A day of firsts!

Ella must be growing as she has been sleeping a lot lately. Last night she slept soundly from 8pm-7am then back to sleep from 7:30-8:30am. She fell asleep later in the morning nursing and is now taking an early afternoon nap. So sweet... :)

Well, we tried prunes today! It didn't go over that well. She made the most disgusted faces as if to say, "Mom, what IS this!?" She's been really constipated the last few days so I was really hoping she'd like the prunes. It was cute though. I handed her the spoon and she grabbed it and shoved it right into her mouth. She did it a few times, so maybe she just wanted to feed herself! Needless to say, she made a huge mess. Prunes were everywhere.

More news is that she finally rolled over onto her tummy this morning! She doesn't love being on her tummy so I'm not surprised this has taken as long as it has. We still practice every day. The problem was always her under arm getting stuck and not bring her top leg around to pull her self over. I help her by nudging up her under arm so it's sort of out of the way. After that she did all the work. Progress!! It was so sweet to watch her. Her face was contorted and twisted and turning pink as you could tell she was trying so very hard to get onto her tummy. She's done it now several times today already and I hardly even have to nudge her arm up. But she understands that to mean "Ok Ella time to roll onto your tummy" so it works. She doesn't stay very long though and just rolls back onto her back (she's VERY good at tummy-back now!).

Ella has loved to stand since she was around 2 months old. I had her standing today and she was holding onto her giraffe. I took my hands off her and she supported and balanced herself! That was another first. She seemed really pleased with herself too.

I can't wait until she starts crawling around, even though that'll mean more work for me. Right now though she seems just so content to sit on the floor and play with her toys, or lay on her back and play with her toys.

On another note entirely, I'm so proud of myself for making it with breastfeeding 7 months. I really hope to make it a year and I don't doubt I'll be sad to see it end. Through all the tears and mastitis and clogged ducts and just getting Ella to learn how to do it, (she got it just before she turned 4 wks old) I would do it all over again. It feels like a big accomplishment. I'm glad I didn't give up. Nursing is such a sweet and wonderful time. It melts my heart to look down at her with her eyes rolling all over. I can almost read her thoughts: "Ohhhh...this tastes sooooo goooood.." It is the sweetest thing in the world. Having her cuddled up to me is the best. In the beginning she used to nurse for an hour at a time. Now she goes 5-15 mins and it's often too quick for me.

I'm so proud of my little pumpkin. She's so wonderful. I think her daddy feels a little bad that he misses some of her firsts while he's at work. This is such an exciting and fun time. She makes us all so happy.