Alexander Benjamin turned nine months old recently. We took him to the doctor, who says he's still a healthy, healthy boy. There is *some* cause for concern, insofar as his weight has dropped relative to his height. He's gone from being a 90th percentile (or so) in height and weight compared with other kids his age to being 75th percentile in height and 55th in weight. I think this is because he tries to eat everything but food. Go figure.

Just a day or two ago, he became an expert at getting into everything that we'd rather he not. He's learned how to take my records off the shelf and out of their jackets and drool on them while we're not paying attention. He has figured out how to unspool a roll of toilet paper, how to flush a toilet (lots of fun! big noise!), how to unshelve books, how to press buttons on the CD carosel to make it spin around and around, and how to climb up the stairs. Oh, and another recent behavior change is that he no longer likes to lie still when we change his diapers. He gets quite upset about it, actually. He'd rather stand or crawl. Very frustrating for mom and dad.

We've been signing certain words to him for a couple months now, but he's not signing them back to us yet. He is, however, expanding his vocabulary of sounds. Taking a cue from his dad, he will now bounce his finger up and down between his lips and say, "Brbrbrbrbrbrbrbrb."

When we took him to the doctor, they ran through a series of routine questions:

"Is he pulling himself up to a standing position?"

"Yes."

"Does he work his way around the coffee table in a standing position?"

"Yes."

"Does he clap his hands or clap toys together?"

Uh-oh.

Is our child somehow defective? He hasn't clapped! "Well, no, Doctor, but he does splash in the pool with his hands, and none of the other kids at swimming class do that." (Okay, I'm kidding -- I didn't actually say that.)

Well, as it turns out, he started clapping just a couple of days ago. So I guess we can rest assured that, his bizarre eating habits aside, he's doing quite well. Yee-ha!