Malstones Galore: The boy is growing up fast!

There he is!

Little Mal is hardly little anymore. I weighed him at a friend's house the other day, and he's 25 pounds. At 9 months. He probably could walk right now, but he shows no interest. He crawls everywhere and pulls up and climbs and sometimes lets go of stuff and stands up. But he's made no effort to take steps, which means I get to look forward to continuing maintenance of these upper body muscles for a few more months, at least.

Developmentally expected, he's in full bore separation anxiety mode. We're back to my not being able to take showers or have him sit through a full meal or my being able to tidy up the kitchen without fussing for me to hold him, but two things help: I know it's temporary, and he's letting James soothe him in ways he didn't before.

For instance, yesterday at the post office, Mal fell back and hit his head. I was busy packaging a couple of things, so James picked Mal up. Mal really wanted me. But he let James hold him, and eventually he calmed down. That was a first! It happened a second time, later in the day, when he was upset that I was busy making dinner. James took Mal to his room, and within a few minutes, Mal was playing quietly.

Speaking of James, I'd noted that Mal had started saying, "Dada" over a month ago. Mal calls James now, as well as saying "Dada!" very happily when he sees his dad after a long day of separation, or even just a long play time, and James comes in to see what's going on.

But that's not all!

The other day, I called to Daphne down the hall, and Mal hollered, "Da-dayee!" It was distinctly different than his "Dada." I wondered if he was trying to say Daphne's name, and since then, he's done it about 5 more times. Today, I'd lost sight of him and hear him saying, "Da-nayee!" I called down the hall, "Is he in your room?" Daphne said, "Yes. Please come get him." But allegedly she did not hear him say her name. Which he does.

Does he call me "Mama"? Nope. Not really. He cries "Mama!" when he wants me, but I think that's just because it works, and because that's a sad sound that kids make. I try to reinforce it by saying, "Yes?" when he randomly repeats, "Mom" over and over again.

We've worked into a semi-routine where Mal naps twice a day instead of three times. Usually, the first nap starts between 9:00 and 11:30 and lasts between an hour and two hours (yes, he wakes up once or twice during, and I have to nurse him back to sleep). Then he'll nap again between 2:30 and 5:00 for the same amount of time, an hour to two hours. If he catches some sleep in the car, one of those might be eliminated, or it might not. The shorter and/or earlier the second nap, the earlier he usually goes to sleep. He was asleep by 8:00 PM two nights ago, but 9:30 last night. It's typically during that window. And he's up between 6:15 and 7:15 every morning. And, yes, he nurses all night.

He does this thing where, when he rouses in the night, he just starts crawling. He might crawl into the wall, or over me, or toward the foot of the bed, or into James' face. I don't know that he's fully waking, but I surely am. I have to wrestle him back into a laying position so he will fall back to sleep. I wake up sore every morning. This kid, remember, weighs nearly 2 stone.

Mal understands a lot. He gets excited when I ask him if he's ready for a bath. When James was trying to point out some birds eating off of the patio deck and said, "Look! There are some birds!" Mal instead looked toward the feeder. He knows some things he isn't supposed to do, and as he starts to do them, he doesn't know enough to be subtle. Instead, he'll go to whatever it is he's not supposed to be messing with (our phones, my soda, Daphne's room, the toilets) and before he gets there, turn to look at us, and giggle with the biggest... uh, poo-eating grin on his face. We're in big trouble, folks.

Mal loves fruit. He will drink anything I pour out of our Ninja, including a thing I made up yesterday that had peaches, mango, banana, cucumber, and spinach in it. The other morning, it was blueberries, chia seeds, banana, spinach, and carrots. He loves cherries. He loves raisins. He likes most meat. He prefers to feed himself than to have us do it. He has a cup with a straw that he can use on his own, but sippy cups still baffle him. He hasn't really cottoned on to the tipping back part yet. He really likes almond milk with a touch of honey (it's prepared and comes in the milk, and it's pasteurized, so don't freak out about the honey before he's a year old).

I almost hate to say this, lest I jinx it, but the past week or so, getting Mal into his carseat hasn't been the knock-down drag-out it has been, well, the rest of his life. That might have to do with the fact that we're in the car a bit more than we were when we lived downtown and he's just realized that nothing bad is going to happen, or it might have to do with the vanilla wafers I've started leaving in the back seat. The second we get into the car, I hand him one and sit him in the seat, strapping him in while he eats it. I'll take the mess over the tantrum any day of the week.

There's probably more I need to note, and I'll think of it later, but for now, I'm worn out and need to get to sleep! I konked out during the fireworks last night, and was out for the evening before 9:30. I felt like doing that again today, but wanted to record some of these things for posterity's sake.