Dear Summer: 9 & 10 Months

Dear Summer,

      Yesterday you turned 10 months old!  Today I am sitting here on the couch with you asleep in my lap and I decided to look through some pictures of the day you were born.  Daddy asked what hat he was wearing when you were born, so that's how I ended up getting into the pictures.  In case you're wondering, it was his Yankees hat.  By the way, you're going to be a Yankees fan.  I'm sorry.

       The last time I visited this blog was when you were turning 9 months old.  I got as far as jotting down ten different things about you at that age before I was called away for a whole month.  I wrote the following things (with my current thoughts on the matter in parenthesis):

~ You love to pull the strings on Daddy's sweatshirt (when Daddy is holding you he is usually wearing his hooded sweatshirt, and you always go for his strings, putting them in your mouth and playing with them.  Sometimes at night when you're asleep in bed with Daddy I have to go around the bed to tuck his strings into his shirt so they don't get wrapped around your neck or anything).

~ Give kisses now (you were starting to give little open mouth kisses when I said "kiss" but I think that's kid of disappeared.  You do smack your mouth a lot, either for fun, or to tell me you want a drink or a bite of something in your mouth).

~ bbbb....ddddd (I guess you were making those sounds?)

~ Baby yoga (you started doing what we call Baby Yoga, on your hands and feet with you butt in the air and head pointed down.  If you were on the bed doing that, I'd flip you right over into a forward roll and you would crack up.  Come to think of it, you're not really doing Baby Yoga so much these days).

~ Cruising (you, you've been cruising on the furniture since about 8 months old.  You're getting ready to walk now.  You'll be standing there against the furniture, and then you take your hands off and just stand there on your own, thinking about walking, and then after a few seconds you drop down and rapidly crawl away.  You are fast!  And you climb everything.  If you're crawling around on the floor and there's something that's about 6-12 inches high, you'll go crawl over it just for the challenge of it.  You climb up the stairs in our house, all the way to the top, with someone behind you, of course.  You started this about 9 months old.  I'm teaching you how to go down the stairs, and I think you're getting it because yesterday you got down from the couch by yourself).

~ Putting things in your mouth (for the longest time you didn't mouth inappropriate things or put things in your mouth and I was so grateful for it.  But you picked it up in an instant and haven't stopped.  You hold something up and shake your head no and do your quacking thing "dah dah dah dah dah" or something like that, but it's high-pitched like a quack).

~ Clap your hands and shake your head when you hear music - "dancing" (You love music.  When it comes on you stop what you're doing to clap and shake yourself around.  Speaking of clapping, that's something that started in the last month.  You picked it up quickly and looove to clap whenever someone else is clapping or if you hear the word 'clap').

~loooove baths (So very much.  You love the water.  Splashing, smacking, putting your face in it, catching it, dumping it.  You go nuts in the bath tub, so much so that you crash all over the place and are constantly banging your head).

At 10 months old you've been saying hi and bye to people with a breathy 'H' sound and your right arm flapping wildly in the air.  You love to play peek-a-boo!  It started out with your hands at your temples with a blanket (or shirt, or hat, or cloth) clasped in them and you totally got the idea.  But now you'll do it even if you don't have an object in your possession.  You pull your hands up and there's your face for all the world to see, then your hands go down and we pretend something big happened anyway because it's still flipping cute.

Diaper changes continue to be a pain because you do not want to lay still on your back and all you do is flip over and scream to get away.  If Daddy or I are changing your diaper, and we're both home, we usually ask the other one to come help hold you down.  Sometimes I have Jacob help me.  Speaking of him, he loves you so much.  Sabine does too.  She is so jazzed to be a big sister, and you're more into her than you were in the past.  You love he hair and touching (smacking) her face.  Jacob takes really good care of you.  If either if your siblings are around, you want to be where they are, doing what they're doing, or at least watching every move they make.

You've become quite a good eater recently, eating a lot and eating really healthy foods.  You seem excited about all the new flavors and tastes and I'm really, really happy about that.  You still nurse, and get so excited to do so.  Nursing has always sort of been your 'reset' button.  You need to reconnect with me that way, and the you can go back your business in a much better mood.

No teeth for Summer yet.  We're kind of surprised because both Jacob and Sabine got their first tooth right after they turned 9 months.  But you were also a lot smaller than them at birth, so maybe your clock runs a little differently.

