Eleanor is 7 months old!

At 7 months old, Ella has been making huge strides. She is so very close to crawling. She gets up on her hands and knees and makes about one forward movement with a hand/knee, then wither drops back to a sit or down to her belly. Eleanor is also pulling up to a stand everywhere that she can: in the tub (aghhh), on my leg in the kitchen (aghh), on the dog (aghhh), basically anywhere that is super dangerous. Ella has rolled off of Madeline's bed once so far, hopefully she will hold off on doing that in the new house with the hardwood floors!
Ella is also laughing constantly, babbling to everyone and (of course) saying dada. I have decided that the ability to string together the da sound does not constitute a first word, but Matt would like to think that Ella's first word is for him! I guess he might deserve this since everything Ella does looks more and more like Matt will have three of us with the same personality, oops! Eleanor is obsessed with the dogs and loves to grab their ears, chew on Lani's feet, and lay on Jameson as much as she can. She watches them walk around and is often totally distracted from crying by the dog coming over.
Eleanor is eating solids regularly now. We can pretty much find something to give her at any restaurant as long as we cut it small or it is soft. Madeline loves to choose Ella's meals and tries to make them match what she is eating. Eleanor is even taking a solid lunch and cheerios to school now, woohoo! We never go anywhere without cheerios and a num-num. She is also starting to use a sippy cup, but mostly that is just a soggy mess! Ella now has 4 teeth through. I still can't get her to hold still long enough for a picture, but I am still trying.
Some video of my favorite sound (baby giggles) regularly induced by Jameson licking her and a video of Madi reading to Eleanor. Notice how enthralled Ella is with Madi!

Where did July go?

I cannot believe that half of the summer is already gone! I think I have forgotten that the summer is for relaxing . . . hopefully I can make up for it in August. I spent the first full week of July helping with an Elementary Science Academy for the County Office. I had an amazingly fun week helping elementary teachers to see what science should look like in their classrooms and getting a look into what fun my kids are going to have when they start real school (we are two years away for Madeline, why does it seem so soon). I didn't like the reminder that pumping anywhere other than my usual places pretty much sucks, since I ended up spending twenty minutes three times a day pumping in my car with the air conditioner blasting so I wouldn't melt. The things I do for my baby! After the ESA week, I spent a week at SDSU for my Noyce fellowship. There, I had three pumping buddies and a breastfeeding mom and her adorable son to spend my pumping time with. It is a little ridiculous how many of us have already had babies and how many of the girls are pregnant currently considering that we have only been together for a year as a group. We may add scary numbers to the population of San Diego if this keeps up for the next four years!

Beating the heat

"I want it"

We have continued on our quest to sell the condo and buy a house. Sadly, nobody had put an offer in on the condo yet, but plenty of people have looked! Matt is hoping that if we drop the price a bit and have another open house, we may get a bite. If not, we may be renting the condo in the fall (not ideal, but doable). The upside is . . . we are in escrow on a super awesome perfect little house in Talmadge! It is a gorgeous little 1948 home. Updated, but still with its original floors, windows, kitchen cabinets, and charm. We are so excited to have a one-story house with a yard for the dogs and kids! I keep finding myself day-dreaming about decorating rooms and what I want to buy, but Matt is keeping me on a very short purchasing leash (at least while we have the condo still). The home inspection went well, the seller has been very nice, and all in all the process of purchasing a home has been way less painful than I expected. While I am so excited to be living in the new house, I am not at all excited about the process of moving. Part of me wants to pack everything in the house right now so that it is done, but I know I can't pack a lot while we are still showing the condo to potential buyers and living/eating in it! I am terrible at waiting and really think we should have gone with a short escrow!

I am so hanging this in the bathroom. Needless to say, Ella has begun pulling up to a stand!

In between all of this, we have been enjoying family time. We have spent as much time in the pool as possible. Due to Madeline's love of swimming as she continues with her lessons and to the knowledge that we won't so easily have a pool to swim in come the end of August. Madi is realling improving in the pool. She can climb out by herself now (elbow, elbow, pull up the belly, knee, knee). She likes to jump in and even get "rocketed" under to get her face wet. Madi's kicks, bubbles, and arm movements are getting stronger, but still have a way to go before they are coordinated. Eleanor has been enjoying the floatie. She loves being outside and the pool time is a natural extension of that, especially with warm water.

