Happy 7 months, Penelope
7 amazing months with this little lovebug.
She is still enjoying solid foods, enamored with her big sis, and smiling up a storm.
A major milestone for month 7: she’s no longer on baby Prilosec!!!!! (<—needs like 12 more exclamation marks)
When we first started to experiment with medication for her reflux, I was really hoping it would be something to make her more comfortable until the reflux subsided, instead of being a more permanent thing, especially since she’s so little. Her pediatrician assured me that it would just be for 6 months or so, and that we would know when she didn’t need it anymore. Sure enough, the reflux stopped right around 6 months, and by month 7, she was weaned entirely off of it. Such awesome news.
Some more updates about 7 months:
Miss P is crawling like a CHAMP but becomes quickly frustrated because she wants to stand. She’ll only crawl until she reaches a piece of steady furniture and starts to whimper until I “stand” her up and let her hold onto the top. We laugh because we think P is going to be our little climber; she already wants to hold and see and stand on everything. She’ll lunge towards whatever object she has her eye on, whether it’s something big, like a toy, or something small, like a hair tie that ended up on the floor. Must babyproof all the things.
She is babbling up a storm! It could be coincidence, but I’m fairly certain she’s saying, “Mama” and “Hiiiii” on purpose.
Solid foods are still going well, but I’ve cut back on them a little. We had a couple of choking episodes (nothing like the initial few we experienced when she was very little), and both occurred about an hour or so after she ate solid foods. She didn’t have any symptoms of an allergic reaction or anything like that, but it was almost like the food was too thick in her stomach. We’ve only done purees up until now, and are now offering bites here and there. This is much to her dismay since she wants to eat everything. The ped just said to be conservative until we can pinpoint what’s going on, and that she just may be more sensitive to certain solids. (Thankfully, it’s not related to stopping the Prilosec. The Prilo never reduced the quantity of spit-up or the choking episodes. It just relieved the burning sensation and made her more comfortable.)
She loves her weekly music class! We’ve been going on and off for a few months now -I had to take breaks in taking her with my surgeries- but we have so much fun while we’re there. The instructor’s voice is like an angel, and she’ll sing and play the guitar, or the kiddos will listen to international and classic music. For many of the songs, the teacher will give us very simple dance moves to do while holding our babies. P is obsessed with “1-2-3, 1-2-3, tan-go, cha-cha.” 🙂 They’ll also get instruments to play, little cars to push around, along with scarves and the parachute. It’s a lot of fun, and has been another great way to meet more moms in the area.
I feel like seeing these two sisters together will always be magical. In the morning, Liv will ask if she can go say “Hi” to Penelope when she’s first waking up. I let Liv go in to see her while I heat up P’s bottle and grab a yogurt and fruit for Liv. When I head into P’s room, it’s the sweetest sight to see them hanging out together. It’s usually P, seated or on all fours in her crib, flashing a giant two-teeth smile at Liv. Liv crouches down right in front of the crib and will either be acting out a puppet show with a stuffed animal, or “reading” her a book. It’s pretty amazing.
Happy 7 months, miss P! We love you so much.
Some of our favorite things at 7 months:
The Ergo! This is the same one we used for Liv, and we both love it.
These teether! She isn’t in to pacifiers or teether much at all, but chomps down on these like crazy when her teeth are hurting
Sensory balls. She could roll these around all day
Baby gap onesies. They look adorable and are so easy to put a quick outfit together.
Honest company diaper bundles. I still can’t believe I didn’t do this with Liv. It’s so nice to not have to make constant diaper runs, and I love that they use natural and biodegradable materials, and offer super cute whimsical prints.
More P updates:
1 month recap
2 months
3 months
4 months
Coping with baby’s reflux
5 months
6 months
Birth Story Part 1
Birth Story Part 2
33 Comments
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She is ALWAYS flashing that huge smile! And her big eyes melt my heart (or is that my uterus calling??) Your girls are so perfect
thank you. i’m so lucky to have them <3
I am so happy to hear about the prilosec being able to be weaned off. Our baby girl is 4 1/2 Months and was started on it at two months, we are also hoping around the 6 month mark we will be able to start weaning her off of it. She is just adorable!
yep! i seriously never believed it would happen, but here we are. hang in there! reflux is no fun
That first photo of her in this post is the best! I love her smile in it.
thank you <3
Ahhhh she is so so cute! Glad she is not on the meds anymore!
thank you! me too <3
she is such a little sweetheart! her big gummy smile is just the BEST!
thank you, friend! she is amazing
Baby fever over here… this is not helping 😉
right? she makes my ovaries hurt, but i think my body waved the white flag on having more kids
We’re going to Hawaii in September so no babies before that… trying to have abs for the trip & no morning sickness on the two 5.5 hour flights from the east coast haha.
