Lightly Dappled: 7 Months of Hazel

Dear Hazel Basil,

Today you woke up as a seven month old baby. This morning you slept in a little bit, and when I heard you gurgling to yourself I went into the bedroom to see you, and you were double-fisting your pacifiers. You weren't totally awake yet, but you were just content with your eyes closed trying to get both pacifiers in your mouth at once. I'm sorry to say, but I think you've inherited my large thumbs. I had to wake you up because your thumb was stuck in the middle of your pacifier, which sometimes happens, and I always worry that it's cutting off all of your circulation to it. So I popped it off (it really does make a loud popping noise) and you were awake! ...and smiling of course.

You currently weigh approximately 16.6 pounds and are (your dad took the measurement and can't remember) inches long. You are a long and lean little bean, so you've grown out of a lot of your clothes length wise. You can pretty solidly wear 9 month onesies and we just went out and bought you a bunch of 12 month sleepers to accommodate your long baby legs. You are definitely a 12 month in pants too because every other size is just capris at this point.

Food! You are eating real food now. You started off with sweet potatoes, then squash, carrots, and most recently avocado. You are pretty funny when you're trying new foods, sometimes you really don't like them at first and scrunch up your face, shudder, and stick your tongue way out. Today you were even making gagging noises because of the avocado (even though you really enjoyed it last night).

You are jibbering and jabbering quite a bit. You like to say dadadadadadadadada although you don't actually associate it as a name for your dad yet.

You sit really sturdily, and you're a strong stander (with help still). You're not officially crawling yet, but you're getting there! You want to move forward, and sometimes you lay on your belly and hit the floor like you're trying to say, "okay, let's go!" You have the individual motions down, but you just need to get a little stronger and more coordinated to put them together. I'm convinced if I could find you some rubber pants that would provide a little more traction, you'd be army crawling all over the hard wood floor.

We have a lot of fun playing with you. You love action play, like having your dad turn you upside down, or singing the tick-tock song at Books for Babies where to get to swing from side to side. As you can see by my many blurry pictures, you're always moving. You also like to get kisses, and I can frequently make you giggles by covering your face in smooches.

All of your toys have been getting good use lately. You really seem to like them all. You frequently shake your rattle toys and bang your block together or on the wood floor to make lots of noise. You like to play in an upright position in your walker too (in which you can only move backwards) because I think it makes you feel like a big girl.

You have been working on your pinching skills. Instead of grabbing with your whole hands you can now use just your pointer and thumb. You like to practice pinching my hair while nursing.

One of my favorite things you do right now happens when you are really tired and we lay you in your bed. There's no fussing or mussing, you just stick your pacifier in your mouth, roll over, and stick that little tushie high in the sky. Cutest thing ever!

Sometimes you sleep pretty well, but other times you still wake up a lot! I think you slept through the night once this month, but you're really just all over the map when it comes to sleep still. We thought you'd be sleeping better after we introduced "solid" foods to you, but at the same time your teeth decided it was time to come in so that may have hindered any progress... That's right, you have two bottom teeth that poked through your gums a little over a week ago!

The scariest moment this month was when your highchair tipped forward at a restaurant. I always leave the bar up on your car seat when it's on a high chair for this very purpose (I frequently prep for worst case scenarios in my head), so luckily the bar hit the table instead of your face, but it was a close call and very scary for me! You weren't hurt and probably didn't even notice anything happened...

Your dad has had a lot of fun shopping with you this month. I sent you guys on a big grocery shopping quest to get things in preparation for a party we had, and despite a head bumping, you both pulled through. We also all went to a toy store and he had a blast playing with the floor piano and helping you ride on a ball bike.

You bring so many smiles to our lives! Not just the amazing one that you flash at us, but also the ones that you bring out in us and in all the strangers around you. I think it's impossible to look at you for more than a minute without smiling. You are a such a little light. and we love you more and more each day. Even when my heart feels full, you manage to make some more room.

Love you little one,
Momma

{ Play hard, sleep hard }

{ Aunt Cath and Court came to visit!! }

{ I am making an open complaint to Google for making it so difficult to upload photos in the right orientation! This momma doesn't have time to fiddle with this! }