Nine Months!

My babies have now been outside of me longer than I carried them.  How did this happen?  Sometimes I look down and them, and it seems impossible that they were so tiny just nine months ago.  We don't have our 9 month well baby appointment until tomorrow, so I don't have the official stats yet, but they are definitely not tiny anymore.  They are growing big and strong.  And beautiful.  They are so, so beautiful!

However, they are not becoming any easier to photograph for these monthly pictures (as you can see by the pictures below).  I used to take about fifty pictures to try to get one decent one.  I only got five pictures in today before I gave up because Harper would not stop eating her sticker.

This picture really shows Harper's eyes.  I'm amazed that they still haven't turned brown like Tannah's.

At nine months:

• Both girls can crawl and pull themselves to standing.  Tannah has started cruising around furniture.  Both girls stand holding on with just one hand.  When Harper first started pulling up to standing, I was her favorite anchoring spot.  She was so proud of herself when she stood up.  It made my heart swell with happiness to see her sweet face looking so proud and happy.
• The girls are still babbling away.  Their favorite sound is still "da" (much to Wei-Yand's delight), and they still just laugh at me when I try to get them to say "ma".  They've been experimenting with their volume levels, so we have a range from adorable whispers to ear piercing shrieks.
• They love toys that make noise.  We got some great new ones for Christmas including music table, an Elephant ball popper and a Simba rocking horse.
• They are in size 9 month or 6-12 month clothes.
• We just moved up to size 4 diapers.
• They sleep from around 7 pm to 6:30 am, but are still generally getting up at least once per night.  Mama is tired, and we're approaching the time when we're going to have to put an end to midnight feedings.
• Tannah has four teeth.  I feel like we've been waiting for Harper's bottom two teeth to pop through forever, but they still haven't made an appearance.
• We've started giving the girls more finger foods.  They got to try pancakes, cheese, and toast this month.
• We've started seeing a little bit of separation anxiety.  Tannah was showing a definite preference for Mommy and Grandma this past month, but Harper is still very laid back and will pretty much allow anyone to hold her.
• The girls have started giving "kisses".  This basically amounts to an open-mouthed slobbery press of their lips against our faces, but I think it's about the sweetest thing ever.
• Tannah initiated a game of peek-a-boo with my dad this month.  It was so cute to see her hiding her little face in a pillow, then peeking out at him.

They are such sweet little girls.  Every month with them brings more fun and more new adventures!