Evelyn Clara: 8 months old

Evie is 8 months old today, I can't even believe it! She is the most amazing little girl, every day she makes us laugh and we are so surprised by how quick she learns and grows. Evie is about 50/50 between army crawling and regular crawling these days, she often starts out in a regular crawl towards something she wants, then at the  end drops to army crawling- it's like her sprint to the finish. :) She is pulling to stand on EVERYTHING, climbing all the time, and she's been cruising the furniture for about two weeks now. Her balance is improving daily, she can stand while holding on with just one hand, and has mastered getting down from standing without falling.
Evie's eating more and more table food these days, she's just like daddy and loves her bread! :) When we go out she sits in the high chair and eats bits of whatever we have just like a big girl- you'd be surprised how well she does since we still don't have any teeth! Her current favorite snack is yogurt melts, and I think her favorite food right now is peaches. We started yogurt and cheese with Evie a couple weeks ago- she loves yogurt (especially peach!), but can't really be bothered with cheese. It's actually the first food I've seen her NOT be interested in, she eats pretty much everything we give her. We'll probably start meat in another month or so.
Evie's new favorite toys are definitely books- mostly because she learned how to turn the pages now. She will lay on the floor with a book for a good 20 minutes or so and just turn the pages back and forth over and over. She especially likes her "Happy Baby Colors" book, I think because it has so many smiling babies in it and she LOVES to look at pictures of other babies.
Evie is becoming a little social butterfly with her other baby friends, she gets very smiley and chatty whenever there's another baby around and she wants to get down and play. She's just starting to show a little bit of stranger anxiety with adults she doesn't know, but if you give her 15-20 minutes, she warms up to pretty much everyone. :)
As you can see above, our photo shoots are getting more and more difficult- she was obsessed with the sticker this time around and I couldn't get a decent photo without her crinkling it. And most of our photo shoot went a little something like this....

I don't know how people do this every single month and keep the photos so consistent!! We tried her sitting up, but that was even worse, she kept crawling away. We'll see how next month goes! ;)

Playdate Madness!

You would think with it being winter time that we'd be stuck at home, but the weather has been unseasonably warm, and Evie and I are taking full advantage! We've been out and about quite a bit lately, and spending lots of time with our baby friends. Evie LOVES to interact with other babies, she gets the biggest smile when she's around another kid! She's usually pretty good too, she doesn't mind if a toy gets snatched from her, and although she's a little grabby with faces, she's very sweet to her friends. Here are some photos of recent outings with Evie's friends!

Evie and her betrothed, Micah

4 babies + 1 toddler = general chaos

Dom and Evie are still friends- even though he may have bitten her nose a few minutes before this!! 

Eli LOVES bubbles

Evie and Emma are destined to be Besties!

I don't know about anyone else, but Tuesday night meetings are getting HARD. It's way past bedtime by the end, and Evie doesn't want to sit anymore, or be quiet. So Steph and I have a weekly "playdate" around 9 pm every Tuesday in the library at the Kingdom Hall. When the girls are just about to lose it, we let them crawl around and play for the last 10 minutes of the meeting. We're pretty sure these two are BFFs already. ;)

Welcome winter!

It's finally cold and snowy here- we usually get bad weather so much sooner, I keep forgetting that it's already December! We haven't had a chance to take Evie in the snow yet, but stay tuned for a super cute pink snowsuit when we do! ;)
And here is Evie's newest hat to go with it, modeling at target. I think it's my new favorite photo of her, love her face!

Family Photos

We had family photos done with my parents, Matt and Ally, and us- here's the link to the gallery!

http://proofs.dedario.com/liane

Password: Evie

Evelyn Clara: 7 months

We just got home from a week long vacation in Florida, and Eric and I both came home with head colds (boo!), so forgive my tardiness with Evie's 7 month update. :) We are all doing wonderfully, and enjoying Evie more and more as she grows before our eyes.

Evie has mastered a lot of new and fun skills over the last month, she's been a busy girl! we started solid food this month as you all know from the videos and such, and she's doing great. Evie has eaten everything we've given her, and hasn't shown an aversion to a single food. She seems to love eating, and sometimes I think she'd just keep eating and eating if we kept giving her food- she never wants to stop! ;) Right now she's having a fruit mixed with oatmeal for breakfast, and a veggie and oatmeal mixed with formula for dinner. I've just started putting her in the high chair when I'm eating lunch and letting her play with some finger food. She's doing really well with picking up bits of food and getting them to her mouth, I can see that she'll have this mastered soon.
On the mobile front, we're still army-crawling, but Evie spends a lot of time on her hands and knees stationary, so I think she'll start crawling for real soon. And she has pretty much totally figured out how to pull herself to standing on furniture, laundry baskets, etc. so now she's standing quite a bit. It's so strange to see such a tiny girl standing up, it makes me laugh everytime I see her. :) And I'm afraid she's going to a climber with her interest in climbing up on anything she can reach, so watch out for that!
We went to the pediatrician today for a weight check since at her 6 month visit her weight gain was a little low, but she's bounced right back and we're on track again so nothing to worry about. Evie is 15.6 lbs and 26.75" long.
Here are some photos from our trip to Florida with Grandma and Grandpa Rudy, Uncle Dan, Aunt Tammy, and Uncle Greg. We had a great time and Evie was SO good, especially on the flights there and back. She slept great in the hotel and discovered her love of swimming. :) I'll be looking into Mommy and Me swimming lessons soon for us!

Evie is a Fish

Just popping in to share a moment from our vacation in Florida- we're having a great time and the weather is great! Tomorrow we're going to Sea World, which I'm hoping Evie enjoys. She clearly likes water, as seen from her fearless attempts to swim out of Eric arms in the pool this afternoon. :)

http://youtu.be/5camXU2TPmw

She's a Daredevil!

Evie has been getting more and more adventurous lately, exploring her abilities and strength. Her new favorite thing to play with is her carseat. She grabs the edge of it, pulls it down, then climbs inside. We need to start putting it in a different spot so she doesnt do this anymore, but I did take a photo while she was supervised. :)

 Then the other day, I changed Evie's diaper, and while taking care of it in the bathroom, I put her on the floor in her room with a toy. I come back to find her like this:

 That basket has toys and stuffed animals in it, and apparently she wanted in! She has now since mastered pulling herself up to kneeling on baskets and boxes. Then this morning, this happened:

Um yea. My 6 and a half month old pulled herself up to standing all on her own. No help. Is that even allowed!?!? I told Evie it's not. ;) She did it again this afternoon on a laundry basket- pray for us. She is growing up way too fast!! And I think it's so interesting that she still can't sit unassisted, but can do all these other things. I'm afraid this means we'll have a little girl who won't sit still!! ;)