"Watch me Mom"

We had a small rain (with some awesome thunder). Madeline felt the need to dress for the weather!

Madi comes home from school now with very definite ideas about eating in or eating out. We have been hearing a lot of "I want to go to Miguel's for dinner." Since Ella is a thousand times easier to go out with now that she sits in a high chair and eats solids, we have been honoring Madi's request more often. Eleanor loves finger foods! She is eating pieces of french fries, anything steamed and small, small slices of melons, pizza crust, cheese, etc. It seems like she would much rather feed herself than eat off a spoon, so I am doing the best I can to accommodate her. I am not feeling as easy at the solid transition as I was with Madeline though. I am sure this has to do with the amount of time I have, but I also think the fact that Madeline was pretty much done nursing during the day by 7 months has something to do with it too. While Ella loves solids, she is very attached to the boob. I am just not sure how weaning is going to happen, but I know that we need to start soon! With how lovely the girls have been at restaurants, we decided it would be fine to bring them with us to Melanie's 40th birthday party at Tower 23 (they were invited). With the help of a few bouncy balls from Michael for Madi and Colden to play with and some french fries for Eleanor, the kids survived the couple hours at the restaurant very well! I am so glad we got the chance to celebrate with Mel!

Meaty Bloody Mary

Mel made Rose Macarons

Madi eating her Macaron

Look at my treat

"more fries"

Last week I wasn't technically working anywhere! Yay! This means that I worked at home for a day, ran a workshop one day, went to the County Office one day, went by school to see what I would be teaching for the last week of summer school, and tried to work in some pool/gym/reading time! It was the perfect balance of busy and relaxing. Madeline also requested a day with me since I wasn't working. She had earned a visit to Sea World with her bedtime stamps, so we decided that on our day together we would go to Sea World as soon as it opened, meet Daddy for lunch and then hang out at home together until swimming class. Sea World was perfect. We missed the majority of the crowds by arriving at 9 and leaving by 11:30. Madi loved the penguins, Belugas, and turtles. She actually touched the sting rays too! Madeline wanted to see the Orca show, but after ten minutes of sitting in the sun, she decided she was melting and we had to go. I can't decide if her feelings about the sun "agh, the sun, the sun is hitting me" are hilarious for a kid that lives in San Diego or just irritating. If she continues to feel this way, she may have to move in with Cat and Jeff in Portland. Madeline got to choose her favorite lunch of Mac and Cheese at Panera (so rich and yummy) and then we played with bubbles, painted on the patio, and tried for a little quiet time at home in the afternoon. It was such a nice day, I forgot how easy it is to just have my big girl with me! I am really looking forward to my individual days with the girls in August.

Eleanor's first time on the swing. Madi was very excited to have her sister with her!

The polar bear is back. He was very active (waiting for breakfast I think)

Too cute

We watched the fishies clean the turtle for about ten minutes

Johnson family

Sisters in love

Fourth of July!

July 4th was a Friday this year, allowing Matt and I to have a long weekend with the girls. I'm not sure if I have the love of long weekends that I used to! There was no sleeping in, no relaxing on the beach, and no laying in front of the tv. What we did have a ton of: snacks, whining, driving to induce naps, swimming, running, crying, and snuggles. Matt and I were more than ready to go back to work by Monday.
We celebrated the actual 4th at the Gross house. The Kelly's and Henrikson's also made it, providing many shrill little girls having fun and a couple of boys to add to the chaos. I am loving how much fun the girls have together. They "swam" in the kid pool and loved getting dragged by the dads along the slip and slide. There was sliding, swinging, and climbing on the playset. And digging in the sand box. Eleanor took advantage of her new skill of sitting, by hanging out in the shaded playpen on the patio. She played with toys, watched the other kids, and generally was super relaxed for most of the day.Madeline had an awesome time and was worn completely out when we put her in the car. This didn't mean she wanted to sleep in the car though, so we still had to endure a bit of a bedtime battle at home.

