Gwen at 7 Months

Gwen's first 7 months are in the books, and with each passing month she gets bigger, stronger and tooth-ier. Her first two teeth busted through her bottom gums a few weeks ago. And judging by the waterfall of drool gushing from her mouth, more teeth may be coming soon. (The first decent shot of her teeth is below.)

Gwen hasn't really shown much interest in crawling yet. But she can hold herself up in a standing position -- which came in handy when she was opening her Valentine's Day presents earlier this month.

On the health front, Gwen tipped the scales at 18 lbs at her most recent doctor appointment. Even better, Gwen finally broke her streak of constant ear infections. She has gone almost a full month since her last one. She's scheduled to get ear tubes on March 1, so hopefully our ear infection saga is behind us.

The month wasn't completely free of medical drama, unfortunately. The whole family got a barf-tastic 24-hour stomach bug, which was followed-up by conjunctivitis (a.k.a. "pink eye") for both Gwen and Morgan. With Spring right around the corner, we're hoping that warmer weather and fresh air will help keep our trips to the doctor at a minimum very soon.

Here are some more photos from Gwen's 7th month...

On January 22, Gwen's pal Cate (little sister of Cooper) came for a visit. The girls sat and discussed all sorts of topics, such as 'What It's Like to Be Cute and Bald.'

February brought another batch of snow to South Jersey. And with Gwen's ear infections on hiatus, we were finally able to bring her out into the snow for the first time.

Gwen's teething has meant that nothing is safe from being chewed on. Luckily, while chomping on everything in her kingdom this month, Gwen also figured out that chewing on a blanket or stuffed animal is a great way to sooth herself back to sleep at night. (Mom and Dad are very grateful.)

Both girls dressed up in their Elmo gear for the red, furry guy's birthday on February 3.

Feeding Gwen her bottle has become so much easier now that she can hold it herself. But, as you can tell from the two photos below, feeding Gwen solid food still has its challenges.

You can't really tell in these photos, but Gwen's hair is finally starting to grow. It's much lighter than Morgan's hair was at this age, and looks like it may be curlier, too. Her new hair hasn't diminished Gwen's fondness for hats, however.