e squared: 7 month update

Why is this month's update late? Well...look at this picture and figure out what I have been doing instead of updating the blog:

Summary of this month in one picture

That's right folks. We now have two children who are busy getting into trouble.

Weight: Last time I weighed her on our super accurate scale, she was 16.5 lbs

Height: She's sleeping right now but I'll update once I get a chance to measure. ETA: As best I can tell, she is 27 inches. Measuring a super squirmy baby is hard!

Teeth: She has both central lower incisors. She's definitely working on some other teeth but no others show any signs of erupting soon.

Diapers: We've tried a couple of different things that have worked. Right now we are rotating through three nighttime diaper solutions: a wool diaper with a bamboo/hemp booster, a fitted diaper with bamboo/hemp inserts + cover, and a bamboo all in one deal. Most mornings she is waking up dry. Then again, I'm not sure if it's the diaper that is making the difference or the fact that she isn't nursing a gazillion times a night.

Clothes: Nothing exciting here- still 6-9 and 9-12, with a few 12 month clothes that fit. We did have to break out bigger socks. Okay, I probably should have brought out the bigger socks like two months ago but I have a toddler who freaked out over Marian wearing "her" socks and since the baby didn't care...

Sleep: With the exception of my weekend in Raleigh, most nights she is only up once. Usually right around 4am, which means if I'm smart and go off to bed at a reasonable hour, I can have 6+ hours of sleep. Most days she takes two naps, although if Ella is noisy and wakes her up early from the afternoon nap she'll take a quick catnap before dinner.

Food: We're mostly doing baby-led weaning now, primarily because with two kids I've found it's much easier to plop the stuff down on her tray and let her feed herself. Jim reminded me about puffs, which are quite possibly the least nutritious baby food ever but does give her plenty of practice on her pincer grip. Still usually one meal a day, except on weekends when she'll have some breakfast with us. And of course she's nursing probably a dozen times a day. She's also working on drinking from a sippy cup. She needs some help but she is a thousand times better at drinking from a sippy cup than she ever was from a bottle.

Milestones: Marian is now a full-blown crawler. In a matter of days the kid went from being slow and hesitant to being crazy fast. I turn my back for a second and she is into mischief. New favorite activities for baby include trying to sneakily eat the dog toys, crawling through one of our end tables, and seeing how many of Ella's toys she can play with before her sister notices. New activity for Mommy includes lots of baby-proofing. (You may ask why our house isn't completely baby-proofed. Well, Ella was a year old when we moved in and could be trusted not to touch certain things.)

Since she learned to crawl- which was, oh, last week- she has moved onto cruising. I am guessing we're going to have another early walker.

She's started babbling a bunch. Mostly a lot of "Blab ba ba BA BA blab!" and "Eh la la LA la LA la"- which we joke is her saying "ELLA!"

Miscellaneous: With the crawling has come a decided preference over toys. It used to be that Ella could tell her "trade" or "switch" while grabbing toys out of her lap and as long as the toddler gave her another toy, all was right with the world. Now there is a lot of tug of war type stuff and shrieking.

Although they have devised a game that is mutually agreeable. Ella pretends Marian is a dog and throws a toy for her to fetch. Marian happily crawls across the floor and grabs it. And repeat. Part of me thinks I should explain to Ella that her sister is not a dog. But then the lazy part of me thinks, "Eh, I can get five minutes of peace" and praises them for playing nicely together.