7 months!

On 2/9 Ruby girl turned 7 months old.

-She's officially started sitting up (2/6)! It's the cutest thing. She is so content looking all around. It is a whole new world to her, and I love seeing her take it all in. Her siblings love to sit beside her and talk to her/interact with her. She must feel more accessible to them, too.

-She's eating rice cereal, sweet potato, carrots, bananas, and pears so far. She really seems to like baby food (cereal least and carrots most I'd say). I just feed her once-around the time we all eat dinner. I'll add a second feeding soon.

-In mid January I started working more consistently with her in the night to sleep (1/22). It seemed to be getting worse rather than better, so I had to do something! I started swaddling her below her armpits instead of her whole body and moved her to her belly (1/10). This didn't really help as much as I'd hoped, but I've kept her in this position. She is now going 6 hour stretches between feedings which doesn't sound great to me, but it's better than it was. She goes to bed around 7:30 and when she wakes up the first time (11 or so), I feed her. I consider this her late night feeding. Then I don't feed her again until around 5 or so. She usually wakes up around 2-3, but I don't feed her then. I was trying to pat her back to get her to sleep, but that was really difficult for me because she is sleeping in a pack and play, and I have to bend WAY over, which was no fun at 2 in the morning. Now I pick her up and she stops fussing immediately. I basically snuggle with her and sometimes fall asleep with her on the futon which is in the playroom where she is currently sleeping (she will move into her room once she starts actually sleeping thru the night). She settles immediately and the times I've tried to feed her, she doesn't even want to eat. Anywhoo....I get her back to sleep and then lay her back down. Sometimes she fusses a little, and I let her work it out. That is our routine right now, but I'm hoping soon she will be able to self-sooth and will go longer stretches.

-She is so vocal and is making all kinds of different noises. She "yells", pops her bottom lip, growls, says "dadadadadada", and makes a noise that Steven says sounds like an ewok. Now instead of just kicking her feet when she sees me, she will yell a long drawn out yell, too, (which Steven and I call her battle cry) and all the nursery workers get such a kick out of it. They say-oh, she had been so quiet! She sure does know momma!!

-She nurses great every 2.5-3 hours or so. She is constantly slapping or swatting with her free arm and loves it when I have strings or a necklace to play with while she eats. She still sucks in her bottom lip and you can see it moving as she sucks on her tongue. Sometimes I have to physically pull her chin to get her to stop when I'm needing to feed her-I try not to be offended! She gets in a pacified trance doing it and it is so funny and cute. It is her signature look, and we all love it. She also does a sweet little smirk when she is sucking her lip and doesn't want to let go but does want to smile.

-She loves the bath and even if she's ready for sleep and starting to get restless, she perks right up when she hears the bathwater and is so happy just splashing around and playing with her little bath toys. She kicks her feet the whole time! She doesn't mind getting water in her eyes and she opens her mouth to try to catch the water when it gets near her mouth. She loves to get a washcloth in her hands and mouth, too. On 2/8 she got to go from the laying down bathtub to the sitting up position, so that was even more exciting for her! She has taken baths by herself, with one and both siblings since then.

-Ruby is such an easy girl. The only thing I can think that makes her upset is getting her face wiped after eating or when I have to wipe her nose. Also when her siblings get all over her and she feels overwhelmed! There are so many days when I don't hear a peep out of her, and I am just amazed at how pleasant she is. She is smiley and sweet, and has such an easy going disposition.

-Just a few notes on events over the past month: lots of outside time/walks with warm winter, baby friend Elijah, time with just Mommy and Daddy while siblings went to Lex with grandma, PCS ice skating, PCS basketball game, Madelyn bday party, knights week (Sofie le giraffe on Lit day, Valentine on holiday), trip to Olive Branch, Memphis IKEA.

This is a great one of her scrunchy nose face. She will scrunch her nose up and breath in and out. The kids get a kick out of this!

She found her tongue in these pics!

I love this one of her scooting down and starting to tell me she's done with my photo shoot! Check out that expression.