Learning to serve their dads beer

John in charge of the kids

First Otter Pop - Is 6 months too young?? Oh well, it helped the sore gums.

At the zoo with Dad

Look at me!

Matt trying to get some sleep in Madeline's bed after she woke up early and came to ours!

Ella is 6 months old, summer is here, and life keeps moving forward . . .

As usual, Matt and I can't stand to let life settle down around us. With the end of the regular school year, I somehow managed to fill my summer calendar (until August) with summer school, professional developments, my SDSU fellowship, and work for the county office. On top of this, as the school year came to a close, Matt (and I)  decided that it was time to put our condo on the market and really start looking for a house! We furiously cleaned, put our garage and some of our house stuff in storage and have spent the last week being ready to remove the dogs, kids, and messiness of daily life at a moment's notice.

Dining room all cleaned up

Living room looks huge when not filled with kid crap

Clean Kitchen!

Storage Unit

The girls and I spent the weekend of our open house in San Clemente. We got the double fun for our work of being out of the house to keep it clean, but also seeing Wendi and Kathy who were visiting from Wisconsin! We had gotten to seen them Tuesday night when they stayed with us (politely saying the couch and our close quarters were comfy, but I think that was exhaustion talking).

Dinner out

Playing at Grandma T's

Ella and Rivers (3 weeks older than her). I was so happy to see another big baby!

Guard dogs at Grandma T's

Lani and Bella resting

Eleanor is officially a half now (as Madeline puts it)! She is gigantic. I sometimes look at her in the morning and think she grew overnight! Matt had the fun of taking Ella for her 6 month appointment (and shots) poor guy. Eleanor's current stats are: weight - 18.9 pounds 90th percentile, height - 27 1/4 inches 90th percentile, head 17 1/4 inches 85th percentile. I wish I could compare this to Madeline's info, but my book is currently in storage so I can't. My guess is that Ella is bigger than Madi was at this age since she has almost regularly been in the 50th percentile weight and 75th percentile height. It's a little crazy to me that Ella is so big since Madi had much more formula in her diet and was better at eating solids at this age.
At 6 months, Eleanor is eating some cereal, cheerios, num nums, and has tried carrots, cantaloupe, watermelon, peaches, applesauce, and vegetable medley. She also had a little funfetti frozen yogurt. Ella doesn't seem to be stoked on pureed solids though she does love to try to pick up her cheerios. She is sitting extremely well and trying to pull up and hold herself in a stand against furniture. Ella babbles all of the time, blows tons of raspberries and has a giggle that brightens my mood every single time I hear it. She loves watching the dogs and Madeline, is very happy watching any of Madi's cartoons on tv and still prefers to sleep in our bed (though she does start most nights in the crib).

Solids

"I'll just eat this toast my sister made"

Hanging out on the green belt while people look at the condo

First dual bath!

Reading Pinkalicious. Ella is enthralled with Madi

We had the opportunity this week to take the girls to their first baseball game. Padres versus the Reds. We got tickets from Dru/Greg who now have offices at Petco Park (go Bumblebee Tuna). The seats were incredible (even though we only made it three innings in the seats since Madi got antsy) and the park has some amazing food and beer choices now. I haven't been to a game since I was pregnant with Madeline. Madeline's favorite park was the tot lot and cotton candy, Matt's was the seats and beer, mine was the wine tasting area, and Ella was just happy to be outside.

Madi and a piggie

"Cotton Candy!!!"

sweet seats

Padres Mickey

Swinging at the tot lot

Madi's favorite activity. Spinning!

 We are fighting bedtime battles with Madeline (it's awful), trying out a sticker chart to get her to go to bed without screaming and kicking. I know we will get past this time and that I will look back at it with humor (Occasionally I have to be careful not to laugh directly at Madi when she throws a fit. She is little and furious and so darn funny). We've been having so much fun, even though life is too crazy and too busy. The quiet times at home are even more relaxing than before. I love the time I get to spend with my girls and seeing how well they are growing.

Madi and I doing a Pinterest Project

Jameson baking

Posing dogs

Sisters in the playroom