Seven Months and Visit from Uncle Trey

Kara is really starting to develop much more of a personality these days. She's a very energetic little girl who loves to explore. She's also fearless. She's become quite the expert at crawling and pulling herself up, and she's getting better at getting back down (though she hasn't mastered that yet).

Kara has always been quite enamored with TV. Since she was about a month old, she would sit and stare at the TV as soon as those flashing lights caught her eye. Mommy and Daddy have always been quick to turn it off, but we're letting her watch very limited amounts (10-15 minutes max per day) these days.  Mommy and Daddy will watch "Signing Time". Kara seems fairly interested, and Mommy and Daddy have learned the signs for eat, milk, water, want, shoes, baby, sleep, more, ball, bird, car, plane, Mom, Dad, flower, fish, dog, and cat. We're hoping Kara picks this up so we can start communicating with her more. Also, Mommy will let Kara watch small amounts of Sesame Street on special occasions. She's enthralled with Elmo. This is about the only time Kara will sit still. See the pictures.

Uncle Trey came up to visit this past weekend before he embarks on his African adventure. Uncle Trey is going to train to be an African safari guide in South Africa for the next year. Here's a link to the program called Bushwise. We hope he has a great time!

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Back to the Daily Grind

After our exciting May (trips to Alabama and Colorado to visit grandparents plus a couple visits from people), June has been a little slower. Kara continues to build on her crawling skills. She can now consistently crawl with her stomach off the ground, much to the dismay of Mommy. She's practicing pulling up on things. She particularly likes to pull up on unstable things (her carrier, bouncy seat, or boxes). So far she's pretty good at getting up but not so great at getting down. We're hoping she figures that out soon.

Kara's starting to talk a little more these days. She'll do some ba-ba's or du-du's every once in a while. Mommy is very excited to get to talk to her little girl (and so is Daddy)!

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Let's Go West!

On May 27th, we headed out West to visit family out in Colorado.  Traveling to Colorado from South Carolina with a baby is quite an adventure, but Kara did great!  She was pretty grumpy most of the day, but was relatively calm during the flight (though it would have been great if she'd slept on the plane, but she didn't).

The first day in Colorado, we just chilled at Grandma and Grandpa's house, letting Kara decompress.  The next day we had friends from Colorado come over to the house to meet Kara.  We got to see a lot of people (though we didn't get to see everyone).  I think everyone had a good time with Kara, and Kara had a lot of fun playing the crowd.

On Sunday, we went to Arvada to visit Great Grandma (G.G.) K. and Aunt Amy.  And for Memorial day, Dad and Grandpa went to Boulder for the Bolder Boulder.  Grandpa ran, lazy Dad just watched.  In the afternoon, we had some more people over to visit Kara.  Overall, we had a great time visiting people!

While we were in Colorado, Kara continued to develop her crawling skills.  She refined her army crawl and then moved on to crawling with her torso off the ground.  She did that for about a day before she decided that she needed to start pulling herself up (see the pictures).  Grandma and Grandpa's house has some steps in the family room, which Kara pulled herself up on.  She started with pulling herself up to her knees but quickly moved on to pulling herself to her feet.  Crazy girl!

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6-Month Birthday!

Kara is now officially a crawler. She started off in early May with dragging herself around the room. It was rough, but she could get around. She quickly moved on to an army crawl and would occasionally balance herself on all fours. She doesn't want to take the time to master any skills, she just keeps on learning new things!

Kara recently had her 6-month check-up with the Dr. She said that Kara looked great (the Dr. was very impressed with how well Kara would sit).  Kara measured 26 1/2 inches long (78th percentile) and weighed in at 15 lbs, 10 oz (43rd percentile), so she's long and lean.  We don't know where she gets that from...

Several people came up to visit Kara in May.  Around May 9th, Patrick and Akila stopped by.  It was great to see them and catch up.  They were amazed at how much Kara had grown since the last time they visited.

A couple of weeks later, Grandma and Grandpa H. came up to see the little girl. They had a great time visiting and couldn't believe how well she could crawl (she was doing her fairly coordinated army crawl at the time).

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The Mobile Baby

Kara is such a joy these days!  She greets us with a smile in the morning and it stays on her face for much of the day.  She's even giving us a few more chuckles and squeals.  Kara is becoming more aware of the world around her every day.  She reaches for things she's interested in (pretty much everything), and loves it when Mommy points out and names many of the items around the house.

A couple pretty major things seem to be happening in front of our eyes - Kara is becoming much more vocal and MOBILE (we're happy and more than a little nervous about the latter).  She "ahhhs" and "ohhhhs" mostly, with a few "ghassss", "heys", and "huhhs" thrown in for fun.  She'll make these noises for minutes at a time, which is quite a departure from our quiet-except-for-crying baby of yore.

And our little girl is *so* close to crawling (we think).  Amazingly, she pretty much goes wherever she wants now, without crawling or walking.  She'll lunge, roll...over and over, and drag herself with her arms across the room.  Kara will hardly even stay still for a book or to eat!

Another fairly new development is a strong aversion to naps and bedtime.  She's still sleeping but not without a fight and screaming.  She just likes playing with Mommy and Daddy way too much! (ha ha ha)  Guess there could be worse things in life!

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