Battle cry here

Kicking those legs!

I kept this one to show how blonde she is getting on top. But if I let her hair down there is still a lot of dark that shows. She gets lots of comments about her stylish brown streak and ombre hair style!:)

Love this one of her brother getting involved and her really talking to him about it! Looks like she is giving him a karate chop!

We love you, sweet girl! Can't wait to see what next month holds!

6 months!

This little cutie turned 6 months on January 9th. It's hard to believe half of her first year has gone by. I adore this age. These next few months are some of my favorites in babyhood. I hope to soak it up! She is growing great and is a healthy little girl. I think she's so chunky and is bigger than her siblings at this age because she gets like 3 more feedings than they did at this point since she still wakes up in the night and eats! At her 6 month appointment on 1/9, she was 50% for weight and 75% for height. See below for some events in Ruby's life over the past month.

Look at her cute little hand here

 -She has busy hands while nursing! She is constantly swatting the air or slapping something while she eats. She pulls her own hair, her ear, the nursing cover, my sweatshirt strings, my necklace...she treats those last few like she's found a jackpot!

 -She is showing lots of mommy love right now which I adore of course! When I walk in to nursery to get her, she can be totally happy with whoever has her, but when she sees me she starts to fuss and whine, kick, and get all animated. Then when I take her she smiles and squeals with happiness through her tears. It cracks everyone up. And I couldn't be happier about such a sweet reunion! She loves me, and I love her! Oh, we finally put her in church nursery for the first time on 1/8 and she did great!!

You can see here she's getting blonder!

 -On 1/1 she sat in a highchair for the first time! I didn't feed her anything, but she was happy just sitting up and joining the party. On 1/9, for her half birthday (ha, ha), she got baby food for the first time. She seemed receptive to it (sweet potato) although most of it just comes right back out. She will have to figure out what to do with the spoon in her mouth. She didn't shutter and cringe like Henry did, though, and since then she's done great, so I hope we have an eater on our hands!

She looks HUGE in this one! Check out those legs! We affectionately call her chunker sometimes...

 -She's starting to want to move more and more. She "bops" her bottom and pokes her belly out if she's laying on her back. You can see in the above pic that she slides down when I sit her up bc she won't be still. She "jumps" out of our arms....lunges forward when we have her facing out, etc. She raises up from the swaddle position and it is so funny looking. Sometimes when she's swaddled and I lay her down, she won't lay her head down all the way. She keeps it raised up like she is too interested in what is happening to relax. Same in her car seat. She won't relax, but raises her head up to check things out.

Sweet girl

 -She wants to sit up and has been doing great assisted with the Boppy behind her. She topples over some or folds forward, but she is building her strength, and I know it won't be long before she sits like a pro. I love this stage, but it also makes me sad that it is happening so fast!

 -She has such a round little face and chubby cheeks! I have gotten multiple separate comments about how she looks like a little cabbage patch doll.

 -Random note-She is such a great car rider. We traveled quite a bit over the holiday, and she never made a peep. Both of her siblings were terrible riders for the first 6 months of their lives, so this is an awesome change. It **kind of** makes up for the fact that she is still not sleeping thru the night like they were at this age. At least it's a little trade off. We forget about her back there and think she is asleep because she is so quiet and pleasant. It is a huge blessing with all of the running around we do!

 -It is probably too early to actually tell this, but she has had 2 different episodes of what almost seems like motion sickness. Both times it's been when Steven has been holding her (past her bedtime while at parties), and he kind of walked around and swayed her and she's fallen asleep. When she's woken up, she throws up and looks white as a sheet! The first time it happened we thought surly she had a stomach virus or something, but she never threw up again and acted totally normal. Then when a very similar scenario happened just a week later, we thought it seemed a lot like sickness from motion. Not sure, but it was so weird!

 -Henry and Annie continue to adore her and baby talk her all the time. They love to hold her and get her toys. They really think she's wonderful and there is no jealousy there at all. I love it.

Yum!!

We sure do love you, sweetness. You are a joy and a little bundle of loveliness!