Can you believe Anna is 8 months already? Doesn’t it seem that just yesterday she was still 3 or 4?

She is turning into such a delightful little human! Her personality shines through more and more every day. Anechka loves company, but does not need to be in the center of attention all the time. Often she can play by herself as long as we are in the same room. I don’t think I ever experienced this with Arosha — he always wanted constant interaction!

Anюtka started to crawl a while back. She can move pretty quickly around the apartment. She usually follows me wherever I go — kitchen, bathroom, bedroom. She crawls kind of funny. If Arosha looked like a giant lizard, she looks like a crab. Her arms and one leg are in the regular crawling position, but another leg she puts not on the knee, but on the foot. Not sure if my explanation makes sense, but we’ve made a video, so it’s easy to see. I call her my little crab from time to time.

Anna smiles a lot. Especially if I am around and she feels safe. She is not afraid of strangers (again, if I am around), but does not like when someone other than me is holding her. She can tolerate Danya or his mom for a short periods of time, but that’s about it.

She loves to pull herself up and actually started cruising a little bit holding onto furniture. I wonder when she’ll start standing by herself.

She can say “ma-ma-ma-ma-ma”, and I think that often she means it. When I am away and she wants to find me or is tired of crawling and wants me to pick her up, she often would do that “ma-ma-ma” chant.

Annushka loves animals and birds. When we went to the farm, she was laughing so much while looking at ducks and horses and sheep. She also was really fascinated by pigeons the first few times she saw them. Each time they flew, she laughed.

She is still breastfed. She does not eat too often — sometimes her breaks during the day are 5 hours long. She wakes up 2-3 times during the night to eat, but I really don’t mind. We are loosely following baby lead weaning, but she barely eats any food. She likes trying what’s on our plates, but usually spits out everything. She figured that she is not a fan of quinoa, buckwheat or avocado (my morning staples at the moment).

Anechka seem to like Arosha very much. She often will lighten up when he gets up in the morning (usually an hour or two later than her) and crawls to him. She does not like when he is pulling her down from behind though — and Arosha likes doing that. He seem to like her a lot too.

We went to the allergist on Friday to see if he can identify anything that might be causing her eczema. The doctor did a skin test for 60 different allergens and all results were negative. I can’t tell you just how relieved I was to hear that. He prescribed a hidrocortisone cream and it helped to clear the worst things up. I don’t know how long her skin will stay more or less OK, but now I have hope that she’ll just outgrow this condition. I feel really bad for her when eczema flares up and she keeps scratching and scratching and scratching.

Just to sum it up, Anюta is such a delightful little girl. I adore her and love her with all my heart. And of course I love our son just as much!

Today Arosha has turned 9 months. He is growing so fast!

It’s been a fun month, although I am starting to loose track of what happened exactly at which point. I think he started to crawl, to sit unassisted and to pull himself up. He also cut 4 teeth — two middle bottom and two middle top ones. They are not fully out yet, but are definitely visible when he smiles, laughs, cries, or opens his mouth widely for any other reason.

He still wakes up a lot at night. I try to be patient. He also started to take only two naps a day — a short one in the morning, and a longer one in the afternoon (although if his afternoon nap is on a shorter side, he’ll nap in the evening as well).

He is getting more and more aware of his surroundings — one of his favorite activities is to crawl to the window and to observe what is happening outside. When we meet people who he is not familiar with, Arosha studies them in quiet and serious manner; he is not very generous with smiles to strangers. He is always happy to see his daddy or grandparents though. I love it when Arosha’s grandma comes to visit every night, and he gets so excited to see her, that I have a hard time holding him in my arms. They also make each other laugh often. And when Arosha sees his daddy, his face invariably lights up with a smile. It’s precious.

I put a stop to early potty training for now. He does not like it, and I see no reason to push him (plus I don’t think it’s possible anyhow). As a matter of fact, he hates changing diapers in general. I think he might be bored on his back, so almost every time I change him, there is some crying involved. Oh, and I am a master of wiping the poop of the crawling baby (he does not lie still once the diaper is off). I also got a good grip on washing his little tushie all by myself now. Not the night-time bath though — he jumps around a bathtub like crazy, so it takes two adults to hold and to bathe him.

Arosha is still not eating solid food well. Not sure if he is not ready yet, or if I just can’t find the right food, but at best he eats about 2 oz of puréed fruits or veggies and about the same amount of whole grain cereal a day. On bad days I manage to feed him a teaspoon or two of whatever food I have for him.

