Evie- 8 months

The last month has been full of firsts for Evie! She started full on crawling (was army crawling some before the 7 month mark), pulling up on furniture, trying to cruise around furniture, got her first two teeth on the bottom middle, first ear infection (right ear), first two rounds of antibiotics (amoxicillan and augmentin), first allergic reaction, first trip to the ER (let's hope last), and first round of steroids.

Sunday morning.

Monday morning.

I have no idea what Evie was allergic to, but she had a few bug bites when she went to bed on Saturday night, work up Sunday morning with some hives all over her and they just got worse through the day. She slept horribly Sunday night and Monday morning the hives had converged into basically one big hive over most of her body, up her throat and cheeks, and on her eyes. Sullivan had a similar reaction once when he was a child that even the allergist couldn't identify, but his never moved up to his face.  They gave Evie some oral steroids and it cleared right up within a few hours.

Our sleep is back to crappy, but with all of the above, it's easy to see why. Most nights for the last two weeks, she's been in bed with me ALL night.  She also wants to nurse ALL night. With teething and an ear infection, I'm sure she just wants the comfort, but it's hard on a momma! Last night she didn't get in bed with me until 11ish and only woke up to nurse twice i think. Instead of getting up for good at 5:30 am, she woke up for a few minutes, but then went back to sleep until about 6:30 am.  I'll take any improvements! Hopefully we will be able to use the long weekend to get her back to sleeping longer and better in her bed. *since this post was written a couple of weeks ago, I can report that there have been no improvements on the sleeping.

Showing off her two teeth!

I always put my hand on the flash. Doh!

Evie is eating lots of baby foods. She doesn't seem crazy about bananas or any of the oatmeal type baby foods. She loves her zucchini, broccoli, carrot mixtures and just about any of the other combinations we've tried. She starts most meals with a few cheerios, and she's gotten her pincer grasp down pretty good. I plan to try some other "real" foods soon. We just don't eat that much baby friendly food, and really, after preparing our meal, and a meal for Sullivan (i know, i know), I don't have it in me to puree something else for Evie. She is still on breastmilk! I'm going to keep it up as long as she's interested and I can keep up. I'm still so sentimental about everything, I may never want to quit.

My two bedhead babies.

These guys love each other so much. 

Poop- there it is.
Evie's first round of antibiotics (coupled with nursing from me while i was on antibiotics) gave her a terrible yeast infection. The doctor of course recommended as much time sans diaper as possible. We usually try for naked time after bath at night, but I, brilliantly, decided to do it one morning before breakfast. She never made a peep to let me know, but I looked up and noticed "something" beside her leg. When I realized what it was, I snatched her up in hopes of avoiding her rolling around in it, but she wasn't finished!!! I was then left holding a pooping baby dropping poop on my house shoes, and all over the towel on the ground (I did have enough sense to have her on a towel during naked time). I ran her to the bathtub and sat her in there, and thankfully, Sullivan woke up at that point and was able to go get Daniel to help me. It was a poop-tastrophe! Would you believe it, after getting her all bathed and dressed and the poop cleaned up, she had a poopy blowout while eating breakfast. Some days just start off like that when you have kids.

Sullivan has been having a great year so far! He's been taking naps at school which helps things all around, but also has been getting good notes each day! His newest skill is snapping his fingers and he likes to emphasize most things he says with a snap now. It's really fun. Imagine: "this sandwich is really good (snap)", "let's go read a book (snap)", "i really like angry birds star wars (snap)". Sullivan has been doing so  much better with the eating. I mean, he still doesn't eat anything, but he will at least try new things occasionally! His soccer team is really good, and I think he's enjoyed that.  He says he wants to play the cello now instead of the violin, so we'll see if this new fancy lasts. I don't plan to start any more music lessons until the soccer season is over.

slight resemblance.

My grandfather had his 93rd birthday at the end of August. The family gathered at the farm for a celebration. I am so lucky to still have my paternal grandparents, and I'm so glad my children have them! Evie's middle name, Chennault, was my grandfather's mother's (Evie's great-great-grandmother Ruby) maiden name.

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.