Letter to my Baby: Week 34

Week 34  Friday, May 20

Dear Ryder,

Another month is gone and you are now 8 months old!  How did this happen so suddenly?  In so many ways it feels like we are just getting used to having a baby in the house, and already you are headed towards toddlerhood.  Just in these last weeks you have started doing so many things you haven’t done before.  Like your daddy says: “It’s like we just get to watch him get smarter everyday.”

You have recently shown a lot of interest in small little parts to things.  You love the patches on Daddy’s shirt, the cord for the blinds, buttons, zippers, and Momma’s earrings and watch.  You love to touch new textures.  You examine by holding, turning the object over or passing between your hands, and then tasting.

You have also become quite adept at reaching for the things you want.  Often times you fling yourself towards the object and momma and daddy have to think fast and hold onto you tight to keep you from flying right out of our arms.  You have no fear if one of us is holding you.  I hope you always feel that way!

You also seem to have finally mastered some level of object permanence.  If I hide a toy under a blanket, you now lift up the blanket to find the toy again.  Unfortunately this also applies to when we try to hide the things we don’t want you to have like the remotes, or the mail, or other things that don’t belong in your little mouth.  You get very put out with us for taking away the things you want.  

You still aren’t crawling, but you really want to move!  You push yourself all the way up with your hands, and then fall backwards.  You can scoot all the way across the carpet doing this, although you haven’t yet realized you can move intentionally to get to something you want.  Mostly you just get frustrated and mad that your body isn’t yet responding the way that you want it to.

You love to go places and get excited when we open the door to take you outside.  We still spend lots of time at parks or the zoo, and you seem to genuinely like new things to see, hear, smell, and (when you are sneaky) taste.  You are a friendly little baby and like when other people stop to say hi.  You love having family come visit, and did really well with your Uncle Corban and Aunt Amanda this last week.  We took you to Disneyland again as well as Universal Studios and shopping.  You do really well in restaurants or other places Momma goes, which I appreciate!

I find that we have settled into a pretty nice routine on most days.  On the days Momma works, we get up and ready and I drop you off.  The days I am home, we usually plan some kind of activity, either before or after your morning nap.  Everyday in the afternoon you sleep for a couple of hours.  Then we have dinner and Daddy comes home.  You love Daddy so much and even if you are happy playing with me will start to fuss until he holds you!  Daddy will play with you for a while, and usually he reads to you.  Silly Daddy likes to make up stories.  He has renamed your board book “Playful Pups: A Touch and Feel Book of Opposites” to “Playful Pups and The Book of Lies.”  He then tries to turn your innocent story about puppies doing opposites into a great adventure full of good and evil.  

Lately when you have noticed a cat in the room you get very excited and start to screech at them.  It makes the cats jump and run away.  I think you are hitting frequencies that we can’t hear, but they can because they sure don’t seem to like the noises you are making!

You love to giggle and laugh.  You think sneezes and hiccups are the funniest things every.  You also like it when we cheer for you and say “ta-da.”  You love words said in funny ways, like “that’s disgusting.”  You also like silly sounds and shushes in your ear.   GIggling at sneezes and hiccups

You are such a delight little one.  I love you with all my heart.

Momma