Even though you don't have teeth growing in yet, you hair is starting to get longer.  Some days you have little curls that form on the back of your head!  Your hair...I can't tell just what color it is, maybe because it's not long enough yet, but it seems like it may be blonde, for now, at least.  Whatever it is, it's cute!  And your lashes...that's one area in which you do take after your siblings.  You've got those long, dark, curly eye lashes that they both have, and people are noticing them a lot lately.

Just like when you were a tiny baby, you're still trying to get somewhere.  When you are with other people, you're always trying to get back to my arms.  You've been really clingy lately.  Sometimes you just need Mommy, but other times once I get out of sight, you're fine.  Still, other times you surprise us and let some special person hold you for a very long time.  When you're in your high chair, you're trying to get out, and you usually succeed in pushing through the straps and standing up.  Even though you love to be in the action, I've noticed the ability you have to entertain yourself quietly for a long time just playing with something on the ground.  But all bets are off if your adult walks out of the room.  You give a little screech/squeal that means for us to get back here and pick you up so you can go along for the ride.

You play around on the floor when we're all home, mostly the kitchen floor because that's where we always seem to be.  You go from room to room and take your time exploring things.  You have your own things and make your own messes.  When we all run around chasing each other, tickling and tackling, you're right there with us.  You're one of us, but you're your own person with your own looks, a tiny head, a tiny toosh, a little bit of light hair with a little curl in the back, a soft belly that I love to kiss, a signature move (back arch with arms above your head) that you were doing inside of me all those months ago.  You would think that my looking back at those pictures from the day you were born would cause me to sigh and exclaim, "Where did the time go!"  But they don't.  They make me feel like it was a million years ago and that you were always with us, and that the people in those pictures were simply coming home to one another at the end of a long day.

Dear Summer: 6 Months

Dear Dear Summer,

      You have lived long enough that I have already started to forget things about you.  For instance, I can remember the words I would have used had I written this post back when I meant to, like at 4, 5 and 6 months of age.  But I can no longer remember that baby.  You're just so amazing, that your current accomplishments are constantly trumping what you did a few months ago.  You are a person, and you are changing and no matter how hard I try, you cannot remain the tiny baby that you are and that I want to keep you as. 

When you turned 4 months old is when I started this post.  I had the words in my head for a long time and they were going to start like this:  Dear Summer, You are the most wiggly baby I know!  Because that was the one most outstanding thing about you.  You spent more time wiggling than anything else (including sleeping).  Everyone around me finally understood what all the complaints where about when you were waiting to be born.  You simply did not stop moving when I was pregnant with you.  You moved so much and in such a way that when people asked what I was having, I told them I was having an octopus.  You moved so much that I would lay awake at night (curled up on the floor) sobbing.  It was a slow form of torture.

So when you were born, and immediately, all the people close to us finally understood that you were a baby clearly on a mission to get somewhere.

At 6 months wrote this about you:  It is not clear yet just what your mission is, but as of a couple weeks ago, you are one step closer to accomplishing it because you have started crawling.  Now I know that your brother also crawled at the same age as you, and Sabine was crawling right at six months, but for some reason you just look so funny going all about the floor and your hands and knees.  Maybe because you're just so teensy.  Like your brother and sister, you are a peanut, but I think you may be the teensiest of  my babies.

Then  I stalled out with a combination of writers' block and an inability to garner 5 minutes to myself.  So I wrote a bunch of notes that I hoped would help me to remember the things I wanted to write about when the mood struck me and I learned the secret to stopping time.  So these aren't going to make sense to anyone else, and I can only hope that in the future I can decode them enough to remember what I was getting at, so, in all their unedited glory, here are some of your 6 month notes:

Your most favorite thing in the world to play with is paper.
Up until now you hadn't really tried to mouth anything.


crawling like a maniac.


you are a rip - last night in bed you were awake for an hour while Daddy and I just laid there 'playing dead'.  this is so hard to do because you are so cute, but you were making that blowing noise that you do with your mouth and smacking Daddy in the face and generally just trying to get his attention.  Then you came over to me and tried out all your moves.


You love being around people.  Some of your crankiest days are the ones where it's just you and me at home.


You love to nurse and only nurse, you will not take a bottle.


They say that a baby's cry is biologically designed to be just annoying enough to make the parents want to take actions to stop it, not run in the other direction.  Well, my dear, you sound like a dying cat when you cry and you sure are lucky Nature made you cute because otherwise...


spit up machine!


runny left eye


fresh milk demands


love paper


song to go to sleep


crawling, pulling up to standing


loon call, hawk cry

So now you are going on 7 months (in 6 days) and I have come back to the computer, with my tail between my legs, to finish this letter.  Having three kids is really hard.  It is not like having two was.  The ante has been upped and your father and I are experiences the consequences.  But we are also having a grand time.  You are such a fun baby.  Your face lights up when you see us come into the room.  You love your brother and sister.  Jacob takes care of you just like you were his own kid.  Sabine tells me all the time how much she loves her baby sister.

