Nine months old

Nine months! About nine and a half months ago I was doing yoga with my big ol' Buddah belly hanging out, imagining my baby inside, sitting in yoga pose, enjoying all the big breathes and stretches as a gift of space as the walls of my belly closed in on her closer and closer by the day. Now she's here - and she's a little over nine months old. And she still enjoys yoga. She likes to sit and watch the poses, waving her arms back and forth, humming along to the Sat Nam mantra's as if on cue. I'm positive she remembers all of it.

Nine months - the time is so relative. Nine months of pregnancy, spent dreaming of who this new little person would be, what she would look like, how she would fit in as her own little being in this family. And then that same amount of time, after birth, watching your little one grow - it goes by in a FLASH! This month has been a biggie. One of her top teeth has started coming in (she got the first two bottom teeth in December) and we went from getting the feel of swallowing mushy rice cereal to full-fledged chewing motions now. She almost seemed insulted one morning when I mashed a banana. Her eyes were pleading, "bring on the chunks mama - I've got some teeth and I'm ready to use 'em". Pita bread, avacado chunks, pasta fagiola - she's conquered them all! She's also been studying everything we say and do with such intent and suddenly has a full repetoire of trained acts. Her arms go up for the "How big is Arianna?" question, she can clap her hands for dancing and cheering, and four days ago the backwards seal move gave way to a full-on forward crawl - INDEPENDENCE at last!!! Today she bee-lined right out of the "play room" and into the kitchen. She went under the kitchen table, checked on Kimo napping with a little tug of his ear then grabbed hold of the bar that runs underneath, and up she went into a stand!

That's it... in just a blink, her days of infancy are over and the limited view of her world has just opened up to a whole new adventure. I'm just hoping that all that yoga pays off and through the bumps and achievements ahead, she always stays grounded as she finds her favorite stars to reach for.