Thanksgiving 2017

It was a quick trip down to see family for Jason, Mabel and I, but it was a good one.  Matilda spent nearly a week down there as Mabel recovered from RSV (details coming in Mabel's 8 month blog).

I'm hoping this is the hardest year we have in terms of sleeping and cousin dynamics.  Mabel slept terrible.  Also, Matilda wants to play with her older cousins, Evelyn wants to play with Matilda, and Mabel pretty much did her own thing.  I think it will be better next year when they're a bit older and Matilda's better at playing with Evelyn, and Mabel can join the fun too.

One of Matilda's favorite part of the week was putting together a gingerbread turkey that our neighbors had given us the prior week.  It didn't look much like the picture on the box when it was done, but I think they enjoyed the fun of putting it together.

We had a great time with Jason's family too.  We weren't able to go out to their ranch like we had hoped, but it was good nonetheless.

It's always hard to leave. 

Mabel's Seventh Month

If last month was characterized by leaps in mobility and nursing woes, this month was characterized by sickness.  Not terrible sicknesses, but sickness nonetheless.  Both of the girls have been having tummy issues.  Mabel's lasted for over 2 weeks.  About a week into the tummy issues, she caught a cold and had a fever, cough, and snotty nose.  I feel like we're seeing the light at the tunnel with her, but now Matilda's got the cold.  Can't wait to get this behind us. 

Stats: Mabel saw the doctor just before she turned 7 months and she weighed 15 pounds 15 ounces (35%).  Still wearing 9 month clothes, although I pulled out some of the 12 month cold weather clothes. 

Still no teeth.

Sleep: No real changes here this month.

Eat: I'm so happy to report that her nursing strike ended after 11 days!  Now she's back to nursing same as before.  Yay!

We tried a few finger foods at the beginning of the month (boiled carrots and roasted zucchini), but she kept gagging so we moved back to purees.  We've been lazy about making homemade purees this time around, so we bought some baby food jars to try.  She's had sweet potatoes (not a huge fan... I think they were too sweet), green beans, and peas.  She also really likes the oatmeal baby cereal.

Play/ Milestones:  Before she got sick, we made it to the neighborhood's Halloween festival, which was nice.

Halloween day was when she got really sick with a fever and cold; she was a terrible mess and wouldn't let me put her down.  We were stuck in her room rocking (see pic below) when Matilda passed out candy with our friends to all the trick-or-treaters. 

Her biggest milestone this month is that she is crawling (sort of).  She gets up on her knees, but isn't coordinated enough to move her hands and knees in synch yet, but she can do a great job commando crawling and is getting better pushing along with one knee at a time.  She'll be crawling on her knees in no time.

Mabel stinking loves cords.  The picture below was taken under supervision, but you have to watch her carefully or she'll go to great lengths to get her hands on them (and body wrapped up in them).

She also enjoys lifting toys above her head and banging them down.  She's also getting more vocal, which has been fun.

Have I mentioned how much Matilda and Mabel get along?  No really, they LOVE each other.  Each of them light up when they see the other one.  It is really awesome to watch and can just melt your heart. :)

Texas Renaissance Festival 2017

It's our favorite time of year.... RENFEST!!  Teehee.  No but seriously, Matilda said camping at the Texas Renaissance Festival is her favorite event of the year.  She said she likes it better than Christmas and her birthday. 

We've made it out there twice this year.  Our first trip was just a day trip one rainy Sunday morning.  Our friend Shane joined us.  As weird as it is, my favorite time to go to the festival is rainy Sunday's.  It's usually pretty empty and you feel like you have more time to enjoy it. 

We decided to wear our "old" outfits for the day.  We mostly explored the shops.  We had pizza for lunch and Matilda ate a cheesecake on a stick. 

Matilda also went through the "scary castle" which was really just a black light maze.

Mabel had a great trip too.  She took a few naps in the sling which was nice.

This past weekend was our second trip of the year.  We camped out there for two nights.  It was Mabel's second time to camp and she did great.  She and I shared the big tent.  Since she's more mobile, we took the pack 'n play and she slept fine in it. 

Matilda and Jason shared the small tent.  Matilda scared us the first night.  She woke up with a fever and was talking nonsense.  She said she had "fire in her feet" which was pretty scary.  Luckily, she was fine the next morning.  She kept swearing she wasn't sick.  I think she was just scared we were going to head home early.

Joel, Laura, and Elijah camped with us Friday and joined us at the festival on Saturday.  Matilda and Elijah got their faces painted and rode the spinning dragon egg ride.

We left the festival mid-day for the kids to take a car nap, before heading back in mid-afternoon.  Matilda ate pizza for early dinner and we walked through the garden. 

Matilda put herself to bed that night.  Both girls were up early the next morning, just after 5 am.  Matilda wanted to wear her butterfly wings and bling, and I didn't have the energy to wear my medieval garb, so we just went in plain clothes on Sunday.

Matilda must have been feeling better because she ate a whole sausage on a stick for breakfast.

We did one of the big swing rides and Matilda did some old school sewing/ knitting, before we headed out.

These next few pictures melt my heart.  As Matilda put it, our girls were just "happy, so happy" to be there.  We grabbed some lunch (Matilda's was pure chocolate), and then headed out for the day.