Alaina at 7 Months Old

Dear Alaina,

You, my sweet girl, are officially closer to being a one year old than you are to a newborn. I'm in complete denial, however, and in my mind you're still a teeny tiny baby. Seriously, I feel like the past 7 months have been the fastest of my life. But then I think about what a fixture you are in our family, and it's a little easier to fathom that it's really been 7 months since we first met you. And what a happy, wonderful 7 months they've been, in large part because you've been here with us!

You are SUCH an adorable baby. I just love you to pieces. We all do. You're smiley and happy (most of the time) and pretty laid back. The big news is that we started solids this past month. I've been making baby food for you, and you're a fan! So far, you've had peas, carrots, butternut squash, bananas, avocados, and apples. You have liked it all.... except the apples. You hated those. HATED them. You gagged so hard I thought you were going to throw up. It was so surprising to Mommy because I thought you'd love them! We'll keep trying :) You've just been eating one solid meal a day at dinner time, but since you seem to enjoy it so much, I've just added in another solid meal at lunchtime. You still nurse about every 3 hours during the day. You're starting to space out your feedings a little more now that you're eating solids, though. You're SUCH a fast nurser. You always have been, but lately, you nurse for less than 5 minutes, and you're done. You seem to be getting plenty to eat, so whatever works!

You're still a really good sleeper. I was thinking the other day about all of the sleep issues we were having with Jude when he was your age, and it made me SO thankful that you've been easy on the sleep front. You probably don't sleep "perfectly" by some people's standards, but Mommy is happy :) The big development in the sleep department is that we finally got rid of the swaddler! You now just sleep in a sleep sack, and I'm SO glad we were finally able to quit swaddling you. We waited until you were ready, so it wasn't a big deal to move away from that. You go to bed between 8 and 8:30 and you sometimes wake up once in the night. Daddy always goes to your room and offers you the pacifier when you wake up. Usually that's enough and you go back to sleep. Sometimes you fuss more and won't go back to sleep, so I will then go up and feed you. A night feeding is the exception rather than the rule at this point, so like I said, I'm happy. You wake up for the day between 7-8, and you go down for a morning nap 2 hours after that. That nap is about an hour long, typically. Your afternoon nap is around 1, and it's usually several hours long. That means you're awake for a LONG stretch in the evenings. Occasionally, you'll take a little nap sometime in the evening, but you're usually just awake until bedtime after that second nap. I know you get tired, but you do pretty well being up so long. I have always just nursed you before bed and you've fallen asleep while eating, but now you're not always falling asleep when you're nursing. I bounce you and pat you when you don't go to sleep nursing, but even that doesn't always put you to sleep. Several times lately, I've just put you in your bed awake, and you've gone to sleep on your own. That's been so nice, and I'm hoping you'll start doing that more and more!

You've had several colds over the past few months that have resulted in wheezing. Since you couldn't seem to completely shake the wheezing, we've been having to do regular breathing treatments. We do one a day at night, and you do so well with them! You just lay still in my arms, and a lot of times you even fall asleep. Your breathing has sounded better, so I'm hoping we can quit doing those soon.

You LOVE to grab things. It's so funny and I think it's adorable. I can't walk by anything without you lunging for it. Of course, once you grab something, it goes immediately to your mouth. You're a huge drooler, but no teeth yet :) You're still loving that exersaucer, and you also have started to enjoy your jumperoo. You can really bounce in that thing, and Aubrey and Jude think it's great fun to "push" you when you're in there (gently, of course). You are sitting up unsupported for longer and longer periods. Sometimes you can sit for a good while, but other times you're so squirmy that you topple over quickly. Because of that, I don't feel comfortable leaving you sitting up by yourself yet, but I know that will be here in no time. You have rolled over (so I know you can) but you're still not a roller in general.

I'm not sure how much you weigh, but you wear a 6 or 9 month clothes. You're still in size 3 diapers. Your eyes are still so blue, and your hair looks blonde most of the time, but sometimes it looks really red. People still say that you look like Aubrey :) You have the SWEETEST smile and a precious dimple.

I never know quite how to close these posts. Because, the truth is, I can never truly sum up just how precious you are and how much we love you in a little blog post. But just know that we are SO thankful for the past 7 months of Lainey! We love you so much!

Mommy