It's harder to sit and write for two reasons. David's crawling like crazy. And he's going everywhere... in a hurry. He also doesn't separate horizontal crawling from vertical crawling. It kinda funny to watch, actually. He'll decide on heading due south, and he starts to motor off in that direction. Then, Whump! He hits his head on something, eventually. Then he looks up, as if to asertain the best route without ropes and caribiners. Then he tries to go vertical. He's geting a good routing on the couch and futon, but hasn't summited either yet.

He's is not quite sleeping throught the night yet. He generally sleeps about 4-5 hours at a stretch. Then one of us will get up to feed him a bottle. He only drinks about 6-7 oz at a time. He's always had a weak or lazy cardiac sphincter, so he spits up all the time. Also, until it gets stronger, we can't really fill him up enough to last the night. The good news is that he is getting better at keeping everything down, so now we'll just work on getting his belly a little bigger.


Speaking of David and good news, he had his 9 month physical last week. He is all caught up size wise, and he is developing as expected for a 9 month old. He's eating Cheerios in his high chair, which is a good indication of his fine motor skills. He's also using his own monosyllabic words, waves back and likes to clap. And boy, does he like to put things in his mouth! I don't even think that he picks things up to play with them or to learn how things feel or move. The hands are just delivery means to the mouth.

Isabelle is interacting with him a little more. She'll sit with him and watch one of the Baby Einstein shows, and crawl around on the floor with him. She also wants to 'help' David get up, or bring him over to the other side of the room. As you might guess, she doesn't quite know how to hold babies. The other day I turned to see what the "mmmmph" sound was due to, and there was Isabelle with a choke hold on David. She was trying to get him up on the couch, and realizing he is a bit heavier then a stuffed animal. She also likes to climb into his crib and play with him when he wakes up from nap. There have been a few choke hold incidences during these times as well.
As far as siblings go, they mostly get along well. We are starting to see some rivalry now that David is becoming more interested in toys and is more mobile. And it's hard for her to understand that he doesn't mean to pinch her or pull her hair, so why isn't it ok to push on his head until he falls down and starts crying? And so it has begun...