Dear Jack,

Today you are 9 months old. Do you feel my eyes boring holes in the back of your head? No? Well, I certainly can't look away anymore. Not long after my last letter to you, you started booking it. You are so fast crawling now. Just a day or two after you mastered that, you started pulling up to stand. You stood at the edge of the coffee table, the couch, my leg, anything stationary long enough for you to grasp. See that past tense, there? Yeah. You don't really do that anymore.



Two days after you first stood up, you started climbing. We thought it would be cute to break out a walking toy that you could use to stand up. Push it if you like. Stand there and look cute if you'd rather. Well, you did push it, walking behind it with surprising grace and never losing your balance. Your need for adventure, however, remained unsatiated. Within a few hours of pushing this toy the normal way (forward), you decided it would be more fun to push it backward, right up to the couch. Instead of expressing frustration that it wouldn't move, you climbed right up onto it. It's been all climbing ever since. The bathtub, the kitchen stools, the couches, the bookcases. You are a little monkey.



I admit to being completely unprepared for this. Aren't you supposed to walk first? Will I find you on top of the refrigerator next week? Sigh. Yawn. Your mama is tired.

Also this month, the joy of cabinets. Opening and closing them. Trying to chew the knobs. Pulling the tupperware out. You also like to play with the handle on the toilet. You haven't figured out how to open the lid yet, but truly, nothing is safe. No amount of child-proofing will hinder you.



You LOVE to be outside and cry at the door when I let the dog out. Soon enough, we will spend most of our days out there. We took a walk with Kassi, Emma, and Lael yesterday and you seemed to be in heaven. It will be rainy and chilly some more, but soon the sun will stay out and the days will be longer and the grass green and not so scratchy. We won't be cooped up in the house all day. I'll be digging acorns out of your cheeks instead of dog food.

Oh yeah, food! You started eating a lot more this month. No baby food, of course. What is baby food to a mountain climber? I've been sharing my dinner with you and making you a little breakfast buffet each morning. You like bits of cheese, apple, melon, pear, and hunks of bread. While you still don't get super excited about any particular food, you seemed to enjoy zucchini from a stir fry we had the other night and black beans from a soup. Potatoes, carrots, banana.

The best development last month, dear son, is the evolution of your "Gooseface" from a scrunched up nose and furrowed brow, to a squinty-eyed grin that use to make us laugh. You are a clown. My clown!



I don't have the energy to wax eloquent this month, but my heart sings with pride for all that you are, even as it skips a beat when I see you tottering on the edge of a precipice.

I love you always,

Mama