We had a little accident about a week ago. Arosha and I were sitting on the living room couch, when he suddenly turned, lost his balance and fell face down on the sharp edge of the coffee table. I beat myself up for not reacting in time and for not putting a soft padding all around the stupid table. He split the skin a little below his lower lip. There was a lot of blood and crying involved, and I got really scared. Good thing that Daniеl’s dad was around, so he came and checked the cut out. He said that it’s not too bad and advised us just to clean the wound and treat it with iodine. No stitches were necessary. Needless to say, we baby-proofed the table that same day. Arosha’s cut is still healing. I understand that things like this are quite common, and try to take it easy as everybody suggested. Still, it’s very hard to see your baby getting hurt.

I am sure there are other things that I am forgetting to mention, but it’s time to go to Daniеl’s parents and enjoy manti on occasion of the Mother’s Day! Happy holiday to all of us! And happy 9 months birthday to Aroshka!

P.S. Two days ago Arosha got his passport in the mail!

Время как всегда летит, и мои благие намерения то написать пост, то ответить на и-мэйлы обычно ничем не заканчиваются. Но вот пока есть пару свободных минуток (Арошка уложен, Даня едет с работы, гороховый суп на ужин сварен), так что приступим к делу.

Вот уже больше месяца прошло как уехала мама. Она всё ждала когда же Ароша научится ползать, сидеть, вставать, когда у него прорежется первый зубик… Совсем чуть-чуть не дождалась — как-то всё быстро случилось в течении последнего месяца.

Первые пару дней после того как Ароша научился вставать держась за мебель, были очень сложными — на ножках он держался совсем слабо, а падать еще толком не научился. Нельзя было отойти от него буквально на секунду, и приходилось подстраховывать падения, дабы он не ударился со всей силы головой об пол или, что гораздо хуже, об острый угол мебели. Кстати, мы купили специальные мягкие штуки для углов, и Даня даже одну из них на стол приклеил. Отвалилась эта вещь, наверное, дня через три (тот факт, что её поочередно пытались грызть то Шублик, то Арошка, наверное только усугубил ситуацию). Да и на все углы и твёрдые поверхности не наставишься мягких подкладок.

Через пару дней стояния Ароша стал крепче держаться ручками за опору (будь то мебель, чья-нибудь штанина, рука взрослого) и гораздо более мастерски падать — не вниз головой, как топор, а как-то больше на попу. Ну, бывают и до сих пор неудачи, но уверенности что у меня, что у него появилось больше, так что я могу оставить Арошу одного в комнате на непродолжительное время.

А вчера мы ходили на почту заказывать нам с Арошей пасспорта. Ура! Ура! Победа комара! Я зажала $75 за ускоренный процесс и теперь надеюсь, что нам это не вылезет боком. По телефону мне сказали, что вся процедура должна занять от 4 до 6 недель. Если государственные чиновники сделают своё дело как положено, проблем у нас возникнуть не должно. А вообще за два пасспорта мы заплатили что-то в районе $240.

Вчера была отличная погодка, так что вместо коляски для транспортации Арошки мы использовали Ergo baby carrier. Вообще удобная штука, я рада что он у нас есть. Я стала иногда выходить на продулки с Арошкой используя этот рюкзак — так как он всё равно не спит, то я не боюсь зайти с Арошишей в магазин, в аптеку или на почту за посылкой (когда он спит, в маленькие магазины заходить опасно — может проснуться). Обычно Арошка выдерживает в Эрго 40-50 минут, что для нас является прогрессом.

А еще у Ароши сейчас режется аж 3 зуба — два нижних посерединке, и один вернхний (средний слева). Пока они едва видны, но если Арошка покусывает меня за палец, то я чувствую их остренькие кончики.

Вот такие вот у нас Ароше-новости. Еще он безобразничает во время еды — всё время плюётся. Просто ужас! На днях я даже расплакалась от какой-то усталости по поводу еды (просто тяжело пытаться кормить плюющегося ребёнка каждый день). Воду он тоже не пьёт — ни из чажечки, ни из ложечки, ни из бутылочи. Даже не знаю как приучать. Еще я купила горшок и пытаюсь Арошку на него иногда высаживать, но он от этого дела не в восторге, так что пока что результаты нулевые. Даже не знаю — может, подожду еще пару месяцев если так же будет идти и дальше.