9 months

Isla's stats:

Her new skill is giving high 5's. If you hold your hand up in front of her and say high 5, she'll slap it. I kinda love it. It's the first thing that we've actually taught her. She kinda loves doing it too.

She is really trying to wave. But doesn't quite have it down yet. She can wave with her hand down by her tummy....or she can put her hand up by her head and kinda move it. but she hasn't combined the bringing her hand up to her head and waving. It's been difficult to teach her to wave because whenever i start to show her she thinks i'm going to ask for a high 5 :)

She has thrown a ball a few times. Mostly she is just throwing it into the ground. But a few times she was trying to throw it to me because we were playing catch.

She is starting to get a little temper (not my favorite newest development). Literally the day she turned 9 months she started throwing little temper tantrums. They only last a minute - but I don't love them. They usually occur when I need to change her diaper or get her dressed. I'm really excited for them to get more intense in a few months (not!).

The sleep training we have been doing for 3 months has finally started to kick in a bit. She now usually only cries for less than 5 minutes before naps and bedtime. We were used to an hour of crying before!

She's down to two naps a day. She gets pretty tired in the evening but can't fall asleep for the third nap.

She loves her daddy. Her favorite time of the day is when dad comes home from work. It works out perfectly because it's right when she is starting to get a little crabby because she didn't take a third nap. So seeing her daddy calms and rejuvenates her.

My favorite time of the day is from about 6:30 to 7:30 pm. We do a bath and then we get in pj's and play for a little bit and then we read stories and I feed her and put her to bed. I love reading stories with her. And she loves them too. She loves mirror books and lift the flap books and short stories. She has loved lift the flap books since about 6 months and started lifting the flaps on her own right away and turning the pages. It's been more recent that she's liked story books too. We definitely try to liven them up with animal noises and really any noises we can. Her favorite story books are Are You My Mother and Goodnight Moon.

She loves music and likes to dance. She bops her head to the music and bounces up and down. I love it so much.

She is getting so great at standing on her own. I think she could do it forever....but she doesn't because I don't think she thinks she's capable. So after a minute she grabs onto me or onto something else.

She's the best. I love her little smooshy face.