9 months

My little baby has almost been out as long as he was in.  Stayed tuned for that post next week.

He is in mostly 9 month clothes, but we have a few 6 month outfits hanging around that still fit.  It really just depends on the brand.  He recently moved into size 4 diapers.  They're pretty big, but size 3 was getting snug.

Isaac's new favorite food is yogurt.  He's pretty hit or miss when it comes to food these days, but I know he'll always eat yogurt if he won't eat anything else.  We offer 4 6-oz bottles, but he usually ends up around 20 ounces total for the day.  He mostly eats what we eat for meals and gets hardly any pureed baby food anymore.  He tried salmon this month and loved it.

Isaac has a love/hate relationship with books.  He enjoys listening to me read before naps and bed, with his paci, but sometimes I try to read to him randomly throughout the day and he just won't sit still long enough to listen.  To encourage him to get more comfortable with books, we set up some books for him under the coffee table, where he can easily reach them and play with them.  We call it his library.  As in, "Rodney, where's Isaac?  I can't see him."  "He's playing in his library."

Speaking of books, Isaac is really into the touch and feel books now.  I bought one for him on a whim the other day and he loved it right away.  He instantly knew to reach for the "touch" parts every time we read it.  Since then we have purchased a few more, and he loves them all.  Now he touches the pages of all his books looking for "touch and feel" pieces.

Once Isaac started crawling a week before his 8 month birthday, he quickly picked up speed and became a baby that moves constantly.  He pulls up on EVERYTHING.  The couch, the refrigerator, the wall, my pants, you name it, he uses it to stand up.  He just started cruising around furniture today, but he has to be motivated by something really cool, like the computer on the other side of the ottoman.  He finds it much easier to go to the floor, crawl to the other side, then stand up again.

We now have a baby gate up at the laundry room door all the time, at least while Isaac is awake.  This is where we keep the cat food and water bowl, and Isaac loves to eat cat food every chance he gets.  Now he stands at the gate and stares into the room.

Isaac uses his ability to move to torment Cash and the cats.  Zeus and Sophie actually let him get pretty close before they move, and they really don't seem too afraid of him.  Cash, on the other hand, is terrified of him.  Isaac makes him nervous.  If you're not watching Isaac like a hawk he'll crawl into the office where Cash sleeps on his bed most of the day and try to crawl onto the dog bed (and the dog).  We're very careful to protect both of them.

Isaac's current favorite toy is his Mozart Magic Cube.  Ours is old and was handed down by Rodney's cousin, and this one on Amazon is made by a different company, so I can't speak for the new model, but it's such a neat toy.  Each button on the sides of the cube plays a different instrument of the same song.  Isaac loves to roll it around on the floor and play the music.  He is also starting to like rolling trucks and cars.  Most of the time he's much happier to leave toys behind and crawl around, pull up, and explore.  His favorite game is chasing a ball around the kitchen.  We call it Hand Soccer.  An empty water bottle works just as well.

He cut his first tooth 2 weeks ago, and his second tooth showed up 10 days later (both bottom front teeth).  We only had day of major crankiness from teething, but I'm sure we won't always be so lucky.

Isaac started giving kisses when asked around 6 months, but then either forgot how, or just became way too stubborn to do what you wanted him to.  He is finally back to giving kisses, and I love it.  I get one almost immediately when I ask, but Rodney only gets one half of the time.  Isaac can be quite the mama's boy sometimes, but he gets so excited when Rodney comes home from work.

And finally, in the language department, Isaac is babbling now.  He only says gagagagaga but he says it like a champ, all day long.  I'm still slightly concerned that he's not say mamama, dadada, or bababa like he "should be", but he's definitely making progress, so we'll just discuss it with the pediatrician on Thursday.

He's such a great kid and I'm so lucky to be his mama.