you're ten months old {dear beautiful little lady}

Dear Quinny

Into double figures now baby girl... I'm not going to deny that it pulls at my heart a little bit that you're ten months old now. This time last year I was eagerly waiting to meet you for the first time, but also apprehensive about what life held in store with a newborn baby and two other children to look after... those feelings; the worry and the excitement, they feel like they were last week, and it just doesn't seem possible you can be ten months old already. 

When I wrote your last letter, it was all about your latest developments of crawling and kneeling up; but this month you're pulling up to standing and starting to cruise the furniture. In fact lately you've been letting go of the furniture quite a bit and trying out your balance with standing unsupported. At the moment you do it for a second or two before grabbing hold again or dropping to your bottom, but your keenness to be up and on the move make us think that you won't hang about when it comes to walking. Even just a few weeks ago if we held your fingers you wouldn't attempt to put one foot in front of the other, but you are doing it now. It's so funny seeing your excited face as we help you toddle across the room. 

You've become so much more vocal this past month too. No proper, understandable words yet; but a lot of babbling and constantly saying "dadadadada" and "yaya" to everything. And you'll have hilarious little baby talk conversations with your brother and sister now too. Before you were born they used to say that when you were born you'd say "googoo gaagaa" and make baby noises, and I think they were a little disappointed when you were first born and the only real noise you made was a cry. So they love that you are trying  to talk to them now. 

It's been an exciting month for you actually, where Dylan and Everly have been off of school and preschool for their summer break. You have quite simply adored having them around all the time. In fact I'm pretty sure you're going to find our quiet school mornings very boring coming September. Now that you are more mobile and have so much personality, the two of them are even more interested in you than they already were. They are always cuddling you, trying to make you laugh, tickling you, and picking you up and moving you around all over the place. I definitely have to step in a little more these days and remind everyone to be gentle; not that you need it, as normally while I'm busy telling them they need to be careful with you, you are busy giggling at their rough and tumble antics. I love that you all delight in each other so much, it makes me so proud.

I talked last month about how your sleep could be a little bit unpredictable and how getting you to bed wasn't always easy. Well this month we've made a bit of conserted effort to smooth out the sleep wrinkles a bit. You've always loved your sleep, but it just seemed a bit like you needed a helping hand in the right direction to get the right amount of sleep. With the amount of food you now eat in a day, and the fact you fed very little in the night if and when you did wake, I decided to simply cut any night feedings if you did wake up. It has worked out really well so far. The first couple of nights we had a little cuddle when you woke up once in the night (around 4ish), but I had you back in your cot within 10 minutes, which just reassured me that the waking wasn't about nursing in the slightest. And then on the third night, you slept though without any early morning wakings, which we knew wasn't out of the norm, because we knew that you did sleep through on occasion, but then you did it again, and again. I won't allow myself to think that you've totally cracked it just yet, as one late night seemed to put us back a bit, and some nights you can still be a pickle about going to bed where you get a bit overtired while I try to get the other two down. But we're going in the right direction... I hope.

I think it's probably the age that you are at, but you are going through a bit of a "mummy phase" where you can be a bit clingy in strange situations, and will cry to be handed back to me even when it's Daddy who is holding you. I know it's just the stage that you are at, and that you will more than likely grow out of this clingy phase of suffering from separation anxiety, so I am choosing to just enjoy it. I'm relishing being your favourite person. I'm loving the fact that no one else can cuddle and settle and soothe you quite like I can. I'm just breathing it in and locking it up in my memory. Because that's a mummy privilege I'd say. And because before I know it, you just won't need me quite so much and I know that I'll miss it.

The other day I watched back a video I made with you when you were a month old. I was talking about your soft brown hair that maybe looked a bit blonde, and how you had blue eyes that I knew would change to brown in the coming months so you'd be like your older siblings. It really made me smile to see how wrong I was, because you've turned out to be a total blondy, definitely the lightest of the three of you, and your eyes remain a bright shiny blue. It's cute really, because you, Dylan and Everly look so alike when you're together, but then when you look closely your eye colour difference really stands out; two complete ends of the spectrum - them with warm chocolate brown, and you with cool sparkly blue. I'm still not sure that they'll always be blue, although I'm happy to be proved wrong, my money would be on perhaps a green shade as you grow up, but we'll see. And at present your blonde hair looks like it's going to have a bit of a curl to it too, which I would secretly love, as my hair was curly at the bottom as a little girl. In fact you are definitely the most like me as a baby of the three of you, my own little mini me.

I love you Ashlyn Quinn, my little dream.

mummy x x x

You can read all of her previous monthly letters by going to her page here.

A tenth month in photos...