Such a BIG Girl!

I know it's been a while since I've added any pictures of Ellie, and she changes every day! For instance, she has more hair every day! And it keeps getting lighter to the point where she's going to have very light brown hair or become a darker blond. Anyway, this girl just keeps growing and growing! She is now wearing her 6-9 months clothes and even her 12 months jeans! Our home scale has her between 18 and 19 lbs and she stands higher than my knee now! (picture to come)

On to the latest news on our 5 and 1/2 month old.

Pretty sure thanks to this common pose and her chewing on our fingers whenever she can as well as her occasional very cranky attitude drooling that she is teething.

She also chews on her pacifiers quite a bit lately. Oh yeah, thanks to a friend, we discovered soothies which are the pacifiers you see in these pictures. Ellie will actually take these where she hasn't taken any other pacifier in a long time. (We're trying to replace finger sucking to make our lives easier down the road...) Our great friend Mary also gave us a "wubbanub" which is a soothie pacifier attached to a stuffed animal. She seems to really like these, especially when she's tired at night or having to do something she's not in love with, like get buckled into her car seat.
In addition to sometimes falling asleep with a pacifier, another sleep development as of late: blankets - on the face. Ellie always has a blanket up against her cheek at night or even over the top of her face at times. It's part of her falling asleep anymore.
Speaking of sleep, this girl really knows how to relax and enjoy her rest. I've actually gotten her up from naps where she slept like this for hours and has her fingers imprinted in the back of her head. And her head smells in those spots like vinegar from sweaty baby hands.... Yum!

This is another one of our big girl's recent developments. She wimpers. Seriously. Sometimes she sounds exactly like a dog. Here is all we have on video so far though.

We still love our food.The only thing we've found she doesn't like so far: bananas and pieces of bread. See? Oh, and the whimpering I mentioned....

Speaking of food. We are introducing one or two basic baby sign language signs and Ellie definitely knows the sign for food now. She calms down when we show her the sign, and sometimes gets excited. One day she even nodded! Twice! No, it hasn't happened since....

Ellie also still loves her baths. She winds up and gets her feet (which she now grabs only when they're put in her face during diaper changes) way up in the air and splashes so much she leaves puddles all over the bathroom floor!

Ellie still isn't rolling over consistently so we continue to work on it, and now we are also working on sitting. She's not a huge fan, so a friend lent us her Bumbo and she seems to be ok hanging out in it.
Although she may not be a huge sitter, she LOVES to stand! And it shows us how tall she has really gotten! She started standing some on her own today with something to back her up. She honestly doesn't need any support anymore, just something to balance her.
She also spends quite a bit of time on her side these days. (but won't roll over to her front on her own - although she likes tummy time more and more and plays with toys while on her tummy for a good 20 minutes now!)
And she continues to show more personality and attitude all the time.
See what I mean?

Definitely her father's daughter....