9 months old!

Today, we celebrated Davis turning 9 months old by taking a day off of work and going to the aquarium with Grandma and Grandpa.  Davis had a fantastic time watching the divers feed the loggerhead sea turtles in the giant ocean tank.  I supported him on the ledge around the tank while he talked, pointed and laughed at the turtles and divers.  He didn't even notice when I took my hands off and he stood by himself for the first time.   It helped that he was in his first pair of real shoes which have helped him stand with a lot more stability.  He has been getting close to doing this at home, but he is usually too distracted by a toy to stay in one place long enough.

After a snack, we headed up to the touching tank where we spent some time touching star-fish and the slimy rocks under water.  It was a little hard to get Davis close enough to the water, but he seemed to enjoy sticking his hands in the water.  We were both a little worried he would grab something, or poke too hard, but he did great and seemed to enjoy himself.

We had lunch at the Faneuil Hall marketplace before trucking a tired baby home for a nap.  During his nap, I installed his new carseat and weather proofed a few windows.  The rest of the day was spent playing, weatherproofing and enjoying Davis and having Grandma and Grandpa visiting.  Kristen hemmed a few of Davis' pants so he his now able to crawl and pull himself up without standing on his pants.

Besides standing for the first time, he has been making huge strides with his motor control.  Friday, he clapped for the first time and has already  progressed from simply banging one closed fist into the other, to having one hand open while he moves them together. Grandpa taught Davis how to smash balls the balls in one of his Christmas presents with a hammer (that is the idea of the toy) and he seems able to pick things up very quickly.

We have continued to work with signs.  Our usual signs are: food, cat, more, touch-no, mom and dad.  Yesterday when I was feeding Davis, he gave what I interpreted to be the sign for cat when Domino and Lilly jumped on the table while he was eating dinner.  With his motor control still being coarse grained, it wasn't exact, but it was pretty thrilling none the less.  We think some of his clapping may be the sign for more (they are pretty similar and he claps a lot at dinner).

Here are a few pictures from the day:

At the tidal pool:

Reaching for something in the tidal pool:

Slimy rocks might have been the most interesting thing to touch:

Playing at home:

I also created a time-lapse video of us playing from our ceiling fan.