In thinking of the best way to describe Zoe at this age, I keep coming back to the same set of words. Curious. Bubbly. And oh, so independent. Zoe likes to know what’s going on around her at all times, and she’s constantly spinning her head, craning her neck or crawling over to a desired person/item to check out things – many of which wind up in her mouth. (Because of her propensity to pick up and try to eat tiny objects on the floor, her babysitter, Elena, has dubbed her the “little vacuum cleaner.”) If you try to hold her when she’s not in a sleepy or (rare) mellow mood, she’ll likely try to squirm out of your arms to zip off somewhere. (Needless to say, she’s not much of a cuddler.)

Speaking of zipping, Zoe has gotten quite good at crawling – and she has also learned how to pick up the speed. I’ve had to move pretty fast to pick her up a few times, and I’ve also gotten quite good at pulling on her pants (and even changing a diaper!) as she’s scooting away. She’s also able to crawl up and down a stair – something she gets practice doing at daycare.

Crawling might soon be old-hat to Zoe, though, as she has taken some pretty big steps (no pun intended) towards walking. A few weeks ago, she started sitting up on her knees and pulling herself up on various objects; around the 9.5-month mark, she began pulling herself up to a full stand (see below). For the last week or so she’s been constantly standing and “cruising,” and it’s not uncommon to find her standing in her crib in the morning or after a nap.

Zoe’s personality continues to be a happy one – she’s often smiling, laughing and squealing – and she’s also more talkative than ever. She still says her “dada”s and “baba”s a lot, and she also likes to experiment with making different sounds. (On a note, she did finally say “mama” this month – but she doesn’t say it very often.) For awhile, she was making very deep, throaty, monster-type sounds; more recently, she has been blowing out to get the sound of her lips rubbing together. She can entertain herself for quite some time doing this.

Another big development is the appearance of her bottom two teeth; they popped out about two weeks ago (at the 41-week mark). Poor Zoe was miserable during the teething process (crying all the time, not sleeping well, etc.), and we’re glad we got through the first two. Her new teeth are awfully cute, but both Q and I will miss her gummy smiles.

I should also mention Zoe’s sleeping patterns, which have changed slightly. Her third, late-afternoon nap finally fell to the wayside (which I’ve learned is fairly common around the 9-month mark), but she continues taking a short (30-45 min.) nap in the morning and a longer one in the afternoon. She still goes to bed around 7:30 or 8 PM and wakes up around 6:30 AM; we’re almost always greeted with a big smile in the morning. We love those smiles – and our happy baby!

-M

This entry was posted on Sunday, September 23rd, 2007 at 8:41 am and is filed under 13.Ten to eleven months. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.