End of Summer trip

We took a mini vacation last week before Sullivan started back to school this Monday. We went to Chattanooga for two nights, and had a blast. We love Chattanooga and it only takes about 5 hours to get there from Oxford, which makes it about our max easy distance with kiddos. We stayed at the Embassy Suites since they have bedrooms with a door! It was nice to be able to put Evie down at 7, close the door, and still eat/watch tv/play without disturbing her. Staying downtown would have been ideal as far as access, but that door was very important this go round.

We did the ocean building of the aquarium the first day and walked to this little Italian restaurant in the arts district that we love for dinner. By this time the kids were hot and tired, so we ended up getting our food to go and ate back at the hotel.

We had to wait for a shark to swim by before we could take a picture! 

 The next day we did Rock City, Ruby Falls, and the Incline Train. We enjoyed all of these, but it was too much for one day. I think we could have spent all day at Rock City just exploring and walking around. There are restaurants at the bottom and at the top lookout, so next trip we'll plan on having lunch there.

Cooling off with some free water from the bar at the top of lookout mountain.

Ruby Falls was neat and cool temperature wise. Evie slept through almost the entire 1 hour tour, so that was perfect timing. It's a little weird to think about being that deep under a mountain and all the crazy what ifs, but it was definitely worth doing.

 The Incline train was a nice chance to just sit and enjoy the ride. Definitely made me nervous when it got so steep at the top, but I managed ok. :) Sullivan loved it, of course!

When you can look straight and see out of the roof of the train, you know you are steep! Was sliding forward in seat a bit, and definitely made me nervous! Evie wonders what's the big deal?

They actually just park the train at the top on the steepest part, so you have to climb up and out of the train.

While waiting on the train to take us back down, I discovered Evie had her first tooth on the bottom right!!

Our last day we went back to the aquarium to do the rivers building. 

We stopped in Huntsville at the Space Center and played around for a while. It was brutally hot outside and we were worn out, so we didn't stay long.

Sullivan did his first 3-D ride while at the Space Center. I was worried he might get scared, but he LOVED it! He wanted to stay in and do it again! He's so grown up!

All in all, it was a great trip! Sullivan is at a very fun age and Evie is so laid back! I would love to go back to the mountains during the fall if we can find the time! We really want to do a longer train ride with the kiddos, and it would be nice to do it while the leaves are changing. We'll see.

Evie- 7 months

So, I didn't get Evie's 6 month post published until after the 7 month mark, but I actually had it written on time. I was waiting to get photos from my nice camera downloaded finally.

Evie had her 6 month checkup between 6 and 7, so I'll post those stats here:
Weight: 18 lb 10 oz (84%)
Height: 27 inches (79%)
Head: 43.5 cm (70%)

We've had another, brutal round of the stomach virus and also the crud. The first year of daycare is hard and germy! My poor sweet girl managed to smile between dry heaves if that tells you anything about her personality! Other than sickness, she's gotten much better at sitting up unassisted, has started army crawling all over the place, is eating much better, and finally sleeping through the night again! It's been a big month!

Evie typically nurses first thing in the morning, has her breakfast about 30 minutes later, and will sometimes nurse again for a few minutes right before we walk out the door. She has 3 or 4 (@ 4 oz) bottles of breast milk while at school, and has started having some baby food at lunch as well. If she drinks all 4 bottles, she will eat baby food for dinner and then nurse again before going to bed at about 7 pm.  She has been sleeping through the night most nights, although, occasionally she will wake up a fuss for a few minutes or want to be fed around 4 am.

Evie had her first trip to the cabin during the last month, but she was sickly and probably didn't get too much out of it. I think she's getting closer to a da-da or mama. When she's tired or hungry her cry sounds a lot like mama, but when she's happy and talking in the mornings we get more da-da sounds. She gives the biggest toothless grins whenever she sees one of our family members. People are constantly remarking on how laid back and happy she is. She thinks her brother is hilarious and he loves her as well. Sullivan still calls her "Evsers" while Daniel lately calls her "Toothless" and I still call her "Evie Pie". Lots of nicknames in our house! Sullivan was demonstrating how to crawl for her last week. They may be unstoppable when she's finally walking! Evie is really noticing our pets now.  She watches the fish while she eats, loves to "pet" our cat Sophie and pull on her ears and tail, and laughs at Bailey. Bailey and Sophie eat up the attention and all the food Evie throws on the floor!

