Dear Lilah,
You are WAY past nine months old now. In fact, you are ten months old, as of yesterday. But, as you know, your mother is nothing if she isn’t a total slacker. It isn’t that I don’t enjoy writing letters to you. Really. It is that between you insisting on trying to pound away at my laptop while I am doing so, and the miniscule amount of time I have without you attached to me, I am unable to do a whole lot of anything these days.
You are getting so big. I was at one of my check-up appointments the other day and there was a woman there with a baby who she “claimed” was 8 weeks old and weighed 11 pounds and I could barely remember you being that tiny ( say “claimed” because I swear to Cheesus, that baby was so small. SO SMALL). You are so full of personality now and you really are a little person and not at all like that little meatloaf that you were when we brought you home from the hospital. It is so strange to think you have changed so much. And also to think that, in just a few months, we will have another meatloaf. And this time it will have a tiny penis. Weird. Anyway, you shouldn’t concern yourself with such things. You just concentrate on being super cute and deliberately spitting on everything in a 20 foot radius of you.
You are not a crawler. And not because you can’t, mind you, but because having to crawl to get somewhere really pisses you off. I wonder if I am the only mom out there scratching her head on this one. I have seen you do it and I know that you are capable, but yet, for some reason, you would rather get in baby plank pose, scoot yourself about a foot backwards and then get super angry and start to screech. I am not as worried that you are behind in development as that you are going to be lazy until your brother is born and then take giant leaps when I don’t have the time or the energy to pad the entire house for you to fall all over.
You say things like “mama” and “dada” but I am pretty sure you don’t yet know that you are saying our respective names. Your dad, however, insists that you say “duck” when it is bath time. (You do have a rubber duckie or two that we have in there with you when Daddy bathes you, but I am not sure that I buy that you are yet calling them ducks. Not because I think you are a dummy, but because I haven’t heard this and your dad has a hearing problem. Meaning he hears what he wants to. And this applies to everyone, not just you.)
You love eating. You are indiscriminate completely about food unless I try to give you peas. Peas and carrots? “Sure, Mom! Bring it!” Peas by themselves? “No way, Mom, get that shit out of my face.” You should know that peas are delicious and you should eat them. Don’t listen to your dad when he talks about how gross they are. He doesn’t know what he’s talking about. You especially love strawberries, pears, and green grapes. All three of my favorite fruits. And we have them just about every day for a snack together and it is really amusing for me to watch you master your dexterity and pick up tiny pieces of slimy stuff. Half of the time, most of it ends up in your lap, but I enjoy watching you stuff your face on the off-chance that you make it in there. (You are totally getting good at it, though. At first, I doubted that you had gotten ANY fruit into your mouth, now I only find a couple of slivers in your lap and on the floor…Good work, my love.)
You are still a really weird sleeper. We attempted to do this thing called “sleep training” wherein your father and I would train you about when and how to sleep on your own. What ended up happening was that you ended up training me and your father on how to sleep with you wrapped around our faces. We are about to start this process again because it is really important to me to have you in your own bed/room before your brother gets here and keeps me up all night. In fairness (to me), it would have been pointless to go full force with sleep training if we were just going to uproot you, which we just did when we moved to this new house. So…yeah. I don’t suck as much as it might seem.
You are also working on getting tooth number 7. And let me tell you, Lilah, teething is a total bitch and you OWE me for this. Like, when you turn 18, you are going to need to buy me a kitten for each tooth that you have. Okay, that’s not a good idea. But I will think of something for you to do. Because this shit is DUMB. (And also makes your sleeping WORSE. Yes. That is possible, it would appear.)
So, again, I am sorry that I was a slack ass during your ninth month, but we had a lot going on. I mean, be for real, we had to move so that we had room for your brother and so that you didn’t catch disobedience and general badness from your cousin. I’m just saying. By the time you read this, you will know exactly what I mean. No need to get too involved. Either way, your father and I are very proud of you. You crack us up every day and you are so effing cute with your growing front teeth and your chubby, delicious cheeks. We can’t get enough of you. You are the love of my life. Duh.
Love always,
Mom
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Broken Condoms 
“What ended up happening was that you ended up training me and your father on how to sleep with you wrapped around our faces.” This one really cracked me up!
It’s funny cause it’s true…lol
Exactly.
