8 months

it's hard to believe our baby girl is 8 months old! she's now crawling all over the place. she loves to follow quinn around and he has fun taking her "to the benture" (on adventures) around the house. and let me tell you, she gets into EVERYTHING! just like her brother, she makes a break to try to get into bella's food and water anytime she's nearby. she likes to pull on plants and play in the dirt. and for some reason she loves to carry around baby wipes, cleaning the floors as she crawls around the house. i'm not complaining about that one! she has recently learned how to crawl up steps and just in the past couple of days she's started trying to stand up from her hands and knees, though she has yet to actually stand upright without holding on.

caroline has started babbling and even saying some words - "mama" (her first word!), "dada", "buh buh" sometimes for bye bye, and my dad claims that she said "hi, papa" several times today. it seemed like just overnight she went from just screeching and not even trying to babble to saying words intentionally. her favorite sound, though, is pretty funny. when she gets excited she will bounce up and down, smile and scrunch up her nose, and breathe really hard and fast out of her nose. if you do it back to her she gets even more excited and does it even louder. she thinks she's pretty funny!

last weekend she waved goodbye for the first time to grammy and grandpa. and when she's tired she does this goofy wave where she holds her left arm up, waves her hand, and then dives over sideways with her whole body. that's actually one way you know she's sleepy and delirious and ready for a nap or bedtime. she's pretty predictable when it comes to wanting to go to sleep - first her eyes start to look tired, she she does the waving/diving sideways business, then she starts rubbing her face on your shoulder when you're holding her. if you catch the signs and put her to bed, she's a happy camper.

miss caroline is eating 2-3 solid meals/day and so far has liked everything she's tried. she eats oatmeal, nectarines, pears, peas, green beans, bananas, peaches, prunes, apples, sweet potatoes, and avocados. she's started eating puffs and loves them, which also means that she's highly frustrated by them because she isn't very good at getting them in her mouth yet. if i put a handful on the table in front of her, she goes after them with both hands until she has two fists full of puffs. then she starts sucking on her hands, trying to get them out. sometimes she gets lucky, but most of the time she just gets frustrated! 

one thing that has not changed is that she continues to be super clingy and have quite a bit of stranger anxiety. last sunday she moved up to a new class at church. when we left, she was playing happily on the floor and we were hopeful that she would enjoy being with the older kids (8-12 months instead of the newborns) and would actually be happy. however, about halfway through the sermon a message popped up on the screen..."will the parents of the child with number 6DC please come to the nursery". of course we were 6DC. so unfortunately the new class was not any better. but we'll keep trying and hopefully someday she'll be able to survive a whole church service without us. :)

our baby girl is such a happy, playful, snuggly, sweet girl. she loves her big brother and they giggle constantly when they play together. she's curious and she loves to chase bella. she's still a great sleeper: she takes 2 naps/day of about 3 hours total and sleeps about 11 hours at night. sweet caroline is such a blessing to our family and we love her so very much!!

happy 8 month birthday, caroline. we love you!

and, just for fun, here's Quinn at 8 months. you'll notice one major similarity...