Happy 9 Months!

It is hard to believe that Kara is 9 months old already. It seems like just yesterday we were bringing her home from the hospital. She's grown so much, and I can't possibly imagine my life without her.

Kara is getting closer and closer to walking (Heather, I think you might owe me a Coke soon!).  She'll pull herself up and then just let go and stand there for a while.  Daddy counted her standing up for 15 seconds all by herself!  She also took one step yesterday - she was trying to move about three feet from the toy bin to the bookshelf, and instead of getting down and crawling, she just took a step.  It was pretty cool, but we're not ready to declare her a walker just yet!

Kara's still working on the talking thing.  Mommy swears Kara said "Hey" to her when she walked into the room once, but she's not consistent with it.  She also seems to call everyone "Dada".  She calls Mommy, Daddy, herself, and her toys "Dada".  We're really looking forward to getting to hear what's going on inside her head!

Kara's a very active little girl these days, so it's hard to get the whole picture of her in just still pictures.  Keep scrolling down to check out some cute videos of our little girl.

Where's Kara? There she is!

Kara's starting to enjoy playing peek-a-boo. She seems to really enjoy peeking around corners to see Mommy. It brings a huge smile to her face (and Mommy's). See the video below.

Other than that, there's not much else to report. We just wanted to share some of the cute pictures we had of Kara.

We were fortunate to stumble upon a link to some pictures from Trey's adventure in Africa. These aren't his pictures, but we're pretty sure the girl that took him is in his group. Here's a link.

Link to our pictures

Goodbye Nap #3

Kara's been a pretty good sleeper for the last few months. For the most part, she's been very good about sleeping through the night and taking about three naps during the day (though the 3rd naps always been kind of hit or miss). However, for the last week, Kara has refused to take her third nap. So far it's been working out pretty well. We haven't seen much of a change in Kara's temperament, and she's actually been going to sleep easier at bedtime (less crying, which makes everyone happy).

Kara's kind of funny with her eating. She still relies on bottles for most of her nutrition, but she's eating more and more solids. She's not a big fan of Mommy and Daddy feeding her. Instead, she really seems to like finger foods and being able to feed herself. In particular, she's a big fan of puffs (kind of like Cheerios, but they dissolve a little easier). We've been experimenting with different solid foods. Yesterday, Mommy gave Kara some couscous with feta cheese and chicken. Kara seemed to really enjoy it, and we think she might have gotten about 10% of the food into her mouth. Tonight we had ground turkey, mashed french fries, and cooked green beans. It went quite well, so that's encouraging.

On another front, Kara's second tooth is coming in.  So now she's got both of her bottom front teeth.  We're trying to get a picture of her cute little teeth, but no luck so far.

Link to pictures

Professional Pictures

On July 14th, we had our first sitting for pictures of Kara. We were lured to the studio with the promise of 40 pictures for $9.99, but we soon realized that was only for one pose (and there were so many cute poses!).  Mommy and Daddy didn't think that the photographer was going to be able to get very many pictures of Kara looking at the camera and smiling, but they were wrong.  Our little girl took some adorable pictures, and Mommy and Daddy walked out with quite a few!

Link to pictures

Visit from Justin, Heather, and Sean

Kara's had a pretty exciting couple of weeks. Grandma H. came up to visit Kara and stayed most of the week. She was amazed at how much Kara has grown in just a month!

This past weekend, Justin, Heather, and Sean came up to visit. They hadn't seen Kara since April. Kara and Sean had a lot of fun playing together. Sean particularly liked playing in Kara's enclosure, which he called "The Zoo". Kara and Sean also went to a nearby playground. Sean had fun playing on the see-saw and exploring the whole park, while Kara enjoyed the swing with Mommy. The rest of the weekend, Kara entertained herself by chasing Julie (their little dog) around the house and trying to grab her tail. I think Kara wore Julie out!

Kara is an expert crawler these days. She can get pretty much anywhere she wants to go. She's also starting to learn the value of sitting. She's figured out she can use both hands to play with toys if she's sitting. She's learning how to communicate a bit more. When she wants to be picked up, she'll starting climbing up your leg. She's also talking with more purpose these days. She'll look at you and say 'da-da-da' or 'ba-ba-ba'. We don't know what she's trying to say, but her gears are turning! It'll be a really good day when she says da-da and means it.

Link to pictures



Heather created her own slideshow with pictures from the weekend.

Hey everyone!
We spent this weekend in South Carolina with our friends, the Stevensons. Warning: this Smilebox is full of sugar, spice, and everything nice (that's what baby Kara is made of)!

Love,
Heather