Where the heck did our little meatloaves go? Remember when we blogged exclusively about morning sickness and not knowing how we would ever pull off this mothering thing? Now our kids are eating grapes. And mine’s walking. Sheesh.
RIGHT?! I mean, this is not to say that I couldn’t still be blogging about morning sickness. Because I really could, the other day I almost threw up in the freezer. And I am already 28.5 weeks along. So, morning sickness is alive and well over here. But I digress…
But yes, where has the time gone? All of our kids are doing things! Like, that actual PEOPLE do! WTF?
I’m so glad I’m not the only one whose child trained them instead of the other way around
I keep telling myself I need to start again, but she just REFUSES to sleep in her bed. She wants to be all warm and snugly with mommy and daddy and it’s just so darn cute…
And don’t feel bad about doing your 9 month letter at 10 months. When Ayden looks back on her baby pictures, she’s going to ask what happened to the 9 month one. The only answer I’ll have is ,”Your mom is totally lazy and didn’t take one.” Ugh.
My baby won’t sleep anywhere but RIGHTNEXTTOME, and she won’t eat any food besides bananas and breast milk so yeah. At least you’re doing okay on the food front. ! 🙂 I love these letters, by the way.
my co-worker’s son doesn’t crawl.he pulls himself up enough to get what he wants and that’s it. If it’s too far, he’ll streeeeeetch out his arm as far as he can (like he’s using the Force or sth) or until it’s within finger touching reach. I want to see the butt scooch!
Reading this, gives me such warm fuzzy feelings, while here is my little one,no longer a meatloaf himself, but a full-fledged house runer that refuses to fall asleep anywhere except in the living room. We gave up on the training, I did not wanted him to hate his craddle, now, he at least don’t make a fuss about being carried there and finding himself there in the morning. I do feel sad tho a bit, I am reading everywhere,including here, babies eating strawberries, while I was explicitly told babies can’t eat nothing red till 1 year old,so I was denying my son strawberries, I dont know now if I was right or wrong, but heck, at least he eats them now!
Lilah is lucky to have her life documented in such a great way. Way to go! She is lucky to have so much love.
Yay!!! You’re pressed!
I’m so excited!!! I did a little dance while I was making breakfast for the old man (who still hasn’t hit me with any golf clubs OR thrown any feces at me, total score, btw.) !!
Um… we are talking about your SigOther, right?
Haha! No, sorry, that was unclear! The dude that I am working for…you know, my little half-job thing for the dementia patient…lol
Ahhh! ~Phew~ Big sigh of relief…
But no, my husband ALSO hasn’t tried to hit me with golf clubs or thrown any feces at me. Knock on wood.
This is so funny! You think 9 (or 10) months go by fast, just wait until they hit school age…seriously, my 3 are in high school & college. I feel like they were all just in the meatloaf stage!
This is a completely terrifying thought! I just can’t imagine!!!
You think that you’ll be a parenting expert, but when the next one comes, you’ll learn that he is COMPLETELY different and will have different rules for you and dad to abide by. Lol. Congrats on the little ones and thanks for sharing this nice letter.
Oh, I have NO illusions that I will be an expert! Ha! I am actually preparing myself completely for this new little guy to be his sister’s total opposite because, I mean, I could NEVER have it easy enough for them to be anything alike! Then I would have some sort of a clue!
Thanks for reading!!!
We have a 9 year old girl and two little boys, 4 and 1. I get a chuckle every time momma calls from upstairs about one of the boys. Just FYI, it’s almost always a penis related inquiry or incident. Good luck! Lol.
HA!!! That will definitely be interesting! Oh goodness, what am I getting myself into?! I don’t know anything about penis related injuries!!
I love the meatloaf analogy and, apparently, Lilah’s hatred of peas and your love of her has earned you a fresh pressing. Congrats.
Thank you, thank you!!!
Lol. I just loved this post. I have a six month old niece, and can identify with some of the things here, though I am sure her parents would identify more. 😉
And oh, those chubby chubby cheeks. Enough said!
Congrats on the Press!!! Well deserved, and Lilah is lucky to have you.
Thank you! I thought this day would never come! HA!
