Avery Turns 7 Months!

Avery turned 7 months old on November 10th.

I guess her biggest accomplishment is that she is finally sleeping through the night. It took some tough love, but unless she's having a rough night, she'll sleep from 8pm until about 6:45 am. Good good. Unfortunately, we've had a string of colds and things at our house, so I haven't starting reaping the sleep benefits just yet, but I'm looking forward to it.

She is starting to get into a routine, now that she's sleeping through the night. She wakes up around 6:45 am and is back down for a nap at 9:30 am. She'll sleep until 11 am or even 11:30 am. Then she'll go back down for a nap around 3pm until 4 pm or so. Sometimes during this nap, she'll nap for 2 hours, and other times she wakes up crying hard and clearly is still tired, but won't go back to sleep. I'm not sure what that's about, but we're working on it. So far, her morning nap is much more consistent. We'll keep trying.

Avery is still drinking milk and eating baby purees.  She also has yogurt at breakfast. She has tried pureed chicken and tofu (which she doesn't like), but she won't get table food until she's a year old. We did start giving her some basic finger foods to practice with like puffs and yogurt melts. She gets a few in her mouth, but they mostly fall out. It's funny. She nurses 7 times a day still and eats baby food 3 times a day. She is still a good eater.  

Physically, she is still immobile, which is nice, but you can just tell she wants to get moving. I don't ever remember Connor having this same motivation. She is a strong sitter, but she'll lunge herself forward and get almost into the crawling position, but after a hand moves out, she slides down onto her belly.

She also tries to pull up on things. She loves taking your fingers and pulling herself up. Also, if you are sitting in front of her, she'll try to climb up your legs. You can actually leave her holding onto a table or toy and she'll stand on her own. She doesn't really take steps when you have her fingers, but she moves around a lot and she'll even let go with one had and try to play and reach for things. I worry, she will be much more of a daredevil than Connor ever was. To this day, he is still very timid.

She is still a super sweet baby. She can probably be described more as mellow than silly or super smiley, but she has those moments too. She just likes to chill. When she's fussy or needy, it's usually because she isn't feeling well or she didn't sleep well. Although, some days she hardly naps and is still a happy girl. I count my blessings every day.

She is liking her excersaucer more now and toys that light up and stuff, but she'll still sit with chewing toys and roll around too. She loves watching her older brother. He still can make her laugh just by smiling at her. It's precious.

This is kind of random, but I thought I'd also document Avery's nicknames at the moment, since I'm sure I'd enjoy reading them as she gets older. At the moment, I often find myself calling Avery "Snoo." This came from Avery Susan...Avery Snoozin' (when she was finally asleep)...to Snoozin'...to just plain Snoo. It's kind of random, but it works. I also still call her my little Lamb, Lamby, or Lambkin. I find myself calling her "Baby" a lot or "Little Lady" too, which is pretty generic and I'm not sure where that comes from. Jeff likes to call her "Peanut Butter Pie." I think he one day also called her "Chinchilla" and that has kind of stuck with me. Who knows how these things start, but we're having fun with it and her. 

In my humble opinion, Avery is still a cutie. Her eyes are still bright blue and she has just the most angelic face and softest skin. Her hair never actually fell out and it's growing back in where it was previously bald in the back.  I am actually having some success putting bows in her hair, but she is definitely starting to notice the hair bows and is trying to pull them out, but we'll stick with it. Hopefully she'll get used to it. I'm having too much fun to stop. :)

Well enjoy some pictures of our sweet little 7 month old. We love you Avery.

Grandma and Grandpa babysat Avery on her 7 month birthday, but they were kind enough to take pictures for us.

Serious face.

Sweet face.

Who me?! I'm 7 months old already?!

One day after dinner, Jeff decided to style Avery's wild hair in multiple ways. We call this,"

Punk Rock Chic."

"The Banker"

"Mad Scientist"

"Baby Bangs"

"Fluff Head"

Peak A Boo. Baby in a towel.

Hi Mommy. I'm clean and cute.

I can't tell who looks more content here, me or Avery after a meal. Man, I just love my sweet little girl.

Just a video of Avery playing contentedly with her toy bell.

http://youtu.be/4erlv9gaRyg

Dewberry Farm and Air Show

We had a few outings lately that were lots of fun.

First, Jeff took Connor to the Houston Air Show. Jeff said he really like watching the plains fly, especially the ones that dropped fake bombs. He also liked walking around and climbing around plains. Luckily, it wasn't too loud since Connor is really against loud noises lately.

Second, we took our annual trip to Dewberry Farm. This was Avery's first year, although she didn't get much out of it this year. Maybe next year she'll get to play too.

Enjoy our pics.

Connor on an aircraft carrier at the Air Show.

Watching "bombs" drop in the aerial displays.

Cool plane moves.

Avery got up from a nap and was all snuggly and cute, so we took some photos.

Baby blue eyes snuggling with Daddy.

It's hard to resist the kisses.

Daddy and his two adorable munchkins.

Connor and his buddy Matthew at Dewberry Farm.

Looking fly in the "cool bus."

For the first 45 minutes Connor was only interested in riding this trike around a track. I guess this is what he wanted to do.

Avery wasn't so sure about this horse swing.

She likes this baby swing.

Snuggling with Daddy.

