Evelyn Hope Black

I hope to get to Evelyn's Birth Story and her first year pictures soon.  But first I went through her 1-11 month photos.  It's so fun seeing her grow and go through memories......  We are very blessed.

 Evelyn, early on, slept 3 to 4 hours at a time. She and I enjoyed nursing. Maybe it was that Thomas couldn't nurse, maybe it was that Evelyn was so good at it, maybe it was both.... but I loved nursing and I realized that I probably took it for granted before.  Her cry was beautiful from the first moment we heard it!  She was so content even with being passed from sibling to sibling.  Bella gave her the nickname of "Evi-Girl"  and we as a family changed the words to the song "Everything is Awesome" from the Lego Movie.  It became "Evelyn is awesome, Evelyn is cool 'cause she's part of our team.  Evelyn is Awesome, 'cause she's in our family."  It was sung  A LOT those first few months.  We still sing it from time to time.  :)   It really fits her perfectly.

Two months of being loved on, cuddled, rocked, kissed, and held can be exhausting.  :)

Evelyn rolled over for the first time, front to back, at 5 weeks.  The kids and I all saw it.  She did it several more times and then not again for a couple weeks. I didn't expect things to be as exciting as they are, all the time.  I thought it'd be just another pregnancy but it wasn't.  With the 3 older kids more aware, the pregnancy, the belly movement, the hiccups, the growth, the ultrasounds were all found with amazement, curiosity and excitement.  The prayers at night even... Bella prayed, faithfully, every night, from day one, "for the baby to grow and be healthy."  At  a few days old, they were amazed that she could open her hands already.  That she nursed so well.  That she cried a "normal cry"  It was all exciting to them.  Her first smiles in her sleep, her coos, and then her rolling over.  All so exciting to them and it's contagious!  I felt myself getting over excited with them.  What joy it brings to a mother's heart.  It's makes it all seem not so difficult or tiring after all, at least for a little while

Evelyn is rolling all ways here and continues to love life!  She started sleeping through the night around 3 months consistently and moved up the stairs to Graces room.  Grace had been looking forward to the time when Evelyn could finally sleep in the crib in *their* room.  :)

I love that she stuck her tongue out in this picture and that I got her fantastic thighs in these pictures.  :)  She had just figured out how to sick out her tongue on purpose.

Our Sweet, sweet Evi-girl at 6 months!  She is an absolute joy always and I love how it shines through in the pictures.  I love that I caught her sucking her fingers in this picture.  She has sucked those fingers from the beginning.  At around four months till about ten/eleven months she would grab my hair first and put it's in her mouth with her fingers.  For whatever reason, she liked sucking on my hair!  Now, her thing to do is to suck her fingers with one hand and grab her hair with the other.  If I am holding her, she will suck her fingers, lay her head on my shoulder and grab my hair with her other hand.  It's a source of comfort for her and I love it.  No one else has ever done that!  .

At Seven months, Evelyn has her two bottom teeth.  She's army crawling and loves to play and eat her toes.  From the time she was born the kids would lay her by them while they were playing cards.  When she could sit up, she sat by them while they were playing cards.  They sometimes even dealt her in and then played for her.  It was so adorable.  Then Evi started crawling.  *insert "dun-dun-dun" here*  She went for the cards every time and wanted to devour them.  She loves looking at them, moving them and eating them.  It's what she does.  So at 7 months, Evelyn received the endearing title of  "Card Monster"  It still exists today.  Needless to say, the kids no longer let her play cards with them  :)   

Evelyn loves to be outside.  OK, Evelyn loves everything.  At 8 months she had her first cheerios.  She's crawling on all fours and pulling up on furniture.

I thought it would be fun to take pictures in the huge pile of leaves Anthony and I raked up for all of us to have fun in.  Leave jumping is fun, rolling around and hearing the crunch is delightful, the smell of leaves and fall are all wonderful.  It's what kids do in fall, unless you hate leaves and are deathly afraid of them.  Then it's just awful.  You scream and wave your arms till people stop giggling and taking pictures to finally save you from the pile of doom.

 Pumpkins are way better :)

  

At ten months, Evelyn was saying "mama" and babbling several other sounds.  Thomas loves listening to her and will try imitating sometimes especially when she's blowing raspberries.  Evelyn is crawling, climbing and following Thomas around everywhere.  She and Thomas crack each other up constantly.  She laughs, he laughs and vice-versa.  pretty soon we're all laughing around the dinner table about nothing.  It's funny.  Evelyn does this thing where she inhales with excitement and it literally makes Thomas fall over laughing.  He laughs so hard that he loses his balance and falls over.  He loves it and she purposely does things like this, looks at him and waits for his reaction.  

The other thing Evi likes to do is crawl after Thomas while he's drinking his milk.  He drinks it lying on the floor so she tries to steal his cup from him.  He scoots on his back to get away from her and she crawls after him.  Sometimes he'll get up and move far away, other times he calls to me for mom intervention.  I love watching them both together.

Evelyn started walking just before Christmas.  It was fun to see her progress and the kids reported every new little detail of her progress whether I had heard it already or not.  :)  She is a very cautious little girl so she went from crawling to walking using "baby steps."  Evi did a really great job keeping away (or maybe not noticing) the tree all through Advent.  It wasn't until December 24th that she noticed the hanging ornaments.  Which gave mom another title, "keeper of the tree" or more likely, "move the ornaments to a higher point on the tree so Evi doesn't keep getting them."  What makes this job difficult is that Evi is faster and more determined than mom when mom only has a limited amount of time to get presents wrapped while kids are out with dad.  None the less, presents got wrapped, ornaments didn't break and tree didn't fall over... till after Christmas by 4th child but that's a different post.  Anyway, after a few days of keeping trying to keep Evi away from the tree, I decided it would be a fantastic idea to put her by the tree to get her 11 month photo.  Apparently, I should have tried to explain better that she's only to stand by the tree and not touch the ornaments.  :)  Most of the pics where faces like the first picture as she tried to grab ornaments and I kept wildly trying to get her to smile for the camera phone.  :)  It was laughable but somehow I got a pic of her smiling while walking away from the tree.  Miracles are real.  :)