10 Months

It was recently brought to my attention that Olive is now 10 months old. 

I am incredibly late with these pictures, and I wonder if that has to do with procrastination, or disorganization, or just the creeping reality that 10 months is only 2 months away from 12 months (MATH!) and 12 months is one year and that means that there is no more baby living in this house. 

There is a toddler. Aha. Ahahahah ha ha HA HA HA oh god seriously what is happening. 

Lately I’ve been calling Olive, Puppy. Yes, as in a baby dog. This is far less cruel than it sounds when you consider that she is basically  taking all of her cues from Gus these days, and I spend my days being trailed by two cute creatures making strange sounds, drooling and begging for tidbits of whatever I am eating. 

She has gotten incredibly quick at crawling, but so far we’ve only lost her twice, so I am going to chalk this up as a win in my book. 

She steadfastedly refuses to use sign language even though it is abundantly clear that she knows a bunch of the signs including potty, milk, all done, more, eat, and drink.

She knows them, yet she DEFIES us!

At mealtimes I enthusiastically sign “more?” before offering her another bite, and she looks me right in the eye and starts grunting excitedly. So I sign again “More?” and she grunts even more excitedly, and then I do a long, sloooow, drawn out version of more: “Olive! Do you want moooorrrreeee?” tapping my fingertips together in slow motion like a moron, and she grunts back just as slowly and emphatically, like “YES. YES WOMAN. YES I WANT MORE. Don’t you hear all of this bloody grunting?! For christ’s sake I’m not sure how much more clear I can be!” (in my mind Olive’s internal monologue sounds like stewie from Family Guy,)

Sometimes I call her Chris Farley, because she is so blonde and so funny, and also so deliciously corpulent. Pudgy and squishy, with fat wrists and chubby legs and I know it’s just a matter of time before she starts becoming a stringy, knobby-kneed child, so I am relishing every ounce of this baby fat and hoping against hope that it never, ever goes away.

She has also become quite snuggly lately, this little baby of mine. She throws her arms around your shoulders, and rests her head on your legs, and if you’re really lucky you will get a drooly open mouthed kiss. With tongue.

For a few months there she was this squirmy, wriggly little thing that just wanted to be anywhere but my arms, but these days she is quite the mamas girl and hey. I will take it!

She also might be a thug. I mean that in the best way possible: but still, a sweet, affectionate, clever little thug. I say this because in addition to her penchant for soother stealing (which continues unabated), she is now scheming!

She constructs elaborate, multifaceted plans designed to maim and humiliate her loved ones. Like the other day I was feeding her lunch, and she looked me in the eye and dropped her spoon off of her highchair tray. That in itself is nothing new, it’s part of this fun  game we play called “Pick that shit up, Mom”. 

But this time when I bent down to pick up her spoon she stretched out and kicked me in the face. And then laughed. 

LAUGHED! I think it’s pretty clear who is running the show around here.

She is the best thing that ever happened to me, and I am so very lucky to be her mom. 

Happy 10 months, Olive Grace!