9 months old

Elizabeth is 9 months old today and becoming very independent. She is crawling everywhere, walking along furniture, pushing objects around (such as chairs) and standing up all by herself for short periods of time. We call her the monster baby because she is constantly into everything and our new favorite word is "NO" which she pretends to not understand (or maybe she really doesn't). Yesterday Alan found her playing on the floor with a grasshopper (I'm not sure how it got inside but it is not a surprise that she found it). Despite the mischief she is so much fun. She pretty much always has a smile on her face is constantly babbling. She waves bye-bye, claps her hands and bounces to music and says "dada." Here are some pictures of the mischief:

Exploring mom's purse.

And here she is trying to open the fireplace door. This is one of her favorite things to do despite being told no several times daily and placing a storage bin in front to attempt to block her.