eight months.

Ethan is eight months old today. As plans for his first birthday party start to come into focus, I find myself utterly in awe and disbelief that he's this old already. Gone are the days of newborn clothes so tiny that they appear to be made for dolls and here are the days of trying to figure out how my not quite crawling child has brought a handful of clothing hangers inside his ballpit. Eight months is proving to be an age already full of unpredictability and surprises.
At eight months, Ethan is feverishly learning to pull himself up on the bars of his crib and the sides of the couch. Being in the standing position is his favorite thing to do, the smile unable to be wiped off of his face until the moment his legs quiver and he plops himself down into the sitting position. He's still trying his hardest to master crawling, something that both captivates and frustrates him and sucks up all of his attention and determination. He has mastered scooting sneakily around on his belly, figuring out how to spin himself in the direction he needs to be to grab hold of my Blackberry or whatever else he has his eye on. Eight months is the age of unstoppable determination.

He's still a big boy, fully in 12 month clothes at this point and holding strong in his size four diapers. His sleep schedule is becoming just that -- a schedule -- and it's becoming a rarity that he wakes up at all during the night. At eight months, his favorite foods are zucchini, plums and apples, greenbeans and lentils and, most recently, YoBaby organic yogurt. He enjoys trying to feed himself, though it takes a couple of tries before he successfully figures it out, and is starting to seek out more independence than he previously wanted or needed. He's filled with his own opinions, desires and wants, and it's been so incredible watching them play out as he continues to develop his own personality.

He is a busy boy, too, what with his My Gym class, swimming lessons and our Stroller Strides class along with the occasional playdate here and there, but we always make time to snuggle up together and read stories. Those fleeting moments of tranquility as we lay in bed or sit on his glider and turn the pages of our favorite storybooks are my favorite moments of every day. Ethan is also busy developing his own strange sense of humor and once he starts laughing, there's nothing that can curb that laughter. Case in point, there is a collage of photos we had taken of Ethan back when he was a month or two old. He thinks these photos are absolutely hilarious and we can't walk past the wall it hangs on without stopping to smile and laugh at the photos of Ethan "back when he was a baby." At eight months, he has totally found his voice and is constantly singing, babbling and screaming. We have some pretty awesome conversations, of course.

Just when I think it can't get any more fun or incredible, Ethan proves me wrong. I really don't know how anything could be better than this. Life with an eight month old is pretty great.