8 months!

I figured since it took me a month to post a blog about Bella being 7 months old, I should probably get this one in on time. ;) So, today Bella is 8 months old. It seems like time keeps flying by. She makes progress by leaps and bounds these days. And of course I am fulfilling my duties as a mother by doting on her 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and telling her (and everyone that will listen) that everything she does is brilliant. Last week she was officially crawling on her hands and knees (barely going a foot before giving up) and tonight she charged across the living room to get to my cell phone (hey, she has her priorities...). She was even trying to stand up using the couch as leverage. She is still amazed at her new talents. She is always looking at her feet and you can tell by the look on her face that she's thinking, Wow! I did it! It's pretty cool. She's talking up a storm these days and is becoming even more opinionated. Her favorite thing to say is dadadadada, which comes in very handy when Dusty comes home from school and she has a poopy diaper. I just tell him that she's been asking for him and he has no choice but to obey her command ;). It's very cute. Despite this she is definitely a momma's girl. There are a couple people out there that she just loves, but when in doubt she always wants her mommy. Most of the time I really love it, but there are those few moments when someone she doesn't know wants to hold her and I just know she's going to freak out. I know all too soon she'll be trying to get away from me as fast as she can, I just have to keep reminding myself of this and enjoy the mommy time while it lasts. It also seems like she's getting bigger and bigger everyday. I feel like she's going through growth spurt after growth spurt. That could be because she eats non-stop. And because of this, I'm glad that she's not a picky eater. She'll eat anything that I put in front of her (this can be bad too because she tries to eat things that aren't food, but I guess all babies do that). We make sure she has a veggie or a protein followed by a fruit everyday. She also loves to feed herself. She loves any little snack that she can pick up by herself and often times tries to take the spoon out of our hand when we're feeding her. I'm also very proud that she is sleeping through the night. It was a long time coming, but now that she does it, I love it! We tried to help her learn to sleep through the night when she was 5 months old, but she didn't take to it. I thought I'd try again when we got back from Christmas, but she started sleeping through the night on her own before then. I'm glad she decided she was ready and went ahead and did it. Every once in a while she'll fuss a little, but more often than not, she goes right back to sleep. Two or three times she's woken up and not gone back to sleep. Having to wake up in the middle of the night on those occasions nearly kills me. I don't know how I did it for 6 or so months. I guess that's why babies are so cute, they make it all worth it. Other than that, she's doing great and we loving watching her grow up. We'll have some official stats (weight, height, etc.) for you next month when we see her doctor for her 9 month well baby appointment (since we don't have a digital scale).