Abigail: 7 months old

 Nicknames:  Abigaily, Munchkin, Sweet Pea, Sunshine, Amorcita, Hijita, (we really haven't varied this as much as I had thought)
Temperament: starting to protest and fuss for attention when we leave her side, very watchful and observant, happy and chatty most of the time

Item/Toy We Love The Most: the red chair, the new jumper, books, the new stroller, the rubber ducky song, the mirror baby

Item/Toy You Love The Most:  food mom and dad are eating, the new jumper, Sophie the Giraffe, books, activity mat, your thumb and fingers, the fringe on the blanket over the couch,the rubber ducky song

Things We're Loving Most Right Now: helping you walk all over the house and stand up whenever possible, watching you shake your head 'no' and laugh, singing songs and dancing, the faces you make when you eat new foods, having conversations with you that now include consonant sounds, watching you problem solve all the time, making you laugh

Things You’re Loving Most Right Now: nursing, eating, sucking your thumb and fingers, standing up and walking with help, jumping in the jumper, walks in the stroller, playing with the mirror baby, getting dried off with your ducky towel after baths

Eating: Abigail has been doing great on food!  We have introduced a variety of foods thus far, mostly food that we have mashed up ourselves but some store bought ones as well.  Abigail has eaten and liked bananas, sweet potatoes, black beans, peas, applesauce, prunes, and oatmeal. She was not crazy about pureed pears. She has become a less messy eater as we have practiced eating from a spoon over the course of the month.  At the beginning, we just fed her one solid meal a day in the evening and just added a morning solid meal in the past few days. For now, she is continuing to nurse six times a day, including once at night and two bottles at daycare.  Her teachers said she sometimes prefers to sit by herself on a boppy and drink her milk alone instead of being held. She is so funny!

 Sleeping:   Sleep has been our biggest challenge over the past month. Abigail had been on a good trend of waking up once at night to eat and rarely fussing otherwise, and on occasion slept through most of the night without waking up.  When we went to Ohio it obviously messed with her schedule, and she woke up several times a night there. She had begun doing this the week before we left as well and this continued to be an issue after we came back.  Abigail resisted falling asleep at night and then would wake up frequently and cry even after she appeared to be down for the night.  We have started to see some improvement so I am tentatively optimistic that things are moving in a positive direction. Abigail continues to take short naps at home (45 minutes or so, usually 3 times) and even shorter naps at daycare (30 minutes is a good one) but she seems to hold it together.  

Playing:   Abigail becomes more active and interested in things all the time!  She can sit for extended periods now but has moved on to show an interest in being vertical, wanting to walk and stand. She is less interested in crawling but is able to maneuver and scoot short distances on her tummy.  She is getting better at grabbing small items like strings and shoelaces and is beginning to use her fingers instead of her whole hand at times.  She loves to chat and giggle with us.  We got her a jumper recently that I will post about later and that has been a lot of fun too. 

 On the last Saturday before her seven month birthday, she was sitting next to one of our slipcovered chairs in the living room.  She turned to it, put both hands on the fabric and pulled herself up! The picture above is her standing there on her own after pulling up.  I was so surprised so I called JP over and she did it again.  She will do the same thing on my hands but I didn't know she was able to do it herself.  

Growth:  No doctor's visit this month but Abigail keeps getting bigger and longer. She is still wearing mostly 6 month to 9 month clothing but we have a few 12 month things that are beginning to fit. She is still in size 2 when we use disposables, but should be ready to move up to size 3 soon.  The cloth diapers continue to work well for us so we use them most of the time. 

The most significant event this month was our trip to Ohio and as I have already mentioned, Abigail did great! She had a lot of fun inspecting Grandma and Grandpa's house and meeting Great Grandma Peggy. It was great to see her enjoy the new toys there and to figure things out, like that the creaking noise on the stairs meant someone was coming.  She was a good traveler on a couple long travel days, so in spite of the sleep issues, we can't complain about how everything turned out.

I feel like every day we talk to Abigail and to each other about how much she is learning and growing and how fun and cute she is. We are so thankful to have such a healthy, happy baby and to see how much she learns and does over time!

A comparison: