Happy 7 months!

Happy 7 months Jasmine!

You've grown so quickly right under our noses. You used to be floppy (but not weak!) and I was always worried about your wobbly neck. I wanted to sit you up for a quick photo, using pillows to keep you upright. I worried about your head snapping back or your face getting smothered into my shoulder while you slept in my arms.

Then one day your neck became stronger and you could look around while I carried you. You still had a tough time controlling your muscles though so your head bobbled around sometimes. I could carry you while you slept for over an hour because I didn't want to wake you by putting you down (and I didn't want to put you down).

Today you're so strong you can stay sitting on your own. You try so hard to stand up so you can run around chasing mom and grandma around, and to run to the door when I get home from work. You can't crawl yet but you can wiggle your butt and sneak across the floor.

I will always remember how I worried I might be burping your little body too hard, picking you up or putting you down too roughly, or twisting your little arms too much trying to get your clothes on.

While 7 months is not a traditional milestone, it is still a great opportunity to reflect. I will always be amazed at how much you have changed in these 7 months. Your personality has developed, you are determined and smart. Keep it up! I wish that you would stay like this longer but I can't be that selfish. I'll always have my memories to look back on.

Baby wearing!

I think I may have written about this before, but now is a good time to come back to this. After almost 7 months, we have tried out a few different baby carriers. My wife likes to use the Baby Bjorn series. I used Aeroplan points to redeem a Lillebaby.

The Baby Bjorn series is really easy to use and simple to put on. Two colour coded hooks hold baby up while double sided clips snap to form a head rest. We have a few different Baby Bjorns. They all have pretty much the same features. The newer ones have a little better back support and padded straps. With Jasmine at 7 months, the weight can quickly take a toll on the shoulders. We haven't tried other configurations yet (inward facing only so far) but it seems like most Baby Bjorns only support the one setting.

The Lillebaby is a lot more complex to use but also much more comfortable. Overall it's a bit heavier with the padding but I feel that it has much better support overall. When I initially tried it with Jasmine she couldn't get used to the feeling. Now that she is older I may try the outward facing mode. She loves reaching out and grabbing things so I think it will be interesting for her to try.

Let me know about your experiences with baby carriers!

It has been a while

A lot has happened in the world since my last post. Let's start with the fun stuff.

Jasmine has grown so much that it's hard to imagine that she was so tiny only a few months ago. She started eating food a couple of months ago. Here is her catalog of foods:

• Milk
• Oat cereal
• Water
• Cucumber
• Lettuce
• Rice cereal
• Rice cracker
• Banana
• Orange

She loves water. Or maybe it's the bottle. Whatever it is, she tries to snatch it away from us when we're drinking. She also drinks directly from the bottle. It's cute.

Also over the last few months we've gotten more gear! She will be outgrowing her current car seat any day now so I installed the new seat over the long weekend, the Diono Radian rXT. 

Reviews for this seat were decent overall, with the most common complaints that it is fairly heavy and difficult to install. I would say that it is definitely heavier than the bucket we used before, but the weight shouldn't be a major issue since it won't be moving very often. Installation was somewhat difficult since the rear facing installation with LATCH only connected at the two points. It was hard to get tight enough so it wasn't swinging around. I ended up tethering the top to the front seat rail. It is also much taller so whoever sits in the front passenger side won't have much leg space. I will have to reinstall it in a month or so if I take the car to swap out the winter tires.