Weed

I've got a weed growing around my place and no, it's not outside in the 3 feet of snow. Ari is now 8 months old and growing like a weed. I seriously cannot believe how much she changes in even a week. She is now crawling on her hands and knees (see video below), pulling herself up to standing position, and sticking anything she can get her hands on into her mouth.

The crawling is great. It doesn't put pressure on her belly like army crawling and so she spits up less. Those of you who were reluctant to hold her because of fear of massive spit up, you can hold her with no less worries.

Ari is a quick, little crawler. While we're eating dinner, I'll put her in the living room to play with toys and before I can sit down and get a bite, she's crawled over to my chair demanding to eat with me. I'm pretty sure Ari's first word is going to be "more" because she uses grunting right now to let us know that she hasn't had enough to eat. I think it's endearing; Brandon less so. It's effective but I'll be happy when she can just say "more." The other night after she'd eaten, I put her on my lap while I ate my taco. She began grunting away and eventually screaming when she realized I would not be sharing my taco with her.

Ari is a joy and such a good baby. She loves to smile at people. She will stare people down until they look at her. Once she's got their attention, she will give them a huge grin. I was shopping for paint last week and the paint dude wasn't even paying attention to what I was asking because he was too busy smiling at Ari.

This last video shows what has become Ari's signature move - the tongue-out-flappy-arm dance. Makes me laugh everytime she does it.

The Next Ariel

I was downstairs doing dinner dishes and Brandon upstairs supervising the laundry-putting-awaying, when I heard Halle singing upstairs in her bedroom. I couldn't help but smile. She loves music and she loves to sing. I had to sneak upstairs and see if I could catch her singing because I knew if she caught me listening, she wouldn't keep belting out the words.

Here's what I nabbed:

When I was young, I was pretty sure I was going to be a professional singer when I got older. I think Halle's ambition is to become the next Ariel.