Pool

Hanging out at the pool while mom works out!

Namaste

Tegan has been learning lots of new tricks lately.  One that has been a big hit with folks here is when she brings her hands together for the Nepali greeting "namaste" after she hears someone say it.  It's pretty adorable.  The nanny must have been working on it for awhile with her.  She also waves at every hello or goodbye opportunity.

Today she decided that she no longer needs to hold on to furniture while standing up.  Today she was playing with a block while squatting and just stood up without holding on to anything, and brought the block with her!  Later as she was cruising around the furniture she'd stop to play with something and just let go for extended lengths of time, of course making me nervous she would fall and hit her head.  She didn't though.  We're going to have a walker before we know it!  And all this learning (and teething - she's up to 5 now) explains the terrible time she's been having sleeping.  I'm just sure though after mastering that whole standing-up-on-her-own thing she's going to sleep great!

Under My Thumb

T and Dave busting out a little Rolling Stones on the Xylophone 

Latest face

Tegan has started making what we call the snarl:

Yum - green beans

Tegan has learned it can be fun to spit food, squish it around your face, and make it ooze off your tongue, but today when I put green beans in front of her for the first time in their non-pureed form she ate them right up without taking a break, and kept them in her mouth!

And thank goodness our shipment arrived last week - feeding this girl without a high chair was becoming very difficult!

9 months

Likes:

• Crawling!  Yay - she figured it out just hours after we left Oregon for Nepal, during our layover in Houston.  She still appears to favor standing and trying to walk over crawling.
• Taking a few falling steps towards dad or mom.  Not really walking, but so darn close
• Showing off her teeth with big smiles - two bottom teeth and a top one poked through our on the 1st.
• Playing phone by holding her toy phone, our iphones, or even a toy monkey up to her ear
• Screeching when happy and sad - yeah, fun on those 35 hours of travel from Oregon to Nepal!
• Clapping
• Eating, still loves fruit and needs to be convinced to actually eat those veggies and not just play with them.  Cheerios are also a favorite.
• Drinking from a straw
• People - she smiles at everyone and anyone all the time
• Visiting mom and dad at work at lunch time

Dislikes:

• Being too far from mom or dad when we're getting ready in the morning
• Really has started putting up a fight at nap and bed time - pushing away with arms and legs - until she gives up and collapses

Nepali love

Folks here looooove Tegan!  They look, point, smile, make noises, touch her cheek, and reach to hold her everywhere we go.  Of course she loves them right back and never fails to give them a big smile.