Notes on Month 8

Mon petit Benjamin,

Since my last letter was so long-winded I'm going to make this one short.

The most exciting thing that happened during your eighth month is that you have started to communicate with us more clearly. No words yet — and it isn't clear to me that your mamamama's refer to me — but you learned to use your hands to clap, which is a lot of fun because you are so enthusiastic about so many things. You also learned how to wave hello and good-bye.

Hands are also good for finger food. When we first introduced finger foods, I was worried you would choke. It ends up that you spent a couple of weeks just pushing the cheerios around your table. Your papa helped you learn how to use your fingers — the "pincer" grasp — to pick them up and very quickly finger food changed from table hockey to something you could put in your mouth and chew. You really like to chew, which is a relief because it means you don't choke on your finger food. You love finger food.

During your eighth month you revealed your French roots by going on strike. Not a fall or spring in France goes by without some sort of strike, be it university or high school students, postal or public transportation workers. You went on a breast strike, meaning that feeding you was quite a struggle because when you don't want to do something you squirm and arch your back, grab things, and generally make yourself very hard to hold on to. You had a lot of bottles and cups of milk.

You also became fairly mobile, though still no crawling, just a lot of stretching and squirming your way forward (or backwards).

It's amazing to me how much you've changed since we brought you home. We re-introduced you to your jumperoo this month and it's amazing to see how differently you treat it:

[video coming soon]

OK, I said this would be brief, so I'll end here with the promise that month nine will be a real letter posted on time (or almost).

Bisous mon amour,
ta maman