7 months

So today is Gwen's 7 month she's more than half way to her 1st birthday. She has definitely learned more this month. We are at a stage I have been waiting for, for a while. When you come near her and she wants to get up she puts up her arms! Yeah! Now I am patiently waiting for the lean, you know when she is in some one's arms and she wants to be held by someone else and she leans. I am teaching Gwen baby signs and I think she understands 'out', she will start jumping up and down excitedly if you say out (or if she is sitting, move her feet excitedly). She is still as cute as ever, and charming. She smiles and giggles a lot and provides Eric and I with much entertainment. Gwen is still happily in the distractable phase where if you move something out of sight range and replace it with something else she will forget. I am not looking forward to the phase where she becomes more stubborn. There is a clause to this though, if the item is not replaced with something better, then said item is whined about until a better object is found. Gwen is definitely into throwing things on the ground. She also watches it on the ground until it loses her interest. She still has a relatively short attention span. She still LOVES to put stuff in her mouth.

Gwen has always been a good stander and very strong, this month as brought Gwen pulling herself up some. The other day as we were readying the bath she actually scooted herself forward off Eric's lap, we were both like, wait, um what are you doing. Gwen has really come to love standing holding on to something. She especially loves naked baby time right before the bath. The maybe 5 minutes I allow her to stand at the bath tub naked always bring big smiles.
These past weeks have been cold. Today was the first day in a while that the temperature actually got above freezing. Since Gwen has been sick, I have been really bundling her almost to the point of overheating, I have to be fully dressed before I get her ready and in the car seat. We have purchased the next car seat she needs (since she is so large). Eric is chomping at the bit to put it in the car, but the beauty of the infant carrier is I can pull it out of the car and run like heck, into the store.
Gwen still gets sad, and since she has had this cold she has gotten rather clingy when she hungry/tired. (I think this is one of the best pictures I have ever taken, I just picture this as her mug shot, yet it somehow also looks fake to me.)Right now we are much happier sitting up than being on our belly, don't get me wrong, Gwen still likes being on her belly, but until she learns to crawl forward/not bat things away with her hands she gets very frustrated. When she is playing when she is sitting she often gets distracted by her toes, but really who doesn't get distracted by their toes?For sometime she has been doing this thing with her hand like she is a princess and waves, you know kind of like a wrist twisting. She often does this with toys also while she is studying them. Eric and I are still amazed at the amount of people that stop us and tell us how cute Gwen is, for about a minute Eric wondered if we could enter her into a contest and make some money, but then he remembered who he married and that it is not likely that I would enter Gwen in a photo contest/beauty pageant and become a stage Mom. But I say, we couldn't be happier with our sweet baby girl and hope that her sweet disposition will continue up through the coming months/years.So I guess all that is left to say is that the Grandmas were right, we ended up with a content baby, thank goodness. Stay tuned for the pictures of Gwen's first taste of avocado. I can't say whether she liked it or not, the jury is still out, but the pictures, hopefully will be priceless.

On a side note, welcome home Morgan, we are glad you are back safe and sound. Also Happy Birthday T! Oh and we have uploaded another video, maybe 2, I don't know the godfather is visiting and I might have some time to do more posting while he hangs out with Eric.