9 months old

Last Tuesday, the 24th, our little Avery turned 9 months old & she is hitting all the developmental milestones right on cue. She is officially crawling, not very fast but she is mobile & thrilled to death about it. She mimics our sounds & words, she watches our mouths when we talk & is saying, "Bye, bye", "Mama", "DaDa", "Hey" and "Uh-Oh" but not intentionally yet. She really enjoys self feeding & will probably be off baby food soon if she keeps rejecting it & asking for what we are eating instead. Right now her favorite things to eat is fruit & yogurt, but she will try most anything. She is down to only 18 oz of formula a day & is starting to get the hang of her sippy cup. 

She still takes 2 naps a day, loves her paci & blankey Minnie while she is sleeping & maybe teething. She has been quite fussy this week & not sleeping well, so we shall see if any teeth pop thru. We lowered her crib mattress Tuesday since she started sitting up in her bed. She is also becoming more aware of strangers & strange places + more attached me Mama. 

July 4th

We headed to Mama's beach house again this year & had a great time even though neither of my sisters or their kids were able to join us. My mom was there for part of the time though & Emma was thrilled. 

We split up our days with 2 days on the beach & 2 days at the pool which Emma really enjoyed. Since we don't have a neighborhood pool she doesn't get to swim very often, so any chance she gets she loves it. I think she may have enjoyed the pool more than the beach this time. For some reason she was scared of the ocean again & would hardly get in it at all. So her "surf board" didn't get much use this time, except for Chris attempting to keep Avery from eating the sand by place her on it. It worked for a while but then we had to distract her with buckets of water to splash in which worked great.

Avery seemed to have a great time regardless where we were except for her eczema flaring up again. Poor thing, I ended up taking her to the dr a few days after we got home since it wasn't getting any better. The dr gave us more steroid ointment & informed me not to use spray sunscreen on her (which we only used to reapply) since it aggravates those who have sensitive skin (I never knew this). All there other things we were doing correctly, Avery just has very sensitive skin prone to eczema. Now she is having random flare ups & I haven't found her triggers other than the norm - sun, sand, ocean & chlorine. Luckily the most recent flare ups don't seem to be bothering her very much, little to no itching. YAY!!!

Avery with a face full of sand, even though she is on the board.

 Now the buckets of water enter the scene.

I love this float for Emma but it got a hole in it while we were at the pool & we had to trash it.