I'm a happy girl. This place looks fun. Maybe I can play next year.

"Daddy, Stop it. You're embarrassing me." This won't be the first time little lady.

Sliding down at the end of the fun playground.

Daddy and Connor having fun on the bumpy slide.

Mid jump on the bouncy pillows.

Shooting corn cobs out of a air blower to targets. Men and shooting stuff. Who can figure.

Now Mommy and Connor try out the jumbo slide.

We made it and are still happy.

Yehaw!

See saw fun.

Now some very competitive tether ball. Gigi is a tether ball champ, so maybe it runs in the family.

This little girl asked if she could play with Connor. He was smitten.

Dewberry Farm was a bit much for Avery. She fell asleep towards the end. What a trooper.

As we headed out, we grabbed some yummy fair food including corn dogs, kettle corn and lemonade. See you next year Dewberry Farm.

Halloween Bonanza

We had a very eventful Halloween. Based on all the pictures I am sharing below, you can see how much fun we had. We started the festivities when Connor got to wear his pirate costume to gymnastics class. They did gymnastics tricks for treats. Then, that following Friday, we attended the church fall/Halloween festival. Then that weekend, we went to the ArBOOretum Event at the Houston Arboretum. Both kids dressed as pirates. And all of these activities were before actual Halloween. Ha!.

Then, Connor got to wear his pirate costume to school Wednesday and then we all got to trick or treat that night. On actual Halloween, Avery wore a lamb costume since we call her our Little Lamb. Now enjoy pics of all of our spooky adventures.

Connor dressed as a pirate before gymnastics class.

Stretching at class with one of his classmates Tristan and his coach Aaron in the Harlem Globetrotters costume.

Doing gymnastics tricks for treats. They got candy.

Fellow gymnasts in costume.

Avery sporting her Halloween outfit, complete with orange shirt, green pants, a black tutu, a Halloween bow, and a "My First Halloween" bib.

That following Friday, we all attended Connor's school, Fall/Halloween festival.

Avery getting her face painted for the first time ever.

Avery showing off her pumpkin and Daddy holding his little pumpkin.

Connor rockin' his Halloween shirt and playing carnival type games for prizes.

Connor made this really "cool" mask.

Heading to the ArBOOretum, Avery took a power nap. Even pirates get sleepy you know. I had bought a lamb costume for Avery since I call her my little lamb, but then I realized how cute it would be to match the kids, since I rarely get that chance. I ended up pulling together a costume pretty easily actually. Little did I know I was already dressing Avery like a pirate. Just kidding.

The Arboretum had a bunch of activities for the kids to do that revolved around nature as we walked through the trails. Of course they got candy when they completed an activity. It is Halloween afterall. Here, Connor got to act like a spider and crawl through a tunnel with his food (which was an inflatable bug). It was cute. His favorite activity though, was one where he got a spray bottle and had to act like a skunk spraying things that scared him.

Avery is awake and ready to play pirate with her brother.

My adorable pirates. Arrgh.

Connor looking dashing as he's playing at the Arboretum.

Some cute shots of the youngest pirate.

Yo Ho, Yo, Ho, the Pirates life for me.

This Halloween thing is fun.

Connor also had a pony ride and we got to ride a train. As you can see from the sky, it was a gorgeous day too and actually pretty cool, so it was perfect for a Halloween festival.

I believe this was the day before Halloween, when we had a picnic at the park and Avery and Connor swung together. I never got a good smiley picture, but Avery actually laughed a couple of times. It was so cute. Here I just captured her staring at her brother. She finds him fascinating.

Silly Connor.

This is fun and my brother is hilarious.

Sibling swinging.

The closest thing I got to a smile with my slow phone camera.

Connor begged me to make these cupcakes that were featured on the cover of Family Circle Magazine. I ended up giving most of them to his classmates and teachers as Halloween gifts. We didn't need 24 cupcakes in the house. They turned out pretty good and were spooky and tasty.

Another photo shoot of Avery in a Halloween outfit. I might have an addiction. Someone stop me.

Here she is about to lunge forward. That is her new thing. She almost gets into crawling stance but then her arms collapse down. Once she builds up that strength...watch out. We'll have a mobile baby on our hands.

A good pic of her three teeth on the bottom.

Ahhh, do I frighten you?

Not so spooky, just handsome.

Connor dressed to be a pirate at school on actual Halloween. Here he is "petting" Avery. Very sweet.

Up close and personal. He's a sweet big brother.

She can't take her eyes off of him, and it's not just because he's in costume. She is seriously so fascinated by her big brother.

Yes, she has two Halloween outfits.

On Halloween night, Avery as a lamb, Connor as a pirate, and Jeff as a ghost. I wore a cowboy hat, but wasn't really dressed up.

Our little lamb and our fierce pirate.

My baby lamb. Since she was dressed up like a stuffed animal, it was harder than normal for me to keep from snuggling her. Can you blame me?

I'm a lamb.

Photo right before we set out to go trick or treating

Our Halloween crew.

Trick or Treating with our neighbors and their children.

Avery is now a ghost?

Checking out the loot. He honestly hasn't eaten much of it. He's probably had two pieces since Halloween. I think he forgot about it. Hey, I'm not complaining.

Avery can't have candy this year, but she was looking on thinking, "Next year, I'm going to rake it in."