up and out

She is growing before my eyes.  I think I can actually stare at her and see her limbs lengthening, her torso widening and her little face getting more defined.  It’s exciting and it’s sad all at the same time.  I miss my little spindly-limbed fragile newborn who only wanted to sleep in my arms all day long.  And I’m so excited about all the changes and milestones coming up.  It’s a mixture of emotions that I think I’ll always have.  I think I get the whole “always your baby” emotion that my mom has for me.  I’m 30 and I’m still her baby girl.

No rolling over yet.  It’s not for lack of trying, though.  She’ll be fine on her tummy for about a minute, during which, she’ll kick and swim and do her mini pushups.  When she’s tilting on her side, however, insta-upset, she gives up and basically lies there crying until someone picks her up.  So frustrating.

On the flip side, she can almost sit upright without any support….as long as she doesn’t swivel her head too fast.  If she starts looking around a lot, she wobbles too much and falls.  But she loves sitting.  She’s constantly pulling her legs up and lifting her head up as her “pull me up to a sit” indication.  Big smiles when we comply.

She’s also reaching out for some things like a rattle her Aunt bought her, my hand, my shirt, etc.  She’s slowly understanding the hand-around-object-and-pull-to-mouth correlation but there’s a lot of lunging mouth to the object which is hilarious every time.

And, boy, does she jabber.  Squeals, squeaks, oooo, ahhh, ungah, goo, and even the occasional laugh.  So far, Stephen and I are the only ones who have experienced in person the full on belly laugh she can do.  She did a short giggle for grandparents and she’ll do a “hmm!” every so often which I think is her version of a chuckle.

Four months is rapidly approaching and we have some decisions to make.

First is solid food.  Our pediatrician mentioned at her last appointment something about rice cereal at four months.  My gut tells me that’s way too soon for food.  I mean, I honestly think she doesn’t need anything else other than breastmilk right now.  She’s growing like a weed and seems perfectly healthy so why not continue on this route?  I hope her doctor will support any decision we make about holding off for the time being as long as she’s healthy.  My mom told me that my brother and I didn’t have any solid food until we were nearly a year old – something I didn’t know.  She breastfed us exclusively until then and then continued breastfeeding until we were about 18 months.  I thought that was so cool.

Second is transition to the crib.  That one is hard for me.  I love having her in the bedroom.  I love being able to pull her into bed when I want to and snuggle up with her.  My mom pointed out that my hesitation is probably because her room is on the other side of our house.  I think she’s right.  If her room was right across the hallway, I might be more open to her being in her crib at night already.  But all the way across the house seems so far away and that doesn’t sit right with me.  Yet.  I know it exasperates my husband but I’ll get there eventually.  She’s napping in her crib more and more during the day, which I think is a big step for me.  Usually I put her down in her pack n play in the room with me.  Progress….albeit slow.

Six months is a good goal for both food and sleeping in the crib, right?

Third isn’t so much a decision but getting into something resembling a routine with her.  She’s starting to settle into her own napping routine so we just need to build everything else around it.  I don’t want so much structure that it cramps her but carving out her playtime and maybe some me time and some hubby time would be good.  I’m going to try to at least get a bedtime routine down pat and then try to stick with it.

So much to do.  I feel like time is slipping by and I don’t have enough of it to accomplish everything I want and still keep track of how much she’s changing.  There aren’t enough hours to be a good mom, a good wife and a good me.

It’ll get there eventually, right?