.: 7 MONTHS

5 days late, but here we go. At 7 months, Carter...

Has two teeth! He got them both within the same week too, what a trooper. His bottom right one came in first, shortly followed by the bottom left. No biting just yet...I am counting my lucky stars!

Has pulled himself up on our little storage ottoman a handful of times. I was so thrown off guard the first time because we had never even practiced doing that. Richard walked at 10 months and I walked at 9 months so I'm worried this one might be taking after his parents.

Still uses army crawling as his main form of transportation but my gosh is that kid fast! He is all.over.the.place all the time. Still very, very active and energetic...this one.

Crosses his middle finger over his index finger...constantly! We say it's his way of signing "r" for Rindlisbacher ;) Both of his Grandmas just think it is the funniest thing ever.

Still totally loves his baths. At least once a day he will crawl into the bathroom and start hitting the tub as a big fat hint. As soon as the water starts running he will laugh and kick his legs in excitement. He sits like a champ now which makes giving him his bath much easier, so I don't mind one bit.

Has mastered making "fart sounds" with his mouth. Gross, I know, but I don't know how else to describe it. Such is the life of a "boy Mom" I guess. I will admit that he has great comedic timing with it though.

Has recently discovered these things around the apartment:

He uses them as instruments (I mean, who hasn't done this?) and then proceeds to rip them off the doors haha.

Had his first bout of semi-serious sickness in the form of Roseola. He ran a high fever of 102 for a little over two days followed by a couple days of a full body rash. He also was very irritable and had hardly any appetite. After the second full day of the fever, we made an appointment with the pediatrician and naturally, the day of the appointment, his fever broke and he was laughing and flirting with everyone in the office. Definitely made us look like silly first time parents. The next day is when his rash came, and after some Googling and some help from my mother-in-law's intuition and giant book of sicknesses, we had ourselves a self-diagnosis! Everything cleared up within a couple days and luckily you are immune once you have it so we are all good!

Has regressed in the sleeping category thanks to the aforementioned sickness and the whole 2-teeth-in-one-week bit. Instead of waking up once a night, he started waking up 4 times a night and just couldn't seem to put himself back to bed. My heart just broke and I decided to start getting up with him until he got better. Once the fever went away and his teeth broke the habit unfortunately stuck. I dealt with being up every 3 hours for about a week and a half until I just couldn't take it anymore. We're currently doing sleep training round 2 and things are actually quickly improving.

Loves the piano, musical toys and being sung to. His Rindlisbacher genes are definitely coming through strong in that regard.

Loves having things dangled over his head while he's on his back. Whether it's a ribbon, toy, my hair or a blanket it's a guaranteed laugh every time.

Has mastered the bitter beer face (as seen below). I just LOVE this little quirk and hope it sticks for awhile :)

Is a big fan of Gerber puffs and these little kale crackers we've gotten for him. I give him pureed baby food everyday but also try to let him have a chance to feed himself and play around with some type of "normal" food as well.

Still nurses at least...6-7 times a day? Even though he can be the most distract-able nurser EVER I don't see us stopping any time soon, he's a big fan.

This past month I had a few days at work where I wasn't able to pump as much as I normally do so my supply took a big hit. I started waking up in the middle of the night to pump and still couldn't get my storage up enough to cover the next day he'd be with my Mom. After some serious guilt, I had Richard buy some formula. He of course, ate it just fine and I was able to replenish my supply. Since that day, he's only had about 3 or 4 formula bottles but it feels good to have a backup. I've discovered tryng something new with your baby will always be accompanied with guilt the first time around (binkies, bottles, crying it out, babysitters, etc) but after seeing that you didn't ruin them forever, and that they still love you....it get much easier.

Is very social and loves being with other kids/people. My mom is both a crazy person and a rockstar because she’ll have days where she watches 6 kids under the age of 4 (2 of which are younger than Carter!!!) I try to arrange it so that Carter isn’t there when ALL the other kids are there, but her and I both have to admit that he totally thrives in the chaos of having a bunch of other kids around.

Is 20 pounds (80th percentile) and 27 inches (75th percentile) as of his 6.5 month check-up. The chubs is still going strong! #cheeksandchinsfordays