See my toofs!

If you look closely, you can see her first two teeth coming in...Also, don't forget to check out her album to see more recent pics.

The Mady B Show

RA training is nearly over and move in is just around the corner. Carrie has had lots of quality time with Mady this last week. Here are a few videos of Mady--the pretty and the ugly. Enjoy!

Toofs!

Madelyn's days as a cute toothless baby are officially over. Her two front bottom teeth have started poking out. Yikes! She has also started working on her fine motor skills by feeding herself Cheerios this week. She will spend twenty or thirty seconds trying to very carefully pinch the little piece of cereal with her thumb and forefinger, and when she finally get it, she stuffs her entire hand in her mouth to make sure the Cheerio goes where it is supposed to. She is also getting better at pushing up onto her hands and knees. She can actually push up onto her hands and feet now. We'll have to see how much longer this lasts before she starts trying to crawl...

In Mommy news, Carrie's degree was officially conferred on Tuesday. Everyone can now start calling her Dr. Carrie. :)

Round of Applause

Sorry for the delay in posting Mady's 7 month picture. Now that I'm back to work it is a little harder to keep up with the blog. It is also getting harder to take these pictures of Madelyn. She gets very distracted by the note card and tries very hard to destroy it. If we can manage to refocus her attention, she will give us about 2 seconds before she starts squirming off the couch.

In addition to aging a month, Mady has started clapping her hands. She still isn't crawling, but she is scooting backwards now. Her method is not graceful, but she has time to work on it. She basically pushes up onto her hands and knees, then flops on her belly, then pushes up again. By doing this, she can very slowly back accross the room. She is continuing to sleep well, which is a huge blessing. Last night she woke once before we went to bed, then she slept for the rest of the night! We didn't have to get up at all. :)

VICTORY!

Madelyn's sleeping patterns have improved dramatically in the last few days (Carrie thinks I'm jinxing us by posting this). Until recently, a good night was when she woke up three times at 10:30, 1:00, and 3:30. But most nights weren't that good. Until now! For the last three nights, she has only woke up once around 3:00. That's it! We can definitely work with that. We have been leaving four pacifiers in her crib with her when she goes down. She is now really good about getting the correct end of the pacifier into her mouth. If she is waking during the night, it seems that she has been able to find a pacifier and soothe herself back to sleep without waking us. We are very hopeful that this will continue, and with any luck at all, we might even be able to eliminate her 3:00 waking. We'll keep you posted.

In other news, her little arms are now strong enough to bench-press her daddy. Ok, not quite that strong yet, but she is able to support herself in a crawling position now. She isn't crawling yet and is only pushing up a little bit, but when we put her on her hands and knees, she can hold that position for a while. One step closer to crawling. I'm terrified.

She is also doing a much better job eating now. She is much less picky with her veggies than she used to be. We've been making our own baby food by steaming and milling fruits and veggies, then freezing them in ice-cube trays. We visited the farmers market today and picked up some fresh squash for Mady.

Finally, here is a fun little video of Mady acting strangely hyper. Notice at the end how she seems to gravitate towards the one object on the floor that she shouldn't be playing with...