4 months later

The passage of time is a curious thing. Days spent raising young children seem to drag on forever, yet somehow in a flash several months pass by. On one hand, it seems so long ago that Claire was born. Those first couple days alone in the hospital with her were not the respite I had heard so many people raving over. Having left the hospital after 24 hours with both boys, I decided to stay the extra day with Claire because I thought it might be nice. But, I did not find it to be relaxing at all. I was lonely and bored and anxious to go home. I had determined during my pregnancy that I would try to enjoy every moment of Claire as a newborn, knowing it would pass too quickly. But, with her birth occurring at the onset of a terrible flu season and then having her contract a really bad cold within days of coming home from the hospital, I just spent the first two months terrified she would die. Yes, I'm a little dramatic. Living in fear and seclusion makes the days interminably long. I was too afraid to take her anywhere, didn't want anyone around her, and instead of enjoying her as a newborn, I just wanted her to get past the 8 week mark. And she did. Now when I look at the tiny clothes she wore those first weeks, I marvel that she was ever that small. I look back and think how quickly those weeks passed. But I still feel that we truly have enjoyed and treasured every moment of her life so far.

It has been four months already. It's hard to remember when she wasn't doing all the things that she's doing now. When she's in her car seat, I can constantly hear the jingling of her toys that hang from the handle of her seat. She constantly bats at them. She spends some time in her baby gym every morning while I get ready and she loves to grab at all the dangling toys. She even grasps her feet and often pulls her paci out of her mouth, but certainly can't get it back in. When she's sitting in someone's lap and they are using their iPhone, you can be guaranteed that she'll try to use it too. She is so close to rolling over. She gets her entire body turned over onto her tummy, except her shoulders don't quite make it over. When laying on her tummy, she can scoot herself all around the floor with her feet. But that shouldn't be read as she's scooting. I'm talking little movements. She loves to stand up in my lap. She is generally a happy, calm girl who really doesn't even get too angry if she's late for a meal. She still loves holding hands, whether her own or someone else's, she's not very particular. While eating she keeps her hands clasped together close to her face and she will also rub her feet together. It's precious. She has started to kiss us with wide, open-mouthed kisses. And she smiles, smiles, smiles, which makes everyone else smile too. Who doesn't want to ohhh and ahhh over a smiling baby? Right before bedtime (around 9 or 9:30) she gets really silly and giggly. I don't even have to try hard to get her to laugh and laugh.

The only area of complaint against Claire had become her sleeping. Claire's sleeping habits over the last month became atrocious! Having never been much of a napper, she started trying to refuse them altogether, getting a 30 minute catnap, at best, following quite a battle to go down. Next, her nighttime sleeping became erratic, waking anywhere from midnight to 2:00, and refusing to go back to sleep in her own bed. Bringing her into our bed only brought restless sleep for both parents and child. After several days, I decided she was going to have to cry it out at nap times to try to get her back into a schedule. The crying it out worked pretty well. She would only cry for about 5 minutes, I would go back in to reinsert her paci, and she would go right to sleep. Still, she would wake up 30 