9 Months: Delightful!

I can not get enough of you, Jonah Cody. I delight in you all day long. You are the most wonderful, amazing, good, precious tiny Guy. You are a pure joy!

18 pounds, 3 ounces (15%)

29 1/4 inches (75%)

You finally decided you like food, Jones! Yay! Your faves are the veggies, but you'll eat anything. I've started sneaking you some table food. You gobble it right up! You even eat the nasty Stage 3 foods with little chunks of who-knows-what mixed into the puree. You give me a confused look during the first few bites, but you keep opening your little mouth for more.

Your very favorite plaything just happens to be attached to you: your toes! (I confess: I am a fan of your tiny toes too. They get a whole lot of kisses!)

Whether you are on your back, giving your toes a nibble or sitting bent in half to get a closer look at those fascinating appendages, your toes are always entertaining. You even chat with them from time to time.

One of my favorite things about you, Jones, is your belly laugh. It is the best sound ever! You laugh easily and often. You have such a light, happy spirit. You toss back that blond baby head of yours and chuckle, eyes sparkling. Your brothers dance around and perform funny tricks just to earn a giggle out of you. A person cannot stay down or crabby with you around!

You are by far the most social of our three boys. At the store or the park, you grin and wave at everyone that passes by. "Ha, ha!" you shout, saying hi to anyone who will listen. And who could resist such a Cutie Pie? When people stop to chat with you, you reward them with drooly smiles and jibber-jabber.

Your communication skills are great! You sign for milk and say "ha" (hi) and "Dada." At 9 months, this is really impressive for our kids that are mostly silent until age 2. You are working on signing please, thank you and all done, but we have a way to go on these.

Another special thing about you Jones:

You adore your Daddy! While the other boys were pretty much mama's boys at your age, you can not get enough of your Dad. When he gets home from work, you smile bigger than ever and wriggle, squiggle with happiness until he picks you up. He can rock you to sleep even when I can't. Daddy loves to play with you and spend time with you.

You need a lot less sleep than either O or Noah, who still took three two hour naps a day at your age and slept about 11 hours at night. You take 2 good naps and sleep about ten hours at night. I am ashamed to say that until just before you turned 9 months old, I was still nursing you at least once in the night. (Awful, I know. But it was so much easier just to take the 10 minutes to feed you rather than let you cry and cry. Plus, I was up with Noah anyway and I treasured that alone, quiet time with just you.) We declared a "Cry It Out Weekend," because finally enough was enough. You must have heard us discussing our plans because the very first night we were going to let you cry, you slept like a rock! And again the next night, and the next. We have had no issues since! You sleep great. Smart Baby!

You are nowhere near crawling. You scoot on occasion, completely unintentionally. You are really too laid back to care about going anywhere, and Mommy loves to tote you around. Plus, Owen and Nosy bring you toys to your heart's content. You never get frustrated when things are out of reach. You just turn your attention to something else. One of these days, you'll discover there is a whole wide world beyond the edge of your baby blanket, but until then, I am happy to have you stay where I put you. :-)

Jonah, you are amazing. I could seriously stare at you, rock you, play with you all day long, just delighting in who God created you to be: the little guy with the bubbly, sparkly personality. You are so affectionate (your favorite way to be held is with your cheek smooshed onto mine while your baby hand strokes my hair) and content. You are an easy baby, a joy to be around. How richly blessed we all are to know you and love you and be entrusted with you for a little while. You are a gift from the Lord. I praise Him because of you. I love you, Jonesy.