Hi Gina, what a cutie she is! Man you have some adorable children! Wanted to give some info on choking – is she actually choking on the spit up, or is she just gagging on it? I know she choked before when she was little, but there is a big difference between choking and gagging. Choking is where they can’t breathe, don’t make sound, are very very agitated and freaking out, turn red and then possibly even blue. Gagging is when they cough a bunch and are still making sound, and they can be very agitated as well. Many parents call gagging choking, but gagging is really common at this age because their gag reflex is much stronger then ours to protect their airway. If she truly is gagging, I would take her to an ENT rather than just her pediatrician. Not feeding her solid foods is not the answer I would be happy with for my little ones I work with (I’m a speech pathologist and have a few feeding kiddos on my caseload).
I meant if she truly is choking, not gagging!
thank you!
she is indeed choking. no sound is coming out, and she kicks her legs and is very agitated. before, the episodes were much longer, and i had the one really horrifying one where she started to turn bright red, and in the past few weeks she’s had about 4 episodes. they’re just way shorter. she’ll look up at me and start squirming or kicking her legs, and i’m like “holy sh*t, here we go,” i pick her up (to elongate her esophagus) and grab my phone to call 9-1-1, and she clears it out. we just don’t know if she stops breathing on purpose because she can feel spit up on the way, or what.
i called the ped today and am waiting for a phone call back to get a GI and ENT referral. she keeps saying we don’t need to go to the GI, but i’m determined to figure out what’s going on
please let me know if you have any more tips or advice- i really appreciate it
Oh that’s so scary! I’m so sorry your little one is having these episodes. I’m with you I wouldn’t rule out GI issues. How would the pediatrician know 100% that nothing was wrong if they haven’t at least asked the expert, ya know? Sounds like your instincts are right! I hope they figure out what the issue is.
Hi Gina,
First of all, I have never commented so I have to tell you I have been faithfully following you for a few years now and look forward to reading every day while on my lunch break 🙂 You are my fave! Anyway, on to why I am commenting…your precious P! My friend has recently had similar choking issues with her 12 month old and it’s turned out to be related to her blood sugar levels. They are still doing testing, but they think it might be related to ketotic hypoglycemia. She would have similar choking incidents after eating, especially breakfast when her blood sugar levels had dropped during the night. They are monitoring her blood sugar levels, etc. until they know more, but I just thought I would mention this to you in case it could be part of what’s happening with P. I don’t want to start a Google search panic at all!…but it’s taken a while for doctors to even come up with this idea for my friend, so just wanted to mention in case it helps you with figuring out what’s going on with P. I hope you and the doctors get to the bottom of this soon!
hi katie,
thank you so much for reading for so long and for the sweet words. that is CRAZY and something that i hadn’t even considered. i’m going to ask for some blood testing to be done. it’s frustrating because i feel like i’ve really had to fight for her pediatrician to do anything. she called the other night because we had a choking incident and told me to put her back on the prilosec, which has never helped with the choking. i told her i didn’t want a band aid, and really want to find out what’s causing this. hopefully we’ll get some answers soon.
YES absolutely push for testing and keep pushing until you are heard. Might even be worth it to take her to your naturopath as well? I’ve learned with my own health issues over the last few years that you have to be that squeaky wheel…and I’ve also learned that most doctors definitely have a band aid fix to prescribe. My own stomach issues (ulcers, leaky gut, etc etc) were not solved until I refused to keep taking antacids and take matters into my own hands (seeing a naturopath and paying the extra money to get an array of testing done and follow her treatment plan). And that was the best decision I’ve ever made and worth every penny. Keep pushing on…and I really hope you get those answers soon! Take care!
Is there another pediatrician you can see? Choking is scary and serious, not something to be brushed aside. Can you get a recommendation from a friend?
I’ve seen almost all of the doctors at this clinic. The bummer is that because there are so many people in SD county, getting into a new docs office usually takes months. Everything is booked. We’ve had a very hard time with medical care here. I plan to make more phone calls today and she has another appointment Monday. I’m definitely trying to be the squeaky wheel, so I hope this all gets figured out. Our friends’ pediatricians (I’ve called 4 different ones) don’t take our insurance
There is seriously no baby in the world that is more smiley! Happy 7 months, Miss P!
seriously! i had no idea a baby could smile this much. it’s amazing
Do you enjoy the age gap? Mine two are only 17mo apart and if we added a 3rd, there would be at least a 5 year gap with the oldest and 4 years with the other one. Have you experienced any negatives with their age gap? They seem so sweet together!
i think any smaller of a gap would have been rough haha. it’s been so amazing that liv is fairly independent and really understood what was going on. she was fully potty trained when we had p, which has also been nice. she has been so sweet to p, and a huge helper
She’s so sweet. She looks so much like your Chef brother!
i think she does, too!
Ohh I can’t believe P is 7 months already! Her smiles are contagious!
they melt my heart every time
so happy she’s off prilosec and doing well! <3 she's more than half way to being a year old, ahh!
thank you! i know- it’s crazy!!
She is so stink in’ cute! And, am I crazy or does she look a lot like your brother (albeit a cute little girl version of him!)?