Ava---7 months

too fast.  it's going too fast.  my boy is not a baby and will be three and my baby girl is growing so fast.  it's unreal.  we've already been with this little soul for more than half a year?!  i already miss her as a newborn, how crazy is that?  i was looking at a video of her (because that's what i do, like an insane person, is look at pictures and watch videos of my kids when they go to sleep), when she was only a couple days old and it literally made my heart ache.  really, i love this age range, the 6-9 months age because they are so stinking cute, laughing and babbling and sitting but not yet walking or crawling or getting into stuff.  she is really showing us her personality---still mostly chill and happy but sometimes impatient and sensitive.  she gets frustrated when she tries to do something but can't, like if she wants to reach for something or tries to move on her belly to get a toy but can't quite physically do it, she gets sooooooooooo mad!  she starts screaming and crying, haha.  mostly in frustration but sometimes it's a sad cry.  she is sensitive to loud noises, they scare her, and has become a little overly reactive to her big brother.  recently he knocked her down a couple times on purpose when she was sitting up, and sometimes he just runs over her or knocks into her accidentally because he is a big, free-range toddler, so she has become nervous when he gets too close now.  i'm not really sure what to do about that besides keep trying to make z watch where he is going, but i imagine that she will get over it as she gets bigger.  she has had a cold for the past two weeks, so she has been a little extra cranky at times, although she still smiles through her coughs and sneezes.  i swear, she has had more colds in her 7 months than z had in his entire first two years.  i'm assuming it's because she was born in the winter, and is therefore more susceptible to the viruses going around, but man, it's rough.  i guess she will have a tough immune system. 

she is sitting like a champ, every once in awhile she will just fall over, which is kind of funny because her head is the heaviest thing on her body so all of a sudden she just goes over and thump! but also kind of sad when she bonks her head on the ground.  she has figured out that if she arches her back she can kind of squirm around and move that way.  she rolls all over, even when i am trying to change her diaper or clothes, she is constantly trying to roll away.  one day, i sat her on the floor kind of near her bouncy activity chair thingy, and when i came back into the room a few minutes later, she must have scooted on her butt over to the bouncy chair and she was holding onto the side support pole trying to pull herself up.  also, my mother in law was giving her a bath and said miss baby pulled herself up to standing by holding onto the side of the bath.  she loves to stand and is really trying to pull herself up.

she is becoming more interested in different toys now, so i'm starting to pull out the blocks and she really likes z's wooden tool box and tools, she loves watching z's thomas the train go around the track and she tries to catch the train and pick it up when it zooms past her.  she loves the musical instrument box that we have, especially the shakers.  she will pick up the egg shaker, and of course she shakes her arm around to make the noise, but she also will hold her arm still and while holding the egg shaker in one hand, she flicks her wrist, bending it so that her hand moves up and down to shake the egg.  it's so cute!  and genius!  haha.  she also really likes the tiny piano, banging on the keys.  oh and she loves to open boxes, containers, and cabinet doors.

she is a full month and a half into solids.  i have been introducing more foods now, like bone broth, brown rice cereal, spinach, egg yolk (cooked), fresh raspberries, quinoa, small mushed up flakes of fish filet, fresh pureed blueberries, she has tasted pineapple and strawberries.  she even had pureed adas polo, which is a persian rice dish with raisins and lentils.  she actually liked it, haha!  she tried some chicken but i had only a small amount, too small to put in the blender or processor, so i just cut it into super tiny pieces but she did not like the consistency at all, so the next time i make her some chicken i need to make enough to blend.  my mother in law had a great idea to just throw some meat, veggies and broth into a pot with some barley or rice, cook it all up and then blend it for her.  that way she kind of gets everything in one.  i am also interested in just cooking up some veggies and fruits so that they are really soft and let her practice picking them up and putting them in her mouth and chewing, kind of baby led weaning style.  so we'll see how that goes.  and i'll continue to add more foods into her menus, she seems to be doing just fine with the ones we have introduced so far.

oh and she has started to add more consenant sounds into her babbling, like dadadada, mmmmammmm, babababa, bllllll, stuff like that.  she grunts, too, like when she is frustrated.

overall this month, it seems like she is really working on physical stuff; using her hands to grab everything, pulling herself up, pulling objects towards her, balancing on her bum, manipulating her tongue and mouth to make new sounds, wiggling and rolling all over.  i'm actually kind of excited for her to crawl even though it means i'll be on double duty as far as mobile children go.  but i feel like she probably won't be crawling for another two months or so.

her sleep is a little better, too.  she pretty much takes about two naps per day, maybe around an hour or so, and sometimes a shorter cat nap.  this generally only works if i keep her on her normal schedule, but gets interrupted if we are out and about or have company.  i changed up her bedtime routine, too, so that i am nursing her for night around 7:30pm and then she usually falls asleep between 8:30-9pm.  then she wakes up twice per night to nurse and sleeps until around 7-7:30am.  i am not sleep training right now.  however, i will start to put her in her crib for naps and maybe if i can figure out the timing of it, i can nurse her in the evenings and hubby can put her to sleep and i will put z to sleep.  maybe that will help her to sleep better since hubs doesn't have the milk.  he is able to put her to sleep really well.  so we'll see if i can figure it out.

-feeding: still nursing every two hours or so in the day and twice at night, and eating more solids as mentioned above.  although in the last couple of days i feel like she hasn't been actually drinking that much milk when she nurses.  maybe she is, and she is just nursing for shorter amounts of time because she is more efficient, which happens at some point, but i don't know.  she is very easily distracted when she nurses, which is different than z, he would just nurse and get his fill and be done

-growth: at her 6 month appointment last month she was just under 14 lbs and 26 inches long, so she is in the 10th and 16th percentiles, respectively, for weight and height.  so, yea, she's still a petite little thing, but healthy and growing.  she still fits all of her 6 month stuff, and some 3-6 month pants

-development: i put a lot of this info above, very grabby, much more physical this month as far as movement, kicking, rolling, trying to pull herself up, very alert, interested in all sorts of new things

-sleep: talked about this above, too, sleeping pretty well, better than a couple months ago thank goodness!

-temperament: mostly happy and smiley but gets upset quickly.  just today, i was feeding her some peas and sweet potato, and i gave her some sips of water from a cup, which she just loves, and when i pulled the cup away and brought the spoon of food to her mouth she got so upset and basically screamed at me until i brought the cup back for her to sip from.  i wasn't sure if this was a fluke so i did it a couple more times and she reacted the same, so she was definitely letting me know she was done with eating and just wanted to sip the water, haha, it was great. she also gets scared quite easily, like yesterday she was sitting up just fine, playing with toys, and she grabbed something that was kind of caught on another toy, and she pulled hard, and when the toy was free she kind of started to fall back a little bit until she caught herself, but the look on her face was so sad, she was scared, and she started crying, sweet little one

-likes: cuddling with mama, drinking water from a cup, playing with new toys, opening things like boxes, playing with musical instruments, her grama, baths, being outside, being held

-dislikes: being put down, being cold or having anything cold touch her skin, sitting still to get diaper changes and clothing changes, when z comes too close to her now unfortunately she gets nervous, not being able to do something that she wants to do or have something that she wants to have

-me: went to the doctor recently so i'll be writing about that in another post :)

but this little moosh is so delightful and i really enjoy watching her grow!