The babies will turn 10 months old tomorrow! They have been making developmental progress left and right. As of last week (within a day of one another), they both can sit back up from laying on the floor. This new-found ability has led to this image greeting me each time I go in to get them up from a nap. I managed to photograph Rissa’s process, so here she is on the way up and then up:
Zach can also do this! Doesn’t he look like Christopher Robin in the second picture? It’s the outfit. Rissa can pull up too, but she is far more cautious and she usually pulls up on us, so I haven’t gotten her picture yet.
They are both signing little fiends. Zach’s favorite sign is “more” and he uses it to ask for food. Rissa’s favorite sign is “more” and she uses it to ask for bubbles (screaming works just fine for getting food so she figures change is unnecessary). If she is extra frustrated because I am extra slow at getting a bite to her mouth, she will grunt and clap her hands together. That means “more NOW!” As soon as we sing a song or she hears one playing, she starts bouncing rhythmically and nodding her head. Our little dancer! She loves to bounce to any type of music (hip hop was especially exciting to her at my hair salon appointment!). She also claps and sometimes says “ap!!!” when she claps because we say “clap, clap, clap” when we do it. First word???? We’re not sure. She also says “up!!!” when Matt plays “up-and-down flying Rissa” with her. However, she says “up” for clapping and “ap” for up-and-down sometimes, so we can’t tell if she means to or not. We count it as talking but we aren’t sure it is an intentional first word yet. Here are the babies with my amazing stylist, Jake, hiding behind their stroller. As Matt always says, “the man does good work!” Jake once asked me if Matt’s mom was available (“Sorry man, she’s been happily married for 35 years”) and he is now getting married next year. The second picture just happened this week and it warms my heart to no end… Rissa finally has enough hair and I finally found something tiny enough for her! Yay!!!
Zach has 2 teeth and has become a big fan of Cheerios! Rissa is JUST sprouting her first one on the bottom and oh my, has it been a painful process! Her little gums are swollen and only Zach can empathize because Matt and I don’t remember our own teething processes, thank goodness!
Zach is amazingly fast at crawling across the floor. I can barely snap a photo of him anymore because he is already in my face reaching for the camera. He’s a crawling lightning bolt… this kid can get over to the vacuum and lick it before I even realize he is on the move! The personal cost has been highest for Hooch… he’s no longer safe just lounging a safe distance away from prying fingers.
Jaime and Matt are making progress too! Actually, Ed and Matt made the most progress. Check them out! They tore out that room like experts last weekend. We haven’t insulated it yet (because we can’t use the staple hammer while the babies are asleep and we can’t go get covered in fiberglass while the babies are awake!) but we hope to tonight. They did everything on the list, although there were some unexpected structural issues (there was NO insulation in one of the outside walls and the floor beam was rotting, so Matt had to take extra time to restabilize it). We’re so glad we gutted it and found these problems, despite the extra frustration! I know these pictures look like beams and wood and not much else, but this is all I have to show you of the HOURS of work and missed sleep and tears and frustration; did I mention hard, laborious work? Matt and Ed did a great job. Oma and Opa took GREAT care of the babies and I, though I could tell how much the babies missed their daddy. You should have seen their faces when we finally came home on Saturday night to see him! It was just beautiful.
