7 months!

Time is FLYING.

So cliche, I know. But really -- it is! Make it stop.

This face.

Little boo is ...

--Pulling herself up! Mostly just on ME, but ... it might be time to lower the crib.

--Crawling! Well, we're just about there. For the longest time, she would be up on all fours, trying to coordinate her hands and her knees. And then, as of just about the past week or so, I've seen her achieve the crawl ... but just for like, a minute. It's not like she's CRAWLING crawling all over the house. But I'm confident she'll be there in no time. So many people have told me that some babies skip crawling, like, they'll just go straight to walking, and developmentally, babies don't NEED to crawl. But I've always had a hunch she'd do it. I mean, standing will always be her true and first love, but she's had the itch to crawl, and she's been working toward it, for quite some time now. Mission almost accomplished!

--Very active. I swear, she won't even lie still for a diaper change these days. She's just like, flipping over, trying to scoot away from me, werkin that crawl life, rocking back and forth on all fours, pulling up, stomping her feet, waving her arms, doing her Pilates, etc. The list goes ON and on and on. She cracks me up. I know they say boys are typically more physical, but she's very into challenging herself, and learning the next big thing. What a little boop.

OMG.

--Sitting (still sitting, I should say), but it's totally no big deal for her these days. She developed that skill last month, but she'd still occasionally topple. Now that's pretty rare! She can also sit in the tub, although I keep my hands by her sides just to be extra safe. James and I need to get one of those mats to put at the bottom, so she won't slip. It is SO SO cute when we go into her room after a nap, or in the morning, and she's just sitting up in her crib, waiting. She'll flap her arm (I swear she's waving; we've been working on the wave for months!) and she gets super excited to see us. I love her in the mornings, she's the happiest bug of all time. She can alllllllso go from crawl position to sitting, and vice versa! I'm so proud. She even wants to straighten her legs from the crawl and try to stand. But she has a ways to go. I love that all the urges are there!

Hi happy!

--Eating! I think she had just started, when I wrote last month's post. Anyway, we're making plenty of progress, and we continue to learn what works/doesn't work for us. Some of her favorite foods include: peaches, blueberries, sweet potatoes, avocados, spinach (lol long story), and grilled cheese (lol again). She's kinda MEH on rice cereal and oatmeal, despite all my best tricks -- mixing it with bananas, or strawberries, or applesauce ... send help! Is she just sick of it? Is it the timing? I'm trying to experiment on all fronts. Our pediatrician keeps emphasizing how great it is for babies, but Ana is not that interested. I get her to take as much as I can, but I feel guilty forcing food on her. I think I've mentioned, we're not like, "finish this! 12 more bites!" When she's done, she's done. We're still not buying baby food, just giving her soft versions of whatever we're eating. We went out to dinner last night and she was ecstatic to eat green bean pieces, small bites of macaroni, and chunks of mashed potato. Today, we gave her bits of rice, and ravioli while we were out. I'd call it baby-led weaning, but she's not that successful at feeding herself. AND we have carpeting all over. We need to get one of those painter tarps to put down, for the mess she'll inevitably make. Mostly we just toss the food in her mouth. So, it's modified BLW. I want to let her play with the spoon and the food ... but then I envision the mess, and I just can't. Those teething wafers are also excellent at distracting her when we're out, and teaching her how to self-feed. I like the Plum Organics ones especially. Oh, and the story on the spinach ... we had a hunch she wouldn't like it, but we thought, gah, it'd be so nutritious for her (plus we were low on groceries), so James soft-boiled a batch of frozen plain spinach. Once it was ready to eat, he just started shoveling it into his mouth, acting like, OVERJOYED to eat it. It was so over the top. Soon enough, she was banging her fists on her high chair in anticipation, like, "I want some! Now now nowwww!" So he shared, and she made this face like, GROSS. But then kept wanting more, based on Jim's reaction, and how much he seemed to love it. It was convincing af. At one point, I even asked, "you didn't like, put seasoning on there, did you? How are you making that look so good?" And he laughed, he was like, "of course not, but it's not horrible, it's just plain spinach." Still, I don't think I would have been able to pull it off! Then my mom gave her some grilled cheese when we were out for RO Wednesday last week. Probably not what the pediatrician would recommend for baby food, but whatever, right? Cheese and bread, I choose my battles and that was not one of them. Analisa, needless to say, LOVVVVED it. We made it for lunch the next day and she nearly ate the whole thing. Check out my IG and you'll see her nearly take out my finger in the process!

--All the eating has also led to some constipation issues (and painful poops, which are really sad to watch), but I think we're making progress. Getting her to drink water in addition to her milk seems to help. Yep, I've officially gone there. Who am I?

So grown up all of a sudden!