Daddy and I talk about how you're a combination of Jacob and Sabine.  You look just like Jacob, but you have the same body as Sabine.  And as far as personality characteristics, you're all a lot like each other.  You're a tiny peanut like them (13 pounds at 6 months), yet full of energy and movement.  You're active and happy and a really bad sleeper (but that is your parents fault, most likely).  You love playing in bed with us when you wake up in the morning.  You love nursing and being held.  You hate your carseat and you hate being changed - whether it's clothing or just a diaper, you do not like to be still and we have to hold you down.  You kick your legs like you just discovered them.  You like grabbing things with your hands and then shaking them around.  Things that make noise are fun for you.  You've just started making some "dadada" babbles.  And you are a people watcher.  MamMa calls you nosy little baby.

I could go on and on, but since you're asleep on my chest in the Moby wrap and I want to go to bed with you, I'll just leave at this:  I love babies so much and I am having so much fun with you; everybody is.  There are so many people who love you and we're going to have a fantastic time watching you become who you will be.  I didn't know I was waiting for you, but now that you're here, I realize our family is complete.

Love,

Mommy

Dear Summer: 2 Weeks

Dear Summer,

    You're two weeks and a few days old now.  At one point you were down to five pounds even, and probably less than that in the days between weigh-ins.  From that point you started to get the hang of nursing and gained 13 ounces in three and a half days!  That was ten days ago, so you're probably nearing seven pounds by now.  The weight is starting to show in your face, is forming little tiny legs rolls and, happily, has given you somewhat of a toosh.  You're skin finally stopped peeling right around the time I was able to give you your first bath (which is nice because now I'm not picking at it all the time) and your skin has become so silky soft!

    To Sabine you are still The New Baby.  To Jacob you are Summy because we realized there isn't an obvious nickname for Summer.  Daddy and I sometimes call you Sumsy because there is a Bob the Builder character with that name.  To Mango you are something interesting to sniff and to Ginger you do not exist.  To the bunnies, you are just one more thing in the long line of things that have pushed them further down the list of priorities.  And to everyone you are a nice something to hold, snuggle and adore.

    For at least the first week of your life I don't think you were put down.  Maybe for ten minutes here or there, but it's very possible you really were never out of arms.  For starters, I would have held you all day if there was nothing else for me to do.  And then there was Daddy holding you every chance he got.  Jacob and Sabine were constantly fighting over who was going to get to hold you.  Jacob especially would just sit there and hold you for a long time.  There were the grandparents and all the other visitors holding you.  And at night you sleep right in the bed with us.  Right now you do spend brief periods in the bassinet that we have downstairs, mostly because I'm really trying hard to put you down so you get used to being on your own because I don't want to mess you up for sleep like I did with the others.  But it's hard because mostly I just want to hold you all day long.      

    My favorite times with you are when your eyes are open and you look around.  I love gazing into your little eyes and wondering what you're thinking.  The extent of your abilities now is to turn your head around, lock you eyes on something, stick your tongue out at in and then make an 'O' with your mouth in approval.  If you like what you see you'll swing your jerky little limbs around in excitement.  It's fun witnessing your motions and realizing that they are familiar ones because they are the exact movements that drove me crazy when you were still inside.  In your sleep you practice your smiles, and sometimes laugh out loud.  The sleep smiles make sense, but we can't figure out how newborn babies laugh - like how do you know things are funny?  And if you can do it in your sleep, how come you can't do it while awake yet?  I guess it is just a mechanical thing at this point and there's no emotion attached to the laughing yet.

    Daddy has already coined a special term for you.  He calls it The Watchtower.  When you're fussy he puts you high up on his shoulder, as if to burp you, and lets you look out at whatever is behind him.  You look so cute with your crinkled brow and dark little eyes peeking out from above Daddy's shoulder.  Things must look very different from up there.

    Some days I don't think it can get much better with you, but I know the next best thing that is coming:  The day that you first smile at us for real.  It's going to be like fireworks going off inside my heart.  Your brother and sister were all over you for the first couple weeks, and have finally started to back off a little bit, but when you begin smiling at them, it's going to be all over.  And when you start giving us belly laughs, I can only imagine what goofballs they'll look like trying to evoke a laugh from you.

