La Buena Vida: Eleanor 7 months

I swear the months are just flying by. Is it already almost Thanksgiving? Crazy.

Eleanor is growing growing growing, and turned 7 months old on the 15th!

I am seriously loving my baby girl these days. At least 10 times a day I swoop her up in my arms and just snuggle her into my face. She lets me because she's such a sweetie and she loves her mommy. She is chubalicious and so much fun to squeeze and snuggle and love on. She is almost 19 lbs! She is showing us her sassy personality more each day. I just love watching how a baby's personality slowly develops. It is one of my favorite parts of being a mom.

Eleanor is a funny girl. She can now crawl but still prefers to "army crawl," dragging her tummy along the floor and pulling herself forward on her elbows. She can get to a sitting position from lying down, and a few days before her 7 month birthday, she succeeded in pulling herself up to standing next to the couch! I swear babies shouldn't be doing that at not-quite-7 months. Why do my girls insist on growing up so fast?

First time pulling herself up to the couch!

Enna loves to talk and talk and talk all day. She makes the funnies sounds. She also makes funny faces with her lips. She pulls them in and mushes them around and blows raspberries and sticks out her tongue and does all kinds of crazy stuff. I love it. She says "ma ma ma ma" when she is crying and upset (usually she is pulling herself along the floor trying to get over to me when she says this, haha). She says "da da da da" when she is happy. Typical, right? She likes to hit things, especially faces. She also likes pulling hair, especially Lia's. She gets super excited about things and waves her hands around and bounces. She is one of those babies who puts EVERYTHING in her mouth (more about that later.)

Dustin thinks I'm a terrible mom for taking pictures of my kids when they are in situations like this. Crawled under the chair and couldn't get back out!

She LOVES jumping, loves her sister, and loves her mommy! She is liking Daddy more and more too. She does not like formula. She does like fruit and veggie purees, but doesn't like plain cereal much. I've attempted to give her bites of soft foods so she can practice chewing, but she usually gags. Not quite ready for those I guess! Her favorite "toy" by far is paper. If there is any kind of paper anywhere on the floor, she will find it and put it in her mouth. She found my cousin's school notes on the floor one time and ate part of them (true story). Last week the girls were sitting on my lap while I read them a book, and suddenly Eleanor lunged forward and ripped the page right out of the book! We call her Quick-Draw because she is so fast. She's always grabbing (and eating) things she shouldn't.

I call Eleanor "the scientist" because she loves exploring things and gets so intent on figuring things out.

A couple of weeks ago, Eleanor received her first hearing aid, and it is adorable. We got her a little pink one and for the first week, she didn't even notice she had it in. Then a little over a week after we got it, she discovered it was in there and was pulling it out all day. Inevitably, it ended up in her mouth. (Remember how she sucks on everything?) When I tested it, I couldn't hear anything and realized her drool had damaged it. After only a week! We had to send it out for repairs and she's currently wearing an ugly brown one that's too big and keeps falling off her ear. That one has ended up in her mouth a few times as well, so we don't put it in as often because I don't want her to ruin 2 hearing aids in 2 weeks! Eleanor is also doing speech therapy stuff twice a month with a nice lady who comes to our house. This is just to make sure her hearing loss doesn't affect her speech or put her at a disadvantage when she starts school, which can sometimes happen even when only one ear is affected. The ladies who come absolutely love Eleanor because she is so funny and talkative and cute. And smart.

So happy and proud to be awake at midnight. I love that her cheeks get all red when she's been sleeping or eating.

Eleanor is still waking up every 2-4 hours at night. Around 6 months I basically gave up on trying to get her to sleep through the night. After a great conversation with my wise daddy, I realized that I had been trying for months to shape Eleanor into the kind of baby I wanted her to be--you know, one who is a good sleeper and is content to play by herself while I make dinner. After all, Lia was that way, so shouldn't Eleanor be the same? I was sure I could do it, sure the reason she wasn't doing what I wanted her to meant I was doing something wrong. Finally, I let go of ALL of the expectations I had put up in my mind about how my second child should be, and realized I just needed to accept and love EVERYTHING about the unique child I have, I suddenly became much less stressed and worried about a lot of things. My baby Enna is truly an amazing and special and wonderful girl. I love everything about her. It's not that I didn't before, it's just that I kept expecting that I would be able to change her into the baby I thought she should be. Obviously that is not going to happen, and I've been much happier now that I've accepted it. I feel a little stupid writing about this because most people probably don't have such silly ideas and then stress over it, but that's me. I'm so grateful for Eleanor--she has already taught me so much in only 7 months! Thanks for being patient with your crazy mom, Enna. Love you girl!