--Continuing to string together consonants! She's been on that babababa game for about a week, which we can get her to switch over to dadadada or mamamama with some encouragement. So so cute! She continues to love the sound of her own voice, and she REALLY loves a room or mall with some echo. She will just yell and shriek. I adore it and her.

--Riding in the cart at the store! Shout out to Edie for the cart cover, which stops her from teething on the metal railing in front of her face ... EW. Ana loves it in the cart so much. It's about as adorbs as you can imagine. She tries to catch people's attention and really loves being out and about in the world : )

Stop it.

--Making this thing we call "funny face!" (Or derp face, if you're around our apartment, haha). It's like, the biggest, gummiest, most over-the-top smile on the planet. And it's so sweet. NEVER GROW UP.

--The happiest, sweetest baby. She's giggly and cuddly and I just can't tell you how much I love being her mom -- more than I ever thought was possible.

--The star of our family pics, I can only assume. Stay tuned! We got 'em taken in Holland two weeks ago with the photog who shot our wedding. I feel like I hold Anzie pics to a pretty high standard, because I take 87867567567 of them every day, but I trust Dionel wholeheartedly. Now if only I could guarantee I looked OK in even like, five of them, we'd be set!

Not a professional pic, just me! Ana loved playing in the sand so much along Lake Michigan. And didn't even try to eat it -- what is life?

--In the midst of a busy summer! I helped host Candace's bridal shower this weekend, then we're going up north next weekend, then it's back to Rochester for Liz and Ryan's wedding, THEN I'm going to Nashville for Candace's bachelorette party (HOW DO YOU GUYS LEAVE YOUR BABIES PLEASE HELP ME), whew! I mean, Ana will be with my mom on the Friday that I leave town, then James the rest of the weekend, and I'm home Sunday afternoon, like, we'll be fine. (Right?) But we can't even FaceTime! Maybe I can teach James how to Skype? GAH  :/    Lots of cute outfits in Ana's future, as you can imagine with all the fun weekends. Her dress for the wedding is onnnnnn point. I kind of coordinated all of us to be ... matching but not matching. I just think it's important, seeing as we'll be in pics together and we shouldn't clash, ya feel? Have I typed about this before? Ana will also wear her first pair of shoes to the wedding! It just felt right, and they were $5.99 at Target. I thought it would look a little white trashy to have a baby in a nice dress but barefoot. (Also, don't ask me about how the baby shopping hiatus has been going).

What a little love.

--Growing some more hair! FINALLY. We like to say she looks like a mad scientist, just because of the weird long hairs that sprout up outta nowhere in the back. But anyway, I haven't needed to stick headbands on her just so strangers don't think she's a boy. Success! I mean, we still call her our son from time to time. But dare I say? I think most of her hair issues are a thing of the past! Cross ya fingers.

--So smart. Newest party trick: Ask her, "where's my nose?" And she'll grab it! I mean, you have to make sure you're sitting directly in her face, but I swear, we tested it all weekend and I really think she knows what we're saying. WHAT!

What else ...

Speaking of headbands/failed shopping hiatuses/etc. from a few paragraphs back, I get asked every now and then where we shop. NOWHERE, should be my answer. "We don't shop much at all." But if I were to tell the truth, I'd be like, Carter's is not the answer. Sorry, Carter's! I mean, sure, they have some occasional gems (actually this light blue outfit is a staple in Ana's closet), but I feel like too often that's the only baby brand people know. And it's at Target, so like, I can't blame. But but but. You can only take so much stuff with writing on it! I mean, she's cute, she's a BABY, so of course. But does every onesie have to remind you? "Mommy's little Kitchenaid."  "Daddy's little Dumpster fire."   "Grandma's mini arsonist."  "Cute as an heirloom tomato."   Get off it! I swear, I've been CLOSE to buying stuff but then put it back because I notice one of the T-shirts says something hokey. However, you CAN find some omg adorable stuff at: H&M, Ralph Lauren (we have a RL outlet, thank goodness; could never afford the real thing), Old Navy, Target, OshKosh, and local baby re-sale stores. If it's more than $5, I'm usually not buying it. Hit the clearance racks and buy big (size-wise), are my two main pieces of advice! Crossing my fingers for another girl at some point, so we can re-wear : )

Preppy baby!

Did I fail to mention our last Rochester trip? It was fun! We celebrated our first Fathers Day with James, which was great, and it's always nice to see the Ganleys. Wedding weekend is coming up so fast, and it's nice to feel like we can do back-to-back trips in a pretty short chunk of time! Ana was such a dream in the car. We were like, "no way will she sleep the whole time, she's not a tiny baby anymore." And then ... she did. #babygoals

Do you and your dad want to be super photogenic? K.

Until next time!