Today marks 8 wonderful months of having our sweet Emsley in our lives! I have recently mentioned on Instagram how each milestone or month that passes I find myself saying “this is the best part” only to find myself saying it again as a new milestone or stage emerges. This wonderful, tiny human being has filled my heart with great amounts of joy as she grows and develops into such a fun, silly, and exciting girl. I am so grateful each day of this motherhood journey as it only keeps getting better and better!

This past month our biggest change was Emsley cutting her first tooth, on the bottom left side of her mouth. I’ll admit, everyone warned us how bad teething would be but our little girl has been such a trooper. She has been sleeping in more and taking longer naps since this tooth has made its appearance. If teething means more sleeping, we are not complaining!

We also ventured into the world of solids a bit more this month and have learnt that her favourite food so far is sweet potato. She did not like carrots and would instantly shudder when we put the spoon to her mouth. She has been fairly neutral with avocado and has seemed to enjoy bananas. I am still breastfeeding, (shocking I know, if you’ve read my feelings on that from earlier posts) and plan to continue on until I go back to work.

Sleep is still wonderful, and we don’t ever take this for granted. Teething has resulted in some crying again before falling asleep at night but it has only lasted for a few minutes before she passes out from exhaustion. She has cut out her evening and late afternoon naps, resulting in a bit more fussiness in the evenings which leads this momma to believe that she could still use a short one around 4:00 pm. Due to the lack of afternoon napping she would be happy to go to bed earlier, around 7:00pm. We, the bad parents we are, tend to stretch her until 8:30 pm as the days are longer, the sun is out and we are often out and about with her. She then sleeps from 8:30 pm until 7:30 am, has a small milk snack and then goes back down until 9:30 am-10:30 am. Her one nap is now around 12:00-1:30pm, with the exception of teething naps being closer to 3 hours.

Seven months has brought an increase in confidence for Emsley while sitting up on her own, which has allowed for more play time abilities and made her very happy! There are still times she will fall over if she gets too excited and turns her head to look behind her. She has also figured out that she can move her feet with the help of us holding her and has taken her first steps, which might be the cutest thing I have witnessed so far. Watching her lift her tiny, size one foot onto its toes, while focusing so very hard on taking a step with that same foot was absolutely incredible. Her face beamed with pride and she screeched with delight as she realized what her body could do. It was amazing to witness and brought tears of joy to my eyes.

This past month I have learnt that a mother’s connection with her child is physically recognizable. It warms my heart to see Emsley react to me in an obvious and different way than others. Up to this point I have yet to notice much of a difference (other than when she is hungry and wanting the boob) with respect to who is with her. But since 7.5 months I have learnt that I have the ability to light up her eyes like no one else in the room and that alone has been the greatest gift I could ever receive. As new mom’s we pour ourselves into our baby experiencing very little in return. We know this entering the world of motherhood and I expected nothing else, but having her see me differently now than everyone else has really made those hours and sacrifice even more worth it.

Happy 8 months baby girl!