Gracie is SEVEN months today!

The week leading up to Gracie's 7 month "birthday" has been incredible! Gracie started sleeping through the night after her 11:30 PM bottle! She started eating banana flavored oatmeal - her first food other than formula! She bumped up sizes to a solid 3-6 month size. She started rolling over both ways constantly with no aid. AND she started sitting up for a few seconds. Her physical therapist was really impressed yesterday. And today - Gracie is SEVEN MONTHS old! I can't believe I've been looking at her face (in picture or in person) since she was just 3 months old. She has been a part of our lives in one manner or another for 4 months now. She's been home for a little over 2 months!

Gracie is starting to be more responsive and expressive. She gets very excited about eating oatmeal and gets twitchy when she tastes peas! She loves to watch her big sister and Libby loves to make Gracie smile. We are trying to move Gracie away from taking a nap every 3 hours to taking 2 solid, longer naps a day - one in the morning and one in the afternoon... but haven't quite got that down just yet.

I can't believe I actually uploaded 18 pictures for this post... but I just couldn't choose my favorite! Enjoy!

All About Gracie

Brighton recently visited our home to evaluate Gracie's development and see if she qualifies for free physical therapy. She was actually not far enough behind to qualify for the regular program, but because of her unique beginnings, severe malnutrition, early sicknesses and adoption she qualified for the "A-typical program". The physical therapist was very helpful in showing me some exercises to help Gracie develop her trunk, neck and arm muscles. The very next day, as if Gracie was listening to her every word and decided she wanted to excel, Gracie started rolling over both ways - from back to tummy and tummy to back. She is getting stronger every day and will be sitting up on her own in no time! Last week we had a check up with Gracie's physician. Gracie weighed in at 15 pounds and 4 ounces!!!!! And she's 26 inches long. So - that puts her in the 20th percentile on weight (which is incredible given her start in life) and the 40th percentile in height. Her little legs are getting all chunky with fat rolls - so cute!

The following are pictures in no particular order of the past 2-3 weeks. Gracie's smile is sly and contagious. She's going to have flirty eyes and the best hair ever (which is growing like weeds! YAY!) We are enjoying her so very much!

Gracie's new jumpin' seat. She looks like a lopsided cricket when she hops on one leg and spins around. Its very funny!

For the next 3 pictures:

My friend, Britney, gave Gracie the butterfly onesie in the photo below. It is special because in the very first picture we had of Gracie (when she was severely malnourished and frail) she was wearing pjs with the "very hungry caterpillar" on it (I've included this picture also so you can see the difference - it's amazing!). When I realized what was on her pjs in that picture it was like God showed me a promise - that Gracie would be just like the beautiful butterfly at the end of that book. And now, here she is at 15.4 pounds wearing the butterfly on her outfit from that same book. The promise was true and God is faithful!

Our Beautiful Butterfly.

Gracie sits in her Bumbo seat on the kitchen counter while I cook. She looks like she's another decoration on the counter she's so small. I love it!

LOVE that smile!

The Gummy Smile!

The kissable cheeks!

The growing soft, curly hair!

The big eyes!

Stretching during play time.

Love that sweet face!

Just want to stare at her eyes forever!

"mommy's answered prayer" onesie. So true!

Cooking with Libby (the cutest Chef in the world!)

Libby loves to help mommy in the kitchen and recently we rediscovered a kids cooking book my sister sent me a while back. Libby decided she wanted to make some special dishes for our house church - so we did. She went shopping with me for all the ingredients and proved to be an awesome chef - not to mention - she is the cutest chef in the world!

Bam!

Above - one of my most favorite photos of all time! How could she be any cuter?!

Catching up... in pictures....

These pictures are not in the right order, but time is too valuable to fuss over it. First pic is my new haircut with my new baby girl.

The Lord has given Libby and our family a special gift in that we have about 10 families around us with adopted Chinese girls the same age as Libby. One of the moms - Shawna - decided to start a China Camp for hand full of us to do a trial run and see how it goes. She did a fabulous job! She invited the girls to her home to learn about China through song, dance, games, foods, etc. The morning of China camp Libby was beyond excited. She just around the house shouting "I'm going to China Camp!!!" Just the idea that she was going to a place that talked about the country she came from meant the world to her. I dressed her up in some of her Chinese clothes for the first morning (above). She was all smiles!

The last day of China Camp all the girls wore their fancy Chinese clothes and had a Tea Party. Libby, again, was ecstatic! She loves hot tea!

The girls also had a "show and tell" day and Libby took her parasol to show off.

These are the precious girls who attended the camp. Aren't they all so beautiful!?!

I even dressed Gracie up in one of Libby's very first Chinese outfits. So cute!

Libby showing off one of her China camp crafts - her paper lantern.

One of Libby's dearest friends, Maliah, was also there and during story time they would sit with their arms wrapped around one another.

Recently, Libby helped me tackle the fun job of teaching Gracie to eat baby food.... it didn't go so well.

Sweet Gracie Lu

I love this sly look. She displays it often!

Libby visited the Guadalupe River with her daddy several times this summer. She loves to sit in this little rapid and let the water push her downstream. She's been catching fish out there too. She helps her daddy get the worms out of the container and she holds the cat-fish and all. She is so much fun!

Neil McClendon, a good friend of ours, was the speaker at one of the camps we lead worship for. He met Gracie for the first time and was really great with tricky Libby.

Sisters!

Hopefully I will have time to share more tomorrow night.