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Watch out - she'll eat anything.

Mira is eight months old now, and I think this may be one of my favorite ages. We're past the days of colic, waking three times a night, and no neck support, yet we're not at the point where she can run away from me, talk back to me, or climb on things too high for her to be on. She sits up now, entertaining herself with a few toys scattered around her. And she's crawling now, too. OK, maybe crawling isn't the right word. More like dragging herself forward in a modified army crawl with her arms while flopping her lower half around like a fish out of water for propulsion. It's not graceful, but it gets the job done.

But while she's charming and entertaining, she also requires more supervision. The past few days have left me exhausted as I've tried to keep her away from anything unsafe. It's as if she can sense danger and is immediately drawn to it: Oooh, look! A knitting needle! Wonder if I can poke it in my eye? Or maybe I can pull this chair over onto me! Hey, is that hard enough to bonk my head on?

And then there's her odd eating habits. Mira puts everything in her mouth. Everything. I'm sprouting new grey hairs from the worry she'll ingest something unsafe. Her favorite forbidden foods are Cordy's PB&J sandwich (trying to get that was the motivation for her first crawl), paper that she has pre-shredded for easier digestion, baby wipes, and carpet fuzz.  I'm officially an expert at the mouth finger sweep now, doing it at least once a day when she finds some small scrap of paper I forgot to remove from her general vicinity. I don't know why she finds these things so tasty - she won't eat green vegetables, but apparently paper is a delicacy that ranks high with ice cream?

There is never a moment to rest or relax when she is playing on the floor. All of the baby proofing in the world could not stop her from satisfying her curiosity and finding something she shouldn't be playing with. If there's nothing in the area to put in her mouth, she will scratch at the carpet to produce just enough fuzz, pausing to lock eyes and grin at me before slowly bringing the offending material to her mouth. I think she enjoys watching me dive from my chair to the floor just in time to snatch the carpet fuzz from her.

Are second children more spirited, or is it just Mira? I don't remember Cordy stressing me out as much when she was this age, and I know she didn't have quite the passion for eating non-food items as Mira. It's hilarious to see how fast Mira's baby radar can spot the one object she shouldn't have, even when surrounded by bright, stimulating toys.

I may be doomed when she starts walking. Paper eating will probably seem like nothing compared to the new and exciting ways she'll think up to keep me on my toes.