Summer is almost over. Just a week and a half before Sullivan is back in school. He's had a lazy summer for the most part, and enjoyed having a sitter at home with him. His behavior has been great lately, so I'm hopeful it will continue when he goes back to school. He's started doing chores around the house; primarily to earn money for chewing gum. I think he likes having jobs...most of the time at least. He helps feed Bailey and let her out, clears the table after meals, picks up toys, helps me dust, and babysits the Roomba as it vacuums since it gets stuck and calls for help all the time. He definitely has a touch of his dad's OCD. After dusting one of our tables, he put the pictures frames back for me. At first he had them arranged by color, but when I looked back later they were no longer in that order. It took me a minute to realize he had arranged them by the number of people in the photograph. Daniel took a picture. It was funny and sweet. He's so smart, I sometimes forget he's only 4. When he is upset these days, his new things it to say either "you're the worst mom ever" or "you are ruining my life". Yes. At 4. Conversely, when he's happy I get "you're the best mom ever" or "I love you so much, Mommy".

Evie- 6 months!

Half way to Evie's first birthday?! How do I slow down and savor each and every moment? They stay little snuggly babies for so short a time. Evie is sooo big! We went to the doctor this week and she is 18 lbs! She is still on breastmilk, but has had cereal and some fruits and veggies a few times.  She is just now starting to really move the food to the back of her mouth rather than pushing it out with her tongue.  She's tried bananas, pears, squash, sweet potatoes, peaches, and avocado. The second time she had pears she ate the whole container, so she has that in common with Sullivan.  The others have been just so so. She wants to drink from my cup all the time.  She's enjoyed chewing on animal crackers- I give her these while I'm trying to eat my own dinner to keep her happy.

Sleep is still terrible! Evie goes down easy as pie, but starts waking up an hour or two later.  Making it worse, I am so tired I've been letting her sleep with me rather than get up all night long.  Other than wanting to nurse several times during the night, she sleeps great with me, but it makes me nervous and I know I don't sleep well with her in the bed. I tried to let her cry it out a bit last night, but Daniel gave in and went and got her.  Had to explain how long we need to wait, don't pick her up, etc.  I guess he's forgotten how this works. No fun though.  She was such a good sleeper, I sure wish we could get back to that!

She still loves her feets and toes and spends a good bit of time in "happy baby" pose and sucking on her toes. She rolls around the floor, but is usually happy on a blanket playing while I cook or what not. She LOVES her johnny jump up in the doorway. Do they make those for bigger kids?? When Evie is tired she rubs her eyes and pulls on her ear and will rub her nose in your shoulder. While she's nursing right before bed she will usually reach up and scratch her head and hair. It's so sweet. She is so happy!

Evie's newest cry sounds a lot like "Mmmooommmm". She typically does this when she's really hungry or at night when she gets a leg stuck in her crib or wants someone to come get her. She is most talkative first thing in the morning as she lays in bed. Lots of "dats, thats, lats" and motor boat sounds this month.

Sullivanism- If you and Daddy died and everyone else died, Evie and I would be stuck here and don't know how to turn on the t.v.

He's loving the bugs these days.  I'm very glad I haven't passed on the "scared of spiders" gene. He now wants to pick up any worm, caterpillar, frog, etc that he finds.  Convenient to have another man in the house to handle these situations for me. :) He's getting better on trying new foods. He usually will only have the one required bite and no more, but occasionally, he'll actually like what he tried. Biggest milestone...he ate a sonic cheeseburger when out to lunch with his sitter.  I didn't believe it when he told me, so I had to confirm with her. He's had a few more since then. Only took 4 1/2 years for my child to like a cheeseburger! I made a chocolate zucchini cake with some garden zucchinis we were given.  He ate about half a piece and hasn't had more.  IT JUST TASTES LIKE CHOCOLATE! How does he know i'm sneaking in veggies?!  Even with is limited diet, he is getting so tall! He grew an inch from May 25 to July 1st!