Our Daughter the Eater AND Sleeper!

Kate wasn't the biggest fan of solids in the world when we first introduced them at six months. In fact, it's only been in the last couple weeks that she's really become an eater...and now I'm having trouble keeping up with her! She loves her rice cereal (particularly if I mix it with breast milk), fruit, meat & veggie dinners, and, of course, cheerios...or Purely O's as the organic brand calls them. Right now I'm trying to get her comfortable with finger foods. She has mastered cheerios (finally realized the crucial last step, which is letting-go once it gets to her mouth!), but struggles with anything wet or sticky. More often than not, chunks of banana, apples, potato, avocado, carrot and the like are tossed over the side of the tray rather than into her mouth. Here is a video of her cheerio success.

Last night Brian decided that Kate owed him some bedtime stories for a change. She loves her daddy, so of course she was more than happy to oblige.

About a week ago I made a concerted effort to stop any nighttime feeding. We had a few rough nights (okay, I'll admit I gave in a couple times...) but last night Kate slept through the night for the second time ever!! 10.5 consecutive hours! Of course Brian and I went to bed later than usual so we weren't even able to take full advantage of it, but my fingers and toes are crossed that we'll be experiencing many consecutive nights of successful slumber! Here's our happy sleeper first thing this morning.

In an effort to get her more interested in standing and moving about, I've been propping Kate up against furniture around the house. She seems to really enjoy it and I can only hope that before too long she'll initiate it herself and start trying to pull up on things. Everyone says I should enjoy this time of immobility because it gets a lot harder once they're motoring around, but I do think it will be a welcomed change.