Davey Bear's 9 month update

It is impossible for me to believe David will be 9 months old this week. I was looking back at my posts when AJ was the same age and was surprised to see how much they look alike. In my mind, my blond-haired, green-eyed boy and my red-haired, blue-eyed boy look very different. But in the pictures, it is clear that they have the same teeth. There must be other similiarities, too, that I am missing because there is a certain je ne sais quoi about them that reminds me of each other.

For his part, David has become mobile in a big way. He is not crawling yet, but he can sit in one spot and paddle around with his feet in a 360 degree rotation in about 2 seconds flat. Definitely fast enough to swipe a forbidden handful of AJ's trains off the train table. Like AJ at this age, David's favorite toy is a cordless house phone with all of the buttons to boop boop beep beep. He is also into books with flaps that cover the pictures, especially one of babies hiding behind beach balls, umbrellas and blocks.

David has the biggest grin that lights up the room, and he flashes it all the time. We took him to have his pictures taken at our friend's photography studio, and the photographer could not get over how smiley he is. She said he does not take a bad picture. But smiley is not to be mistaken for easy going, because he has a stubborn streak to him and can be hard-headed. Every time I try to put him in the high chair, he stiffens his entire body, refuses to bend his legs, arches his back and throws his head back in protest. He is a selective eater, and I sense that some of it is due to power struggles and his need to assert his own will. After AJ's early career as a competitive eater, it is hard for me to relax about David's refusals to eat because I worry that he is not getting enough nutrients. Whenever I voice this concern, someone tells me that David clearly doesn't look like he is hurting in the food department. So far, David's hands-down favorite food is dry toast. He likes to eat things that he can feed (and therefore control) himself, like peas, pasta, diced up fruit and the toast. He does not drink much water out of his sippy cup, and AJ did more drinking from the cup at the same age. I think the big difference is that AJ never took a bottle and so went straight to the cup, while David is a fan of the ba-ba.

David is a bit of a daddy's boy, which I like to see. He lights up whenever Joe walks into a room and starts frantically kicking his legs and stretches out his arms to Joe to be scooped up. He is also a big fan of the cats and lunges toward them whenever they get within a body length of his reach. I have noticed that the cats are less willing to let the second little tail puller get near them. Maybe they are getting kid wise in their middle age.

The little things that I want to remember about David at this age are the way his hair curls just around the bottom of his head, his hilarious in-and-out fast laugh, the adoring glances he gives AJ, the way he spits his pacifier out--patooie--whenever he sees a bottle coming his direction and his contented sigh whenever I pick him up.

In terms of talking, David has been on a da-da-da-da kick in his babbling lately that leads me to think this will be his first word. I could also swear that he said "aah ja" this morning when he was looking at AJ. Our nanny thinks he has been saying AJ as well.

The pictures are of David at 9 and 4 months. Here is a link to AJ's nine month update for comparison.