Niner!

How in the world did this little girl get this old so fast? She turned nine months old on the 11th and I am honestly freaking out. In my mind she's still a newborn.
I would like to apologize in advance for the fact that this post is going to be LONG and there will be very close to one million pictures. I could pretty much talk about Palmer all day every day.

I guess I'll start with her stats. She had her nine month check-up this morning. Just as I suspected, she's still perfect. She is 15 pounds 12 ounces, which is a little under the 25th percentile. She is 26 1/2 inches tall, which is close to the 20th percentile. Her head continues to grow at a Lyman rate - she's between 90 and 95th percentile for head circumference. That's my girl!
The following pictures were taken on her nine month birthday.





Palmer girl is busy busy busy! She does not like to hold still and she needs her toys to be rotated very regularly or else she gets bored. As long as you change her scenery often she is happy happy happy. Church is a very long and exhausting three hours. She's not one to just sit still and hang out on my lap. She twists all around and pulls herself up on the back of the pew and on chairs in order to see everything and everyone around her. Of course church starts right when she should be going down for her afternoon nap so she starts out tired and it gets harder and harder to keep her entertained for the whole three hours. She refuses to sleep in my arms. She'll sleep in a crib or pack-n-play and that's just about it. She did end up falling asleep in my arms about five minutes before church ended yesterday; I think she just got so tired that she could not fight it for one more minute. She is not a cuddler at all. She won't cuddle with me before I put her down to sleep. She just wants to be left alone in her crib. She won't rest her head on my shoulder for more than two seconds ever. There's a few laurels in young women's that have understandably fallen in love with Palmercita. They steal her from me every week and Palmer loves them back. Yesterday while Lindsey had Palmer she totally cuddled with her! She laid her head on Lindsey's shoulder and left it there for quite awhile! I was so jealous.

This child is laid back and just goes with the flow. She makes you earn her smiles and it REALLY takes a lot to get her to laugh, but when she does laugh it's the best sound in the world. Everyone always comments that she just seems so content. They are very correct, BUT in the last month she has started to develop a little attitude if she's bored or unhappy with her surroundings. She'll be sitting on the floor happily playing with toys and suddenly she'll scream LOUDLY and MADLY and just hold it until I do something to make her happier. It's very easy to get her happy again and then she goes right back to playing happily. She's happy to go to anybody and doesn't seem to feel any stranger danger. BUT she seems to be turning into a bit of a mama's girl. If she's with someone else, even Taylor, and she sees me walk by or hears my voice she'll start fussing and reaching for me. I love that she loves me, but I want her to be happy with others too. I can't be right by her side every minute of every day. Don't get me wrong though, this little girl really loves her daddy. She lights up when he walks in the door after work. She gets all excited and starts flailing her arms and squealing. She laughs the most for him.


I posted the above picture because of the drool ring on her shirt. This was the first time that I have ever seen her with a drool ring on her shirt. The second and last time that I've seen it was the next day. For this reason and others I was certain she was going to bust out with a tooth, but it hasn't happened. She's getting by just fine without teeth.


All of my family except Deco and Kera were down for my cousin's funeral and then Easter festivities. Palmer and Denver were so stinking cute together. They played lots and lots for the days that Denver was here. They shared toys and binkies and told each other some great stories.


Palmer absolutely loved having extra aunts and cousins to hang out with for a few days. She loves her Aunt Marilyn.

The above and below pictures are on Easter in her pretty Easter dress. I love playing dress-up with my little doll.

This year's Easter picnic was my favorite that I can ever remember. The weather was P-E-R-F-E-C-T! The food was delicious. The company was great. We went to Recapture Pockets, down near Bluff. This is where we've gone for Easter my whole life and where my dad used to go when he was a kid. It is the absolute perfect place for Easter picnicking. We had four-wheelers and the Razr for a little added fun. It was just such a good fun day.
Palmer and Denver hung out on this picnic mat and ate snacks and played with toys.

Lexi and Palmer love each other. Palmer never laughs for me when I tickle her, but she loved it when Lexi tickled her little tummy.
Kristi, Lexi and Scout keeping the babies company. Palmer just really loves her aunts, uncles and cousins.
Here's everyone waiting to take off into the rocks to find Easter eggs!

And they're off!

Palmer loved picking up the eggs...and then eating them :)



Palmer and Daddy had to sit down and rest after some strenuous egg hunting. It was pretty warm by this part of the day.
Yes, I'm that mom that didn't bring a basket for Palmer to put her eggs in, so we used a grocery sack instead. To be fair, she didn't mind at all and I didn't actually plan on her collecting her own eggs since I knew I would just end up eating all her candy. But everyone said that she had to hunt eggs with the rest of the kids so we took part. I was glad we did - it was really fun.

Heading back to check out their loot. Look at the rocks in the background. I challenge anyone to show me a better place for an Easter egg hunt.

Palmercita still has the most beautiful blue eyes. I absolutely love my pretty little girl. Her hair is growing slowly but surely, mostly on top. She sleeps great for the most part. She sleeps an average of 12 hours at night. Sometimes she fusses once or twice in the night, but gets herself back to sleep within a minute or two. Every once in a while she doesn't calm herself down so easily and I have the dilemma of whether or not to go comfort her. I am weak so I end up going to her if she cries for too long. Luckily that doesn't happen very often. She takes two good naps most days. Every once in awhile she'll take a short third nap if I think she really needs it for one reason or another. She's not crawling yet, but is getting better at scooting and pushing herself around. She still struggles with going forward, but is getting better at it each day. She loves to pull herself up on things and you can just tell that she thinks she's such a big girl as she stands there holding onto the couch or whatever it may be. She is still a great eater. She eats anything that I give her and she eats a lot of it! She went through a few days where she acted quite picky about what she would and wouldn't eat. She wouldn't eat some things that she had never had a problem with before. She got over that pretty quickly and she's back to eating everything I put in front of her. She used to prefer vegetables, but seems to be leaning towards fruits a little more now. Her least favorite is the protein/veggie combos I give her, but she has really warmed up to them and after a couple of bites she really seems to like them. She jabbers a lot. For a couple of weeks she said, "dadadada" almost exclusively. But for the last couple of weeks she mostly says, "mamamama." I know that they're just sounds to her but I love it so much! She started waving "hi" and "bye" a few weeks ago. I didn't even realize she was old enough to start teaching her such things, but my sister-in-law Heather told me she was probably about the right age for waving. So when I was leaving Heather's house she was waving goodbye to Palmer and sure enough she waved back! After that she waved at anyone that waved at her. She's gotten a little stubborn about it for the last week or so, but she'll still do it sometimes. She loves to play pat-a-cake and peekaboo. She also loves it when I stand and dance with her to music. She shakes her head and kicks her feet in excitement. She absolutely loves bath time. From the moment I set her in the water to the time I take her out she splashes splashes splashes! I usually end up drenched after giving her a bath. She loves it.

I really will do a post about the progress on our house soon. It's all framed up right now, except for the roof trusses which should come by the end of this week. Woohoo for progress!

I just thought I'd end with this little gem. She's just chilling with her sippy cup and a book.