7 months old!!

Here’s some of what Riley’s up to at 7 months:

Gross Motor Development:
His ability to sit unassisted has improved, but we’re still not quite there yet. He’ll lean forward in the gorilla pose and when he decides to sit up, he overshoots and falls backwards. Or else, he'll start leaning to the side and he doesn't bother to try and fight the force of gravity. Here's some video of his progress:

Since he’s able to do tummy time for longer periods, we’ve seen his neck and upper back strength improve as he lifts his chest higher off the ground now. Here he's practicing his yoga and demonstrating the cobra pose:









Also, he’s rolling both back to belly and belly to back now and moves around by twisting his body while on his tummy. In a matter of minutes he will travel by rolling, twisting and scooting so I do have to keep a better eye on him than I used to.

He seems to prefer standing to sitting. If I grab his hands he’ll stiffen up his legs in hopes that I’ll pull him to a standing position. He clearly enjoys it, so we are letting him work on this skill as well. Daddy took some video of his progress:


This morning after his bath he hung on to the side of the tub...I was there to catch him just in case:












Fine Motor Development:
The kid grabs for anything he can, I really have to watch him now as he'll lunge for whatever is within reach. He doesn't necessarily put things in his mouth, but he likes to see if it makes noise or if he's in the high chair or bumbo seat, to see what happens when he drops it. The two toys that he does pop into his mouth are his colored links and his smiley face toy, which is a cloth toy with a rattle in the top:









Language Development:
No, he's not babbling yet, just makes a lot of noise and funny sounds. He knows his name however, and will stop what he's doing to look at us when we call him by name. We continue to see that he’s much more interested in people than toys – our little extrovert. He enjoys reading Barnyard Dance!, The Foot Book as well as the Rhyme Bible Storybook.

Social Development
He enjoys playing peek-a-boo, tickle games and looking at his (or our) reflection in the mirror. He still enjoys his jumper or sitting in the Boppy but gets bored of his toys -- he'd rather have us there to interact with him. He's not one to play on his own for more than 5-10 min before he starts looking for us to play with him.

He is showing a preference for being held and letting us know when he feels we're not doing it enough. No stranger anxiety as of yet -- he'll go to anyone and still flirts with any lady who pays him attention.

Eating and Sleeping:
He’s eating two meals of solid foods each day with varying success depending on his mood. Typical meals are cereal and veggies, hard-boiled egg yolk/white potatoes/plain yogurt, and meat/sweet potatoes. He gets fruit (usually apples or pears) for dessert. He continues to take 4 bottles a day for a total of 20 oz of formula. On his 6 month blog, I mentioned I was working on getting avocados into his diet. I finally found a way to do so -- by combining it with HB egg yolks and greek yogurt. Here's the satisfied boy after such a meal this morning:









So, I'll leave with the best of the photo shoot today... he was having fun with Pooh Bear:




























"Jingle Bells...Batman Smells..."









"....Robin Lays an Egg..."









Ha Ha, I crack myself up!!










We love our Riley-boy!!

Shelby