Dallas is SEVEN months (and almost 2 weeks) old!!

I get the bad mommy award for this one. Yep.

It's been over a month since I've blogged, and I'm almost two weeks late posting Dallas's 7 month update! Last month I wrote everything down so I'd remember what she's been doing. This month, I didn't do that. See? I told you I get the bad mommy award. I won't include the things she's been doing the last two weeks in this post. I'll save them for next month.

This month, Dallas...

• is sleeping through the night again most nights. She still wakes up every once in a while at some unpredictable hour, but for the most part she's sleeping from about 8:00pm till 7:30am. She is such a good sleeper!
• had her first cold. It was so sad! She was only sick for about 2-3 days, but the residual runny nose and congestion is even still hanging around.
  
• got her first tooth! It's her bottom left middle tooth, and it is so cute! I love her little snaggle tooth smile :) I'm sure the tooth has a lot to do with her waking up at night.

showing off her tooth

• takes two regular naps a day in her crib, and will sleep for anywhere from one to three hours at a time. Her first nap normally happens around 9-10am, and her second nap happens around 2pm.
  
• sleeps all over her crib. It is not unusual for me to find her balled up in the corner or flat on her stomach smooshed against the side of the crib. (And for the record, I've never taken her bumper pads out of the crib. For some reason I've never been worried that she'll smother to death with them in the bed. Feel free to share your thoughts on this!)
  
• sleeps with a little Jaguar blanket that she got from the hospital every night, and gets really excited when I give it to her at bed time. She only gets to play with this toy when it's time to go to sleep, and it's so cute to see her cuddle Mr. Jaguar in her arms.
• loves to have play dates with all of her baby friends.

Dallas with Collin and Max

Clara, Max, Dallas, and Brookelynne at Collin's birthday party

at the pool with Max and Collin

• is still fascinated with Baggie.
  
• loves the remote control better than any other toy in the world. I don't let her play with it, though, since she just wants to put it in her mouth.
  
• loves to play with my hair. She'll run her fingers through my bangs over and over again and just look at the way my hair falls. If she pulls my hair, I'll say "OUCH" and she'll stop.
  
• will stare really hard at anything she throws. It's like she's thinking, "Hey, I wanted to play with that." And speaking of throwing...
• throws EVERYTHING. She can chuck her rattle all the way across the living room. I think she enjoys the noise it makes on the hardwood floor.
  
• nurses only 4-5 times a day including when she wakes up and goes to bed.
• eats two solid meals a day. She has oatmeal and some fruit for breakfast, and a variety of veggies for dinner. She eats bananas (LOVES), apples, pears, peas, green beans (HATES), carrots, butternut squash (LOVES), acorn squash (LOVES), avocado, and sweet potatoes (LOVES). I make all of her baby food. We are about to start eating lunch, so she'll be eating 3 meals a day.
  

• eats Gerber puffs (like Cheerios) with every meal and as a snack whenever we go out. She can even pick them up off her tray and put them in her own mouth! It so so cute! Dustin and I like to cheer for her every time one makes it into her mouth.
  
• likes to play with her sippy cup but doesn't drink much out of it. She mostly just uses it as a chew toy.
  
• loves to take baths. She would sit in the tub ALL NIGHT if we'd let her. She has so much fun playing with all of her bath toys.
  
• LOVES her exersaucer.
• lets me paint her toe nails.

• will sit on a blanket surrounded by toys and play for hours! She likes for me to sit by her and play with her, but she's just as happy to play by herself. She knows how to get to a lying down position without having to fall, so if she wants a toy that's too far away for her to reach sitting up, she'll just lay down and roll over to the toy. She likes to roll off of her blanket and lay on the hard wood floor, too.

• fall asleep in random places ALL. THE. TIME.

in her high chair

on a wagon ride at Collin's birthday party

• has gotten a lot better about being in the nursery at church. She was just promoted to a new class, though, and her Sunday School teachers were sad to see her go. Thankfully, she already loves her new Sunday School teacher, Jennifer, and her new Sunday evening teachers, Julie and Whitney. The next step is getting her to take a nap in a crib at church to help with some of the fussiness.
  
• talks a TON! We think she might know what Da-da means at this point, but I guess we can't know for sure. She'll say Ma-ma, too, but not nearly as often.
• makes all kinds of weird noises with her mouth.
• is learning to clap and say "Bye-bye."
  
• has learned to take off her hair bow. I'm using this special skill to try to teach her the word "NO." This is a regular battle.
  
• gets REALLY excited every day when Dustin gets home from work. Her whole face lights up and she always smiles at him so big! Dallas definitely loves her daddy!
• laughs a lot more often than she used to. It is still special every single time, but I'm glad that we don't have to work quite so hard for it any more.
  
• is doing the thing where she leans towards me with her arms out when she wants me to take her from someone, and she lifts her arms up when she's on the floor or in her exersaucer and wants me to pick her up.
• went to her first Easter egg hunt!

playing with eggs with her cousin Rylan

see Zipper in the background? He's gotten big!

• had her first Easter!

• went swimming for the first time!

• wears size 3 diapers. We use Target brand, Huggies, and Pampers. Pampers are my favorite, but we use whatever is on sale or people give us.
  
• wears size 6-9 and 9-12 month clothes pretty equally.
• weighed 17 lbs. 7 oz. at the doctor's office this past Monday. We went in to let them check out a diaper rash and found out that she also had an ear infection! She wasn't really fussy before, but now that she's taking medicine, I can tell that she feels a lot better.
  

7 months old -- April 18, 2010