7 months old!

The other day, I was watching some videos of Anna when she was only a few weeks old, and it is amazing how much she's changed in just half a year.  She is so much more independent.  She can roll over and pick things up and sit up all by herself.  And she has SO much personality.  We are always laughing at her funny expressions and little quirks.  And she's so BIG!  I saw a little 4-week-old baby at church on Sunday who looked absolutely tiny.  I thought for sure he must have been a preemie, but when I asked his mom how much he weighed when he was born, he was almost exactly the same as Anna!  I couldn't believe that she used to be that small!

Anna's biggest accomplishment this month has been learning to sit all on her own.  She can sit up without any support for over a half hour.  What is amazing to me is how she can lean forward to grab a toy...almost to where she looks like she's going to fall over...and then she'll just sit back up again.  She LOVES her toys.  Her favorites are her teddy bear, a Mickey Mouse stuffed animal, and this neat colored ball thing that you'll see in some pictures later on.  She is starting to use the pincer grip to now to pick up smaller objects.

Being able to sit up means she can use her highchair now for mealtimes.  She loves being able to sit with us and eat "grown-up" food.  We pretty much have to strip her down to her diaper while she eats and then give her a bath afterward (and sweep and mop the floor!), but it's so fun to watch her explore new foods.  She's not a picky eater.  She eats about anything!  Here's some pictures Derek took of her eating broccoli.  (I wish we took pictures the day she ate watermelon...her diaper was stained pink!)

While being able to grab things makes holding toys and eating solids easier, it makes some things more difficult.  Story time isn't very fun because she grabs the books out of our hands and tries to eat them.  She grabs food off our plates.  She grabs my necklace.  She grabs our faces...which is funny sometimes, but sometimes hurts!

Anna's sleep has been a little better this month.  I didn't really stick to the "sleep training" method I described in last month's post.  We tried it for a few days.  It worked some of the time, mostly for naps.  But at night she would just toss and turn and cry until I couldn't take it anymore and picked her up.  So now, we still try to put her down awake in her crib, but if she cries for more than five or ten minutes, we'll just pick her up and try something else.

But in the process, we've learned some new tricks that help her sleep.  One is that she likes to sleep on her side/stomach.  I used to always lay her down on her back after I had rocked her to sleep.  But when she falls asleep in her crib, she always rolls onto her side.  It is super funny because she'll often use the rails of the crib to push off when she turns over...and to keep her body in a side-lying position.  Here's a picture of her little toes gripping the rails of the crib...

Anyway, so now I always lay her down on her side or tummy.  She seems to sleep a little longer that way.

Anna also likes sleeping on the big bed in her room.  We're going to miss having that when we move into our new house!  When she can't fall asleep in her crib, I'll often pick her up and lie next to her on the big bed.  If I pretend to be asleep, after about 15-20 minutes of her tossing and turning, she'll fall asleep too...usually without any crying!  After she's in a deep sleep, we can transfer her easily to her crib.  The only problem is that I sometimes have a hard time pretending to be asleep because she's just so darn funny!  She'll "talk" or buzz her lips or blow air in my face...and I can't help but start laughing.  And then she smiles because she thinks it's funny and knows I'm not asleep.  Little stinker!

Anyway, bedtime is less of a struggle now.  But we still haven't figured out how to get her to sleep through the night.  Her doctor told me that she should be able to sleep 8 hours without needing to eat and that she was probably waking up to "comfort nurse."  So I've tried not nursing her every time she wakes up.  But she is still waking up just as much. So I'm pretty much out of ideas and just waiting for her to hopefully grow out of it soon!

So the update on Anna's eyes.  We took her back to the opthamologist (different one this time), and he flashed a bunch of lights at her and put different lenses in front of her eyes just like last time.  He said that he's almost 80% sure that it's a problem with the eye muscles that will require surgery.  I would go into more details about the problem and the surgery, but Derek already did that. So if you want to know more, read this post on his blog.  But basically, we're going to patch her right for 2 hours a day to strengthen the left one, and then go back for a follow-up appointment at the end of August where we'll most likely need to schedule her surgery.  It is scary to think about...mostly because she's so little and there's always the slight chance of a bad reaction to anesthesia.  That's really the scariest part to me, having her put under.  The surgery itself is pretty simple and doesn't even require any recovery time or pain medication afterword.  She'll go in and come home the same day.  So we're a little nervous about it, but mostly we just want her eyes to work they way they're supposed to.  We're happy that it's something that can be fixed!

Still happy, even with the eye patch on.  Look at those bottom teeth! 

Speaking of Anna's eyes, they still haven't decided what color they want to be.  I guess I would call them brown.  But they're not dark brown like mine or Derek's.  Sometimes, they look almost a hazelly green.  Other times they look steel gray.  It all just depends on the lighting.

Here are some of my current favorite things about Anna.

1.) She loves playing games.  She and I have this game when I'm nursing her.  She always likes to reach up and touch my face.  So I started "eating" her fingers, and she thinks it's hilarious!  It distracts her from eating, but we still play it anyway. :)  She also plays peek-a-boo with Daddy.  She'll cover his eyes with her hands and then uncover them.  It's so funny!

2.) Almost every time she's falling asleep she makes this funny noise...it's like half-way between a whine and a whimper.  I'll have to get a video of it sometime.  It's so cute!

3.) Anna is so curious about everything!  I was tying my shoes next to her the other day, and she just stared at my shoes with wide-eyed expression on her face.  It's like that with every new thing she sees.  She just stares and stares, trying to figure out what's going on.  And she does it with people too.  When she meets you for the first time, she'll just stare you down...it's like she's searching your soul.  It's a little disconcerting!

4.) She loves different textures.  We'll just sit her in the grass and she'll just rub her hands and feet back and forth through the grass. She loves also loves Dereks' arm hair, the fringe of blankets, and the bristles on her brush.

5.) Her giggle.  It's still really rare, and it makes me laugh every time!

6.) She likes to smack things.  I think she just likes the sounds it makes.  She hits the tray on her highchair, Grandma's granite countertop, the couch cushions.  And the piano keys!  She also loves to slap the surface of the water and make splashes when we go swimming.

7.) Anna noises.  They actually sounds more like talking now, rather than coos and squeals. It's hard to explain, but it really sounds like she's saying words...just none that are intelligible.  Especially when she's upset about something, it really sounds like she's grumbling.

8.) Anna's scrunched-up-eyed, two-toothed, chubby-cheeked smile.  She is such a little ham!