Lydia turned eight months old on Labor Day.  Happy birthday, honey!

I can’t believe how much Lydia has changed over the past month, most of all in her social skills.  Lydia now reaches out to someone if she wants to be picked up (which absolutely melts this mother’s heart, since she stretches her hands out to me nearly every time I walk by).  She also is developing a sense of humor and has a funny scrunched up face that she uses to get my attention and make me laugh at her.

As far as physical changes go, she is growing more hair (I know you probably can’t tell from the pictures, but I promise you, she does have more in the back than she used to!)  She also finally got her first tooth (lower front right) and is gnawing on everything in sight.  Her eyes have gotten a tiny bit deeper in color.  In fact, people frequently say, “Oh, she has brown eyes like her mother.”  However, she really doesn’t have brown eyes like me, because mine are just plain brown.  Lydia’s eyes though are a really cool combination of brown around the center and gray around the outside and the two colors mingle together in between.  I don’t know if they will go all brown at some point, but for now, they are not “brown eyes just like her mother’s”.

Lydia is not yet crawling in the true sense of the word, but when she wants something, she can generally find a way to get over to it.  Her mode of transportation is sort of inchworm/pushing with toes/rolling over multiple times, but involves little to no use of her upper body, which is sort of impressive when you think about it.  She does sometimes try to use her arms, but it ends up looking like a push-up and doesn’t actually get her anywhere.  Makes for a funny picture though!  Drop and give me 50!

Her current favorites include feeding herself finger foods, chewing on things (especially books), her stuffed lamb that she sleeps with, being tickled, baths, playing peek-a-boo, and getting her hands on anything that she isn’t supposed to have, especially if it is one of Alethea’s toys.

The things she dislikes aren’t many, but do include being fed with a spoon (she’d rather do it herself), being put to bed and having Mommy walk out of the room.  The more tired and/or hungry she is, the worse it is if I leave while she’s watching.

Lydia’s relationship with her big sister continues to be a rather one sided conversation where Alethea tells Lydia what she feels, likes and what she ought or ought not do.  “Stop pulling the quilt, Eeya!  We’re trying to take pictures!”

Lydia takes it all in stride (I’m sure it helps that she doesn’t understand what Alethea is saying) and continues to assume that any attention from her big sister is a good thing.  Really, Lydia soaks up attention in general and always has a smile for anyone who comes along, provided she can bestow her charm from the safety of Mommy’s arms.

Thanks for being a bright ray of sunshine in our lives, Lydia Grace!  We love you to pieces!