9 months old

Henry is 9 months old today! We took him to the petting farm at the Lincoln Park Zoo to celebrate and enjoy what's left of the warm weather. Henry enjoyed petting the goats, looking at the cows, ponies, chicks, and vegetable garden. He even got to see a demonstration of grooming a pony! The goats were especially interested in Mark's pants and leg hair.

Henry is 18 lbs. 5 oz. now and only 27 inches tall. It was very hard to believe that he only grew 1/2 an inch in the past three months, but that's what the doctor said! He is certainly growing out of his clothes quickly.

He is eating solids pretty well, although he prefers store bought food to my home cooked baby food. Poor me! He really likes to feed himself although he's not great at chewing, so we have a few scares when he eats. His favorite foods right now are cottage cheese, yogurt, whole peas, avocado, banana, peaches, and pears.

Mark wanted me to add that he is awesome!

first words and sleep for mommy and daddy!

Henry's sleep habits were really getting out of control. He's never been a great sleeper, but for the past week and a half he was up every 45-60 minutes and would wake up the instant he touched the crib. We had to do something!! So, after a lot of research, discussion, and many sleepless nights we decided to Ferberize that boy. It went so much better than we ever dreamed. After only three nights he is falling asleep on his own with only a little bit of crying and staying asleep for long stretches of time (7 hours last night). Today he put himself to sleep for a nap with no crying. I know there will still be bad nights and other set backs when teething or illness come along, but we are happy right now.

Last night he said his first words! I wouldn't have believed it if he hadn't said it twice. After dinner he said "all done". For the past 3 months I've been trying to teach him the sign for all done after meals. So I say it about 4 times and do the sign then I say it and make him do the sign. I've never gotten any type of response from him until last night. I said "all done" and he looked up at me and said "aahh done". I said "Did you just say 'all done'?" and again he said "aahh done". He can't do the sign, but he said it two times and again (although not as clearly) this morning. Other babies say mama, dada, ball... but not my kid!

We also had a great trip to Cleveland last weekend. We celebrated Omi's 89th birthday. Henry had so much fun with his grandparents, great grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and doggies! He went swimming with B and Quinnie, too. We'll be traveling back there in October and we're looking forward to visiting again!