    Whatever is coming, it's going to be good.  There isn't going to be much downtime around here for quite a while.  We're going to be tired and cranky.  The house is going to get messy and it's going to drive me crazy.  You're going to continue to poop all over things and your spit up is going to reach greater distances.  You'll keep us awake at night (like last night when you were up for 2 1/2 hours straight).  But at the end of the day we'll look at you, fall in love a little more, and know that it's all worth it.

Love,

    Mommy

   

Dear Summer: Welcome!

Dear Summer,

    You were born two days ago, on August 2nd, 2011.  The time was 6:22pm and we had just gotten to the hospital about 20 minutes before that.  One push and you were out!

    Since it's still fresh in my mind, I might as well go over how the day went.  12 hours before you were born I was still asleep in bed.  Around 8am I told Daddy that maybe he should stay home from work, to be on the safe side (since he didn't want to go in anyway, as we thought you would have been born already).  Late in the morning the whole family went and did errands.  We went to the grocery store, Sabine got her hair cut, etc.  Daddy thought I was crazy to be out and about, but it wasn't even that bad until about noon.  I wasn't even sure it was going to be the day until a couple hours after that when we'd gotten Sabine down for a nap.  I cooked an early dinner, vacuumed the house, and Daddy was getting so mad at me because even though I was having contractions, I couldn't just sit still.  Sometime after 5pm I called MamMa to tell her maybe she should come by to take your brother and sister.  Then I went in the backyard to tell Daddy I'd called you and I started weeding the garden.  That's what I was doing an hour before you were born!

    I think I was just afraid to sit still because I was so scared of what was coming.  When MamMa and Papa got here I didn't want to leave your brother and sister.  I kept giving them hugs and telling them I loved them.  And Daddy was getting more mad because he wanted me to get in the car.  And then when we were partway to the hospital is when I realized you were going to be born very soon.  Just like when your big sister was born, I had to have Daddy drop me off at the door, but this time I made it inside and could still talk.  I couldn't sign to admit papers though, I was shaking too hard!  Inside the delivery room the nurses were being very vague, so in retrospect, I think they realized you were ready to be born, but they were trying to wait for the midwife to get there, and not make me too scared about her not being there.  The same midwife that delivered Sabine walked in and one push later, literally 10 seconds, it was all over.  I can honestly say it was easier than and not as painful as my last birth.  I feel like I won the gold medal in the Childbirth Olympics.

    You are so tiny, Summer!  You were 5lb 7oz, 19 in. when you were born.  And I was a week late with you - I don't know how you go to be so tiny.  Jacob was 7lb. 7oz, so you are a whole two pounds lighter than he was at birth.  Sabine was 7lb 5oz, which is the exact reverse of you, a fact that will make it easier to remember these new statistics.  All of us girls in this family have S names, not something that was particularly planned.  We girls also have only 2s in the day of our birthdays; Sabine is June 22nd and I am October 2nd. Oh yeah, same month as Daddy's birthday, same day of the month as your mother. Anyway, numbers are important to me, so I've been doing a lot of playing around with them in my head the past couple days.

    You're coming home to a full and loving household, little baby.  We have four rabbits, two dogs, and now three kids!  You have one big brother and one big sister, just like I do.  You and I are both the baby girls of the family; it's going to be nice growing up, you'll have lots of people to do stuff for you.  It probably won't be very quiet, but I promise it will be very fun!  You will learn to love being outside in nature, eat lots of healthy foods (you'll probably also develop an amazing appetite for ice cream), read tons of books, and chances are, you'll be one active kid, just like your siblings. You'll grow up with a deep respect for our planet. You'll be introduced to the Tickle Spider and The Bull.  You'll run circles inside our house and always have someone to try to catch.  You'll quickly discover the joys of snuggling in bed with a warm body next to you, and I promise we'll find a place to fit you when there's already a full bed.  You'll get lots of shoulder rides from Daddy.  Jacob will dote on you he'll share his construction vehicles and tools.  Sabine will teach you lots of songs and encourage you to dance.

    I'll keep you ever so close to me and will probably be over-protective; and even though I can't imagine it yet, I know I'll let you go out in to the world when it's your time because you'll teach me things too.  You'll teach me about parts of my heart I didn't know could exist, and I'll learn (perhaps painfully) that I'm capable of things that I thought were impossible (like letting go).  I can't fathom these things yet, but I know they'll happen because I love you with an indescribable fierceness that, surely, can overcome any obstacle.