Megan Lindsay McEwan Wansbrough - Megan's Gallery

Megan is now six and a half months old. Over the last couple of weeks she has celebrated her first Easter, and has been practising her sitting and standing skills. She's been to lots of interesting places this fortnight - softplay at Cadwinkle; Polkemmet and Beecraigs Country parks, Ratho and South Queensferry, as well as going swimming, to an Easter egg hunt, out for several meals, meeting some old friends and enjoying helping Grandpa celebrate his 60th birthday!

The biggest excitement of the last couple of weeks however is that Megan started eating solid food for the first time (when she was 6 months and 4 days old). Her first food was mashed banana, which she loved. But she also has been grabbing food from our plates and trying it out (notably a hot cross bun and a yorkshire pudding!). She doesn't seem to be bothered by trying new flavours and has managed to try quite a wide variety already including apple, pear, bread and, a favourite, couscous. In fact, the only thing she hasn't enjoyed is baby rice! As we can fully understand her dislike of this sticky glue-like substance we won't bother offering it to her again!

She really likes to feed herself and is fairly adept at getting a spoon into her mouth. She loves experimenting with different finger foods - sticks of carrot, pear and banana, as well as toast, rice cakes, rusks and biscotti (rich tea biscuits for babies!). It's great fun - but very messy!

She has been experimenting with new sleeping positions recently, trying on her tummy, before demonstrating a very definite preference for sleeping on her right side. In fact, often when she wakes in the night, all we need to do it roll her back onto her side and she settles immediately even if she's been quite worked up.

Megan has been practising both her sitting and standing skills. She's made rapid progress with her sitting - just a few short weeks ago, she was barely sitting for longer than a few minutes without falling over, she is now a confident sitter. She is able to sit unsupported for long periods of time, reach for toys that are some distance away and sit back up again, and most recently will sit and "bounce" on her bottom as if she's trying to get to a toy that is out of her reach! We wonder if she will prefer bottom-shuffling as a mode of locomotion, rather than crawling.

We got out the ball blaster for her a couple of weeks ago, and this has encouraged her to stand more. She also stood holding onto the safety rail on Aidan's bed as her only means of support for more than 10 seconds. She can now stand for relatively long periods of time holding on to our fingers, or the ball blaster, so she's obviously getting pretty strong. She's now working on her balance and is becoming more stable with each passing day. She will take an occasional step too when you give her the opportunity to walk.

After several months of battling to keep her eczema under control, we gave up recently and took her to the doctor, who prescribed a couple of different creams for her. Thankfully these have worked quickly and effectively, and she's much more comfortable. That said, part of the reason for her skin flare-up is that her third tooth is now visible underneath the surface... Watch this space!

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