Dearest Julianne,
You have officially spent more time in this world than in Mama’s tummy! I hope you’re enjoying our world so far!
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| Julianne in utero @ 39 weeks |
You had a pretty exciting month, you fell sick for the first time, you started standing on your own, you even fell from the bed! How much more exciting can life get for you?
It must have been pretty awful fighting that throat infection. The only good thing that came out of it for you must be those extra cuddles you managed to steal from Mama, clinging onto me for your dear life all night wanting to sleep in my arms. That clearly didn’t do my sleep any good but it gave me a good lesson on motherhood and how I your needs must always be before mine.
You are developing wonderfully for a 9 month old. You have mustered enough courage to now crawl outside of your playmate on the cool tiled floor. You have also mastered climbing up the stairs, something you learnt in just one day. Now, whenever we leave you on your playmate in front of the stairs, you will almost immediately crawl towards the stairs. Sophie Che Che has become the official stairs-guard with her “No climbing up the stairs Juju!”. You really are such a little monkey going places these days, our eyes have to be on you all the time to make sure accidents don’t happen.
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| Climbing up the stairs she goes |
From all fours to your feet. You seem to have decided that since no one else around you seems to be do this crawling thing, it must be more fun standing just like everyone else you see. Today, you can cruise comfortably and your favourite past-time other than chewing on all things in sight is to stand on Por Por’s bed, steadying yourself while holding onto the bay window or the arm chair and then letting go of your hands to stand on your own without support. You started with being able to do that for a few seconds. Today, you have progressed to standing for as long as 20 seconds before you fall back onto the bed. You get mighty please with yourself whenever you can stand for a long time. We always reward your efforts with claps and cheers so you know you did a good job! You crave the applause and have that oh so irritatingly-cute arrogant look on your face each time you know you did good!
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| Her favourite position - standing |
Unfortunately, this development milestone comes at a price as it caused you your first fall just a few days ago. You were standing on the bed as usually and I didn’t realise you were so close to the edge of the bed while doing so. Then you fell backwards and just dived down the bed. It all happened so fast, I couldn’t react in time to stop the fall even though I was just sitting next to you. Thankfully, falling onto the bed first kind of broke the fall and you were all fine after a quick and loud cry. No visible boo-boo even. Thank God. And being that little monkey you are, you were determined not to let the fall get in your way of standing independently. We put you back on the bed and you were back climbing and jumping again. Do you not know fear?
You are at a really cute age now where you can interact with us. You even know how to play peeka-boo with us. You will take your little blankkie and pull it up to cover your face then slowly bring it down as you wait for Mama to go “peeka-boo!”. It’s so adorable! The other new game you learnt this month was the ‘treasure hunt’ game. It’s a game we created for you. What we do is use the nursing pillow to make this little ‘well’ and we’ll throw all sorts of your favourite things inside – remote control, iphone, ricola sweet box, mini torch, apple tv control – and leave you to dig into the ‘well’ and pull out the treasures. I love seeing you stick your small head into that ‘well’ as you go in search for your treasures. You take the job very seriously and always know which are the new treasures to pull out when we throw new toys in.
I don’t have benchmark of what a 9 month old vocabulary should be but you clearly understand a few words/instructions at this age.
Turn the page
No
Clap your hands
Twinkle twinkle
Bye bye (this is a hit and miss though)
Pat pat
Among the words you can say are “Mama”, “Papa” and “Por Por”. You should have seen Por Por’s face beam with delight when she first heard you calling her just 2 days ago. Next shall be Yiyi ok?
The highlight of your month has got to be the highlight of Mama’s month too! Seeing Da-yi, Che Che Sophie and Uncle Jude again after 7 months!! (Ok, 4 months for Uncle Jude since he made a trip back in March). And what do you know, they are not going to disappear this time anymore like they did when you were 2 months old. They’re back here to stay – to celebrate your first birthday with you, to watch you grow!! I cannot be more proud of your cousin Sophie who clearly adores you and have been such a sweet Che Che. She feeds you bagel crumbs, plants you kisses, stops you from climbing the stairs, tells you to stop squirming so that I can put on your swim diaper and has been this big Che Che to you, like she knows it’s her job to protect you and be gentle towards you. You on the other hand have been trying to pull her hair and her jammies, I sure hope they are signs of affection. I have been telling you how you much now learn to share the attention with Che Che Sophie so no giving me your pouty face when Gong Gong, Por Por or Mama leaves you alone to give Che Che Sophie some of our time.
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| Sharing her bagel with Juju |
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| Giving Juju a little kiss |
Da-yi thinks you’re such a cutie and she loves your pouty face. She thinks you’re one funny 9 month old! I think you kept her well entertained when she spent the day with you recently. You took a while to warm up to her – in fact you warmed up to Uncle Jude faster than you did Da-yi. I know, you have this thing for guys. It’s the same reason why you adore Gong Gong. Flirting at 9 months huh young lady?
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| With Da-yi .... |
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| And Uncle Jude |
You are not all angel of course. This month, you started giving me trouble with your solids, particularly your dinner of cereal. It started when you had your throat infection. You didn’t have much of an appetite then cos it must have been painfully swallowing. But when you still didn’t want to eat your cereal after you got well, I figured it can’t be about the throat infection. I’m guessing you are getting bored with your oatmeal so I’ve designing creative ways to make you eat your cereal – which I’m still pretty much insistent on giving you cos that’s the only way I get additional milk into your diet. We use to top each spoon of your oatmeal with freshly scrapped apples or peaches but now, I mix them into the cereal instead. Sadly it doesn’t seem to work very much. Every dinner time is like war with you. So at Gong Gong’s advise, we’re giving you a break from your cereal and gonna feed your porridge for dinner for the next few days. When you start showing signs of getting bored with your porridge (because this now means you’ll have porridge for both lunch and dinner), we’ll come back to cereal. Well the good that came out of you not eating your dinner properly is that you’re hungry by your night feed and hungry enough to drink down almost 180ml of milk. 180ml!! That’s volume I thought I’ll can only dream of you drinking. When babies your age are gulping down 240ml at each feed, you are averaging only about 130ml today. When you hit 180ml, I recall checking your PJs to make sure it was not because the bottle was leaking. Still on the eating front, we have met with a couple of food allergy reactions so far, the most disturbing to date has to be your reaction towards cow’s milk. I fed you some yogurt puffs the other day and sadly, rashes started appearing around your mouth soon after. Looks like my grand plan to put you on cow’s milk once you turn one will have to be put on hold. At 9 months, you remain exclusively breastfed something I hope to do till you turn one at least. But at the looks of things, it’s either I continue breastfeeding you or we’ll have to transit to soy milk just like your Che Che Sophie. Let’s see, maybe you’ll outgrow the allergy in the next 3 months. As far as eating and food are concern, you definitely have Mama’s genes. Don’t like to eat, fussy with food and allergic to certain food – yes, the signs are all there!
August promises to be an exciting month!! Lot’s of birthday celebrations coming up, starting with your very first birthday party. See your first birthday invite from Che Che Sophie!!
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| Your very first birthday party!! |
You also have Aunty Rulin and Uncle Shaun’s wedding to grace (your very first) and Por Por’s grand 60th birthday! 3 more months and you’ll be ONE!! Mama is already starting to plan for your little party!! How exciting!!
Have fun in month 10 little pumpkin!! You’re truly blessed with so much love around you!
Love you so much,
Mama
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