ten months.

well, bi-monthly may be the new rhythm for my margot posts, as i can't seem to get my act together. the months just seem to be flying by. this less-little lady is ten months old now. sheesh.

at her nine month appointment, she weighed fifteen pounds four ounces and was twenty seven inches long. now, i assume she's bigger. her pajamas definitely think so, as recently her big toe has worn a hole through them in order to make more room (no worries, i bought new, bigger ones yesterday).

at ten months old, margot is ridiculously mobile. at around eight and a half months she figured out rolling over (that one took her forever. that kid had zero interest in intentionally putting herself onto her tummy) and within the week she was crawling. now she's using everything to pull herself up (including jon's leg hair) and is cruising. soon, we'll have a toddler on our hands, and then the kitties will certainly be doomed.

as you can tell, this new found mobility meant we had to invent a new photo shooting technique. i just took the crib mattress out and doubled it over on the floor, using it like a chair. this sort of worked, with a lot of help from jon and bribing with food to get her to sit still. we took one hundred and fifteen pictures and got maybe a dozen acceptable ones. makes one grateful for digital photography.

 

this month i think has the most drastic comparison to the last time. being mobile is such a huge change and makes her seem so much more like a tiny person. she's a total ham, too. she loves smiling at strangers. everywhere. it's ridiculous. she also likes pointing. we're trying to teach that she should wave instead of point. so now when we say 'wave', she waves her hand and her whole body goes along with it. 

to add to the slew of margot changes, she's also getting her top two teeth. like the bottom ones, they're both coming in at the same time. please slow down with all of this growing up miss margot, mom's not ready for it.

puffs.

parenting is craziness. even after nine months, i feel like i'm totally winging it. and i don't think that that feeling will go away any time soon. i have learned though, that a large part of maintaining one's sanity centers around distracting the small one. and what's more distracting to one still mastering the pincer grasp than the ubiquitous puff cereal? i cannot give margot more than three or so at once though. if i do, she will take them by the fistful and cram them all into her mouth at the same time. this, then, does not keep her distracted for long, which defeats the purpose of puffs (because we all know we don't feed them puffs for their nutritional value). i believe though, that i have now brilliantly solved the puff distribution problem.

it's a bit hard to tell from the picture, but it's a small tupperware with a hole about the size of a puff cut out in the lid (the fourth picture probably shows it best). it combines two of margot's favorite things--eating puffs and shaking noisy things. we refer to it as her 'shake shake'.

the process goes something like this. margot shakes the container excitedly, unaware as puffs fall around her.

taking a break from the tiring shaking, she makes a discovery. ho, a puff!

flinging the 'shake shake' aside, she masterfully picks up the puff and crams it into her mouth.

this process then repeats until it's empty or she gets bored and moves on to new adventures. this may be one of my proudest parenting moments. it feels a bit like the enrichment activities they do at the zoo--like giving the gorillas pumpkins or the tigers paper mache easter eggs. here, margot is learning about cause and effect while giving mom some much needed time to do something like wash the dishes, or comb her hair, or write this blog.

so, go ahead, make your own and fill it with anything that is tasty and makes a satisfying noise when shaken. any other great ideas out there for small one distractions?

wild and wonderful.

it's been a couple of months since my last making clothes for margot post and, as it's no longer pants season, it's time for some summery fun around here. 

i would like to say that the inspiration for this shirt came from the hours we've spent driving through west virginia recently. and perhaps subconsciously it did. but this shirt really came about because this morning, in picking out margot's cloths for today, i came across this plain t-shirt, and plain t-shirts don't last too long in my house.

so, at eight o'clock this morning, while margot was tearing through the house like a crazy person, chasing the kitties in her walker, i was drinking coffee and making this quick shirt. i just sketched out the design, positioned it inside the shirt, and traced it onto the shirt with a pink fabric marker. easy peasy. 

and i think the phrase 'wild and wonderful' suits miss margot quite well. point proven by the fifty or so photos i took and the only four presentable-ish ones that came out. this kid!

if you want to make your own t-shirt, you can get the design here. this should be sized for about a nine month old shirt, but could easily be sized up or down. i kind of want one now too.