Ruby Hope McKee Starling

Ruby is now pulling up to standing on her own.  She is kinda cruzing but gets nervous/scared and won't do it too much.  She is also pretty cautious about sitting down from standing.  Most of the time she fusses until one of us holds her hands as she sits down.  We are so proud of her, for reaching this milestone.

She is talking more and more everyday.  Her favorite words are Mama, Dada, Ella and Bibi.  She has also started dancing to music.  Right now the things that get her grooving are rap or funk.  It's really kinda funny.  It's really stretching the limits of our Indie Rock music collection. She dances by rocking front to back and shaking her head.  Her speech therapist thought she was telling her no, until i explained that's how she dances.  We don't really shake our head No at her.  In fact we really don't have to tell her no very often.  I'm sure that will change soon.  Of course Ruby will always be the perfect child that never does anything wrong....

She is also starting to get the hang of stacking blocks.  She still hasn't mastered putting things into a container, but we're working on it.  These two are what she "failed" during her developmental assessment.  As you can guess she has plenty of opportunity to put her toys into something.  Like the toy box every night, maybe.

It's  summer in Texas.  Our AC is on and we've had highs in the 90's for the past week.  We got Ruby a wading pool and we've been putting it to good use.  We're trying to get prepared for her swimming lesson that start next month.  Our neighborhood is pool on the weekends now and we hope to let her get some experience  this weekend.

We have a check-up on Friday with the GI Doc.  We've weaned her off of the Nexium and we hope that he will give us the boot.  We've hesitated posting about the Nexium, but it's been almost a month since her last dose.  We think we are in the clear.  Ruby takes no regular meds now.  It only took a year, but we did it!  Ruby's weight is the biggest concern.  She is only 16lbs 14oz and way below the curve.  The fevers didn't help much.  We're trying to get her fattened up, but it's hard.  Hopefully in the next weeks she'll gain some.  The options if she deosn't start to gain aren't all that great.  We've come so far.  We hope we don't have to take step back anytime soon.

This is what happens when you leave the camera on the ground in the backyard.  I found several surprise pictures when I downloaded from the camera this morning.