Scarbrough Fair: 7 Months Old

Dear Lane,

Today you turn seven months old. Happy Birthday! I must say, I am both glad and saddened by this day. Most moms realize when their baby turns 1 how bittersweet it all is, watching babies grow up. It's hit me much earlier, and while I rejoice in your new discoveries and new skills, a part of me is sad that my baby is already growing up. All that being said, you learned how to do some major stuff this month!

About three weeks ago you learned how to crawl. Two weeks ago you started crawling well. Then a week ago you learned how to pull up on things. You now crawl and scoot yourself all over the place. You pull up on the couch, on the frame of the table, and on the frames of chairs. However, your favorite tool for helping yourself get to a standing position is: daddy's leg hair! You love to grab on while he's sitting down and pull yourself up using just his leg hair for leverage. It's hilarious, because of course daddy hates it. You are also completely out of your 3-month or 3-6 month clothes: you are wearing exclusively 6-month sizes, although even some of those are still too big! Some of your 9-month onesies fit you if you're wearing a cloth diaper, but they're too big around: you just need the length. We can't wait for cooler weather so you can actually wear all of your cute clothes again: it's been so hot that most days you just crawl around in your diaper and bloomers.

This month you took your first trip to the beach. You thought it was ok, but we think the noise from ocean scared you a bit. Maybe it will not be such a shock the next time we go and you'll enjoy it more. You also took your first ride on a boat. We took a ferry boat over to the Europe side of Istanbul together. You loved it: the wind in your face and the hum of the engine kept you occupied for the whole trip. You have a fascination with strings, buckles, paper, and cords. Mommy was just telling daddy today that we should just buy you your very own telephone cord that you could play with, because maybe it would keep you away from all the other cords in the house. You also like to touch our faces, poke at our eyes, and pull at our hair. You especially like it when mommy wears makeup and love to try to grab her eyelashes and nose.

You also still love to play peekaboo, but now you've figured out how to pull the blanket off of our heads as well as off of your own. You love to babble and your favorite sound is "bababababa," and although we've caught you babbling "mamamama" or "dadadada" before, we don't think you know you're saying our names yet! Maybe this upcoming month you'll figure that out. You also like to listen to mommy play the guitar and sometimes you try to sing with her. It's the most precious sound.

You tried lots more solid foods this month: mango, avocado, oatmeal, apples, bulgur, pears, peas, yogurt, and yesterday you got some scrambled egg yolk. You're not such a big fan of peas or bulgur (mommy's not so big on bulgur, either, actually), but you seem to like all the other things alright. Your favorites are still peaches and zucchini, though. You make the cutest noises when we feed you those. You can feed yourself a teething cookie or piece of toast and sometimes can get smaller pieces of food into your mouth. You also like to gnaw on pizza crust, but you get really mad at us when we catch you sticking the whole thing in your mouth and we have to reach in to get it out. But we'd rather have you mad at us than dead from choking, so you'll just have to deal with it. You are also not a big fan of bibs and try to pull them off sometimes, but you'll just have to deal with those too, because you sure can make a mess with all the food we give you!

This month we thought you were going to get some teeth. You had a fever for three days and were an absolute pill. Then the fever went away and you got a rash all over your body, but we thought that was just heat rash, because it has been so hot here and we don't have an air conditioner. However, a doctor friend of ours said that you probably had Roseola, and we think he's probably right, because your rash went away after a couple of days even though it was still hot here.

You have finally settled into somewhat of a sleeping schedule. Mommy and daddy are so, so glad about this! We don't blame you for being a little difficult in this area: after all, you've been to eight states, the District of Colombia, and two countries in your short little life and have slept in ten different places. But we are glad that you're finally learning how to sleep well at night. When we're at home we start getting you ready for bed at around 6:00 or 6:15. You and mom take a shower together and then daddy gets you dried off and your diaper on. One of us gives you a bottle of mommy's milk and then we read you a story from the Bible. Then we sing "Goodnight Sweetheart" to you and put you in bed. Sometimes (if you've only had two naps that day) you fall asleep by 7:00, and other times you don't fall asleep until 7:30 or so. But you usually sleep until at least 4:30 now, usually until 5:00 or 5:30, and occasionally until 6:00. You eat one more time then, and then you go back to sleep until 7 (usually), but sometimes you wake up at 6:30 or sleep until 8:00. You usually take two good naps of an hour and ten minutes to an hour and a half, and sometimes you take a third 30-45 minute nap around dinner time. We read a story and sing a song, usually "Jesus loves me" or "Jesus loves the little children" before putting you down for your nap. It's great that you're settling into a schedule!

I think those are our highlights from this past month! You are getting so big and so strong! You are still so happy and you smile, laugh, and babble so much. We love you and love getting to watch you grow.

Love,

Mommy and Daddy