ELLA JAMES & HADLEY JULIETTE: 7 months old

Ella is 7 months old today. How did this happen? So quickly? Really? She is crawling now taking more "steps" with her arms without going down on her belly now. Any day she will be zooming off without a thought. She pulls herself up on the new toys I got her that is like a walker with wheels. She is walking with it. She pulls herself up, or with my help stands with it. Then she pushes it forward and takes little steps. I don't know what she thinks she is doing trying to walk already. I am not ready for that! She is so much more than a baby girl now. Other people are commenting on how she is changing in the face even. She has completely stopped nursing now. She took one more suckle the other morning but merely for comfort and fell right back asleep. There are mixed feelings about that. It is nice because we are so on the go now so the convenience is nice not to have to pump or breast-feed anymore but I do miss the closeness. That is why I thrive on the times that she will just cuddle up and snuggle with me.

Today we started off by taking her 7 month pictures at Penney's. As always she had just fallen asleep when it was time for us to go, but I scooped her up and took her anyway. She is always such a good sport and in such a good mood. Sometimes she just needs a little power nap as long as she is going somewhere new and she is interested in what is going on. Once we got there she was wide awake and ready to pose! We only have a few thousand pictures of her already...not too many. The photographer wanted to put her in a beach scene which was fine with me so she started off in a little beach chair. She was supposed to sit still but she is so on the go she started to crawl off and ended up falling out of the chair. Super mommy to the rescue I ran and was able to catch her before she hit the ground. She still cried though because I think it scared her. She got over it quickly and ended up taking some super cute pictures.

After that her Mamaw met us and took her for a little while so Dawn and I could go see Toy Story 3. It was great and in 3D but a little dark. My mom wanted to know why I didn't take Ella. She probably would have liked it, but it was a little long and I didn't want to bother anyone :) After the movie we met back up with miss Ella and went to Dawn's apartment to meet the cable guy. He took entirely too long which majorly cut into our pool time. However Ella was highly entertained with the cats! I sat her on the carpet and she saw Sox and Bella. She literally squealed with glee! Both cats were so good with her. Sox let her "pet" him and pull his hair which she was so excited about. Then little kitten Bella came along and was trapped. Poor Kitty. But the look on Ella's face was priceless. She was so happy! She is such an animal lover. Oh it was so great.

Finally we made it to the pool. Ella was standing up in her stroller trying to jump out just about. I just about needed to strap her in for her own safety. She is so curious and ready to go that she has no idea how she could hurt herself. She is fearless and knows no better.

We hopped into the pool and she did her classic little shudder and sucked in her tummy. She loves the water and did so well swimming with Dawn and I. I finally decided I would be brave and just dunk her. I wanted to get it over with and see how she would do. So Dawn helped me and we counted one, two, three and I dunked her straight down and straight back up. I think she opened her mouth at the end because she coughed a little bit. She blinked her eyes super fast and then looked to me to see what she should think. I immediately lifted her into the air to play with her again. She whimpered once and then started to smile again. Whew! She handled it well.

We ended up leaving about 45 minutes later because she was so tired and DONE! So we left and put her in her cars-seat and poof she was happy and flirting with Dawn. The cutest face ever and Dawn captured it on camera! Then it was back to the tears and my cue to go home. So off we went.