Peanut – 7 Months

Dear sweetheart,

I feel like I just finished posting about 6 month’s appointment and the next thing I know, I have to write another monthly post.

It seems like time is flying, yet there are so many new things that happen with you that I wonder how it all fit into just 1 month.

You change and learn something new every single day.

To say that daddy and I fall in love with you more and more every single day might sound impossible, but true.

We love watching your little personality develop.

Although I must admit that I’m a little nervous for our future and your teenage years.

Here are some high lights from our 7th month together:

Walking.  You are always walking.  You wake up, lift your skinny little arms towards us and immediately pull up using our hands into a standing position.  From here it’s about 0.5 seconds until you start shuffling your little feet with meaning and diving forward with meaning.  If you’re tired, walking cures it.  If you’re cranky, walking cures it.  The month started with us walking you around the house and ended with you holding yourself up in a standing position while leaning and even shifting and turning to grab on to something else to support yourself.

You’re sitting up like a champ with no assistance and a couple of times you’ve pulled yourself up from a “crawl” position (on your hands and knees) into a sitting position.

As of about a week ago, you started rolling over from your back to your stomach.  You started by doing it in your crib.  We’d put you in, plug you up with a pacifier and walk away.  By the time we turned on the baby monitor, you were on your belly.  It took some snooping and watching to see you shift your weight and then use your knees and hands to roll yourself over and end up on your belly.  About 2 minutes after you usually get pretty upset about this new position and cry until we come in and turn you back over and place you on your bed.  That’s when we start the whole process all over again.

Along with sitting, standing and walking, you’re learning how to pull yourself up from a sitting into a standing position.  In the beginning of the month you would only do it while holding on to our hands.  Today you pulled up on the ottoman, the drawer and your exersaucer.  You’re still not a very big fan of using something other than my hands to do it, but it looks like you’re getting use to it.

You’re discovering your body parts.  Lately some of your favorites is grabbing your ears (which led us to your pediatrician office more than once since we just assumed it was an ear infection), sucking your thumb (although you still prefer the pacifier), and playing with your (and sometimes my) feet.

You recognize us all the time and squeal with delight whenever you see one of us enter the room.  You’ve also started to reach out and up for us whenever you see us.  This makes me especially happy when I walk in to daycare after a super long day at the office.  Nothing wipes away the trials of the day like your gummy smile and happy squeal.

You’ve also started to grab and hold on to us.  When we’re playing or rolling around, you turn and reach for me, grab on to my arm or shirt, pull yourself up so you’re close to me and then hold on tight.  It makes me so happy I’m afraid my heart might jump out of my own chest.

One of the funnest and cutest things that you learned this month is dancing and singing.  Whenever we sign “Itsy bitsy spider” or “patty cake,” you shake your body and turn your head side to side and “sing” along with us.  I have a video that I promise to post.

This month brought on 2 successful overnight trips!  You slept through about half of the night both times and took about a day or two to get used to sleeping again at night.  I think our next trip will have to be with a playpen since you’re learning how to stand up on your own (we were traveling with a cosleeper).

You’re still a pretty good eater (although we’ve learned that you do not like beans).  And although you enjoy drinking out of your sippy cup, you’re a much bigger fan of drinking out of our glasses (and then spitting it all over my lap).

Some other new things from this month: your first time at the playground and first trip the to aquarium.

You are still the happiest and easiest kid (I’m pretty sure on this planet).  Now, in addition to your daddy and me knowing it, we are often reminded by your daycare teachers (in case we decide to have 500 more kids since you were so easy?). Yet we never tire of hearing it.