This is such an awesome post! Love how you are writing letters – hillarious about the sleep training btw – my son is 16 months and is refusing to be sleep trained. On going battle! Good luck
Awesome post!’!!! And lol, some babies don’t crawl. I started walking directly, as did my sister. Neither of us had a crawling stage lol.
Awesome post! Kids are fantastic, but parenting is hard!! mine are 6 and 8 already! Keep the humor in parenting, its exactly how I get through it 🙂
Great post! Your meatloaf will be so happy to read this when she is older. In fact I bet she’ll love it more because you slacked off then was so fantastic in catching up.
Loved reading this! I am the next stage on, in parenting, and this post brought it all back! Loving, honest and humorous.
Lovely, fun, authentic
I promise you, not only will Lilah not sleep with you forever, she won’t even want to sleep at home in a few years! First it’ll be sleep-overs with friends, then sleep-away camps, and before you can blink a sleep deprived eye she’ll be away at college. I wanna to break this to you as gently as possible… if I’ve learned one thing from raising my two sons (now age 17 and 21) it’s that no matter how old they are we sleep with them metaphorically wrapped around our faces all our lives.
such a great post…am an aunt and my nephew keeps rolling into me all night…
when i have to make him sleep, i always end up sleeping before him…
thanks for sharing your experiences, good luck for the babies…
Super duper cute!!!! I don’t have kids yet, but lots of my friends have little ones. Every time we get together, we talk about things like this. (Well, they do… I do a lot of listening, mostly.) Anyway, this was awesome. Congrats on being pressed! This definitely deserved. it. 🙂
Love this! I may steal this idea and write letters to my own kids when I have them as its a lovely thing to do. This is one of my favourite things I have read on Freshly Pressed so far.
Haha. This is so funny! Love it. Thanks for a good laugh.
Gosh 10months and still having a baby attached… I was hoping this would get better and I’m only 6 weeks down the line of baby 2! Baby 1 (now 4) was early so she spent her first month in an incubator and didn’t need help being soothed… Easy baby!
I really enjoyed reading this, it was humorous and heart warming! I am guilty of not writing my little one nearly enough and most all of the letters I have written start out with something like ” sorry I have not written for so long, but we have been soooo busy”. The whole sleeping delima is a hard one, everyone will give you loads of advice but I cant really…not because I don’t have any but because you don’t know me from adam, you havent asked, and why the heck would you listen to me anyways! Regardless, I wish you all the best as you discover the things that work best for you and I pray you have a healthy and safe second delivery! God bless, and thatnks again for the laughs.
Wow love this post! I can totally relate! So funny and I admire you; sounds like you have your hands full! Best of luck and everything else!
You are so funny and makes me laugh, thank you for sharing and inspiring me to write a letter or letters to my baby too. It will be fun for our children to read once they can understand what we think, feel, but it may take some time, perhaps few years down the road. Thank you so much!
Its funny, its cute, its loving !!
Really nice, I am so sure your daughter will love this.
This is so cute and adorable. Kind of makes me want one haha 🙂
Haha this is awesome, even for those without babies. Great read.
A GREAT WRITE!
You… I like you, I may even have a slight blog writing crush on you… This is an awesome letter. Oh and sleep training, yeah…didn’t happen with my twins. As long as they slept, I was happy.
Reblogged this on Oyia Brown.
Hey. love the blog. I think your baby might not be crawling because you get her everything she needs, why crawl when all I have to do is act like a plank? She sounds like she has you well under her thumb. This is not a bad thing btw.
Too cute!
Your daughter will laugh so hard when she’s older and reads this.
Perfection!
Don’t count on Baby L sleeping in her own room and own bed after baby brother arrives. We often had two adults and four kids in one full size bed. I swear, they just could not sleep without touching one of us. I remember waking up one morning and moving to the couch, just so I could breathe. I like your writing style & you made this mom of older kids and young adults laugh out loud!
My My! What a hilarious REAL take on exactly what happens with a new meatloaf. I have a later in life “surprise blessing” (#3) and can sooo relate to the twisted, effed up set of circumstances you can find yourself in at any given moment. Love your style! Best of luck with your penis-sporting meatloaf. It is the BEST to have at least one of each!
Wonderful blog! I couldn’t document the 9-10 months better. Your doing a beautiful thing for your child, I wish I had the energy to document it! 😉 I look forward to reading the toddler years…
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