Vocal

Mattie has really found her voice this week. Everything is 'dada' or 'mama'. She will start out low and get louder and louder. It is too cute. We are so thankful to have our happy, smiley girl back to normal. Tonight when I came home from work, I was hugging Mattie on the couch and she grabbed me by the face, got real close and said, "Mama" over and over to me. It just made my heart melt. She is so precious and loving already!

She has been eating lots the past few days and has tried some other new foods. She likes cheese and bread (of course), squash, fresh peas, and black beans. She loves to try new things and it is neat to watch her expression each time.

Here is a video of Mattie at dinner tonight and some good photos from this week. Enjoy!

Our Little Cowgirl

Cute video from Mattie playing this week below. She already likes horses just as much as her Mommy & Daddy!

Farmyard Fun

Eleri took her son Henry and Mattie to visit the Burgers new calves today. The pair had quite a fun trip and Eleri got some really great photos of them. The weather has been so beautiful this week and we have really enjoyed getting out for walks. Mattie really likes to be outside and it makes me even more excited for the things we'll get to do this spring!

We have officially completed our breathing treatments and Mattie is doing great. She has almost stopped coughing completely and her runny nose is gone. Hooray!

Here are some photos from today's adventure:

I feel good! (as sung by Mattie)

We are on the mend and doing much better! So thankful to have our happy, healthy girl back with us. :)

Valentines Virus

We've had an eventful past week filled with lots of congestion and coughing. Mattie has not been feeling very good so we took her to the doctor on Friday. She had a little fever earlier that day and had not been able to shake the coughing and wheezing. Turns out she has RSV (a respiratory virus) and we are keeping her home until tuesday. We are grateful that George has presidents day off on Monday so he can stay home with her. We've been giving her breathing treatments every four hours as well as an oral steroid. We can tell it is already helping. Mattie has handled all of this pretty well. She's still sleeping good at night but it has disrupted her daytime napping, (I'll take the nighttime sleep over naps any day!) :)

In a couple of weeks our little pumpkin will be eight months old! It's hard to believe how big she's getting. She is almost crawling and sits up completely on her own. This morning George was holding her in a standing position and she took a couple of steps! We were both so excited. She loves to eat and her favorite foods are bananas, yogurt, peaches, sweet potatoes and avocado. I've been having fun trying new foods with her. Last week I made some homeade carrots and apples with a little cinnamon. She loved it!

She is still saying "da-da" all the time but has started saying "ma-ma" too. :) she loves to talk and interact and is always making some kind of new noise. We just love this girl!

Here are some pics from her breathing treatments and some others from the past few weeks:

7 Months of Sweet Mattie Cakes

This past week we celebrated 7 months with Mattie and my first birthday being a mommy! It was wonderful. She got up about 30 minutes earlier that morning and we got to cuddle and play before I had to get ready for work. Made my birthday so much more special! George surprised me with my birthday present that morning and Mattie helped me open it. It was so cute watching her chew on my card and pull the tissue paper out. He gave me a beautiful orange sapphire necklace to match the earrings he got for me for Mother's Day last year. :) I love it!

Mattie is growing more and more each week. She's now over 17 lb and 27" long. She is so alert to everything around her and notices when George and I leave a room or when we talk to each other. She says "Da-da" all the time and it is also the first thing she says when she wakes up from her naps. She wakes up so happy and then starts babbling. She has started cuddling with me after her last feeding at night before I lay her down. We rock and sing and after a few minutes she is ready to be put in her crib. She likes to sleep with a teddy bear and cuddles with it as soon as we lay her down. It is so cute!

She is eating tons of new things. This week we tried: blueberries, mangoes, peaches, peas and a few others. She LOVES puffs. (A semi-soft cereal that dissolves quickly). She will even grab a handful and pull one out with her other hand and put it in her mouth. She loves eating these and is so proud of herself when she's feeding them to herself. We actually had to slow down on giving them to her because she was getting a little bored with the soft baby food. Now, we give her a few as 'dessert' when she eats well. Eleri was giving her some the other day while she was in the high chair. When Mattie ran out of puffs, Eleri started pouring some out onto the tray and Mattie tried to stick her head under the canister to catch the falling puffs in her mouth. She is such a character.

We think little M will be crawling soon. She is getting up on all fours and rocking back and fourth. She can move backwards pretty well and rolls around to get to places she wants to be. Mattie is so loving right now and gives kisses and hugs. Her kisses are more like slobbery exchanges but we love it! :)

Here are some wonderful pics that Mike Mazzo took of us last weekend. Thanks, Mike!