm not trying to tell you how to think or try and start up a debate, I'm just posting something that I agree with to my blog. I recognize that the education system is not perfect, but really, what job does everything perfectly well? Please don't be offended and feel free to disagree.

"Teachers' hefty salaries are driving up taxes, and they only work 9 or10 months a year! It's time we put things in perspective and pay them for what they do - babysit! We can get that for less than minimum wage.That's right. Let's give them $3.00 an hour and only the hours they worked; not any of that silly planning time, or any time they spend before or after school. That would be $19.50 a day (.....................7:45 to 3:00 PM with 45 min. off for lunch and plan-- that equals 6 1/2 hours). Each parent should pay $19.50 a day for these teachers to baby-sit their children. Now how many students do they teach in a day...maybe 30? So that's $19.50 x 30 = $585.00 a day. However, remember they only work 180 days a year!!!I am not going to pay them for any vacations. LET'S SEE.... That's $585 X 180= $105,300 per year. (Hold on! My calculator needs new batteries).What about those special education teachers and the ones with Master's degrees? Well, we could pay them minimum wage ($7.75), and just to be fair, round it off to $8.00 an hour. That would be $8 X 6 1/2 hours X 30 children X 180 days = $280,800 per year. Wait a minute -- there's something wrong here! There sure is! The average teacher's salary (nation wide) is $50,000. $50,000/180 days = $277.77/per day/30 students=$9.25/6.5 hours = $1.42 per hour per student--a very inexpensive baby-sitter and they even EDUCATE your kids! WHAT A DEAL!!!! Make a teacher smile; repost this to show appreciation for all educators! thanx to all of y'all!!!"

PIG

You know that pig on the zip-line in the GEICO commercial that annoyingly goes "Wheeeeee!" over and over? That is Lila's favorite commercial. She can be eating and she'll turn her head to watch the entire thing. She can be playing on the floor and she'll turn to the t.v. to watch it. She can be crawling behind the couch and she'll come around it just to watch that commercial. So even though I think it's annoying, it's hilarious to watch Lila freak out over the commercial.

I know she's almost 8 months and so I'll be posting about her again soon, but I can't help but list some things that she loves. She now loves to crawl and is WAY more mobile than I imagined her being. I didn't think there would be much of a difference between her inchworm and crawling, but there is... a BIG difference. For the past week she's been pulling herself up to a standing position entirely on her own. She loves the diaper box because it has a picture of a baby on it. She says "mama" when she gets hungry and cries when we leave the room. She loves to get up on her knees and look around at things and she loves to give hugs to her mommy and daddy.

I guess I should leave some things for her 8 month post, although I'm sure I'll be repeating some of these as well.