did I catch a niner in there?

What are you calling from, a walkie talkie? Name that movie (hint: fat guy in a little coat). 

                           

So we celebrated Sydney's 9 month birthday a few weeks ago, which means she's 3/4 of the way through her first year. Haha. It's laughable, really. Parental cliche- time truly does haul it's little ass through our lives, doesn't it?

At her 9 month appointment, she was tipping the scales at 19lbs which puts her in the 75th percentile, 28" tall 76 percentile and head circumference of something or other that lands her in the 52 percentile. As you can tell, the whole head circumference is not high on my priority list. All in all, our little peanut is doing great! Her doctor eased my fears about her not crawling quite yet, and reassured me that "all kids develop at their own pace." Sure, sure, but when's she going to crawl already?! She was never one who took to the whole rolling or army crawl or any other mode of transportation. What if her legs don't work? What if her arms are too short (I don't know how that would ever be a valid concern)? WHAT IF? Ahhh and now I'm playing right, smack dab in the middle of the parent game. Worry, fear, anxiety, hooray. But alas, last Thursday (June 27th) we saw movement! One arm, then one leg, then another arm and another leg! The crawling motion happened. Fast forward 5 days and we have one mobile little lady. What an incredible thing it is, being able to watch your children learn such monumental developmental milestones. Watching their wheels turning, learning to trust in themselves and take action. It's incredible, really. And bittersweet. As with all of Sydney's milestones, there is always a tiny pang of melancholy that accompanies the joy and excitement. My baby is growing up. Tear.

The other day I was talking with a friend at work about her child, asking how he was doing and all I got from her was "good, he's doing really well." And I immediately went to "Of course, everything is perfect, perfect, perfect. Mom's never divulge the TRUTH. lies, perfect little lies." But then I thought about my own response when anyone asks about Sydney and it goes something like this "great, really, really great. she's pretty awesome." And I realized, that's truth. I'm absolutely telling the truth, because it is great. She is wonderful and we think she's pretty awesome. Sure there are the fussy moments, the tiring moments, the frustrating moments, but that's all they really are. Moments. They are part of the experience but just a tiny part. When I think of Sydney and being a parent, there is an automatic, rose-colored filter put on life. How could things not be great? Those other mom's aren't lying to try to beat me in some non-existent one-upping, who's got the better baby game (well maybe one or two are), but rather they're trying to find an ordinary word to describe the...uh-oh...here I go, I'm going to say it...extraordinary experience all of us parents understand.

And that? Is one girl's travel from a cynical, eye rolling single gal to emotional, sappy mess of a parent. 

 Because really, how could this not melt even the hardest of hards?