We decided to take advantage of the last of the warm weather to visit our local park for the first time. Juliette had a blast — plenty of fun things to do, like riding the rocking horse, playing on the see-saw with Mom and Dad, swinging on the swing, and sliding down the slide. Mom and Dad apologize for the poor photos, but we only had our phones on hand to snap the pictures.

Riding the rocking horse

“Higher, Daddy, higher!”

It seems that Dad’s end is a little too heavy.

Guess who’s nine months old already? It was just yesterday that we were snapping the eight-month photo…

Nine months old today!

Time for Juliette’s nine month check-up today, and she got a perfect report card. She tips the scales at 8.5kg (no wonder she feels so heavy when Dad carries her into daycare each day) and measures 71cm tall.

She had her first MMR vaccination today (mumps, measles, rubella), three months ahead of schedule. They vaccinate the kids our community ahead of schedule because of the large numbers of Swiss parents who opt out of vaccinating their kids — a decision which puts their kids as well as mine at risk. We are a generation that has forgotten what these terrible diseases look like.

The doctor was amazing. She distracted Juliette with a hopping wind-up toy and a music box, and gave her the vaccination without Juliette even noticing. I’d been bracing myself for a morning of tears and soothing, and instead I got a totally contented child who acted like nothing unusual had happened.

She’s been great all day, and is clearly not bothered at all by the vaccine. She’ll be nine months old in two days; I don’t know where the time has gone. You blink and you miss it.

Juliette’s gettin’ her hair did.

Happy as can be

Standing up. Practice makes perfect!

I’m a stand-up kind of girl.

Juliette’s always been able to stand up, from the very earliest days. But she never showed much interest in standing up herself.

Well, that’s all changed this week. On Wednesday, when she stays at home with Mom, she started to take her first (assisted) steps across the floor. And in the last day or two, she’s been pulling herself up every chance she gets. We first noticed when the baby-cam went blank (she’d managed to reach up and knock it to the floor). But now she seems to be standing every chance she gets.

Time to raise the bars on the crib, I think!

There have been accusations that Juliette has so many clothes that she never wears the same thing twice. I glanced at the picture on my phone, and noticed exactly the same picture staring back up at me. Proof positive that Juliette does, from time to time, wear the same outfit twice.

“Why yes, you have seen this outfit before…”

Juliette is still learning to sit up on her own. She’s getting better, but occasionally she loses focus and ends up toppling over.

We bought Juliette a set of safety mats to play on, so that when she falls over, she doesn’t bonk her head too hard on the stone floors. Unfortunately, we didn’t explain the concept to her, and she things that we’ve bought the world’s largest puzzle. It took her about ten minutes to work out how to disassemble the mat and use its various pieces for teething.

“Wow, this sure comes apart easily…”

“Can I get the whole thing in my mouth?”

“Great game! Thanks, Dad!”

The law of the playground can be savage sometimes! Apparently there was a dispute over a toy, and Juliette learned an important lesson. While possession may, in fact, be 9/10ths of the law — it turns out that the other 1/10th can be quite important if the other girl is bigger than you.

Looking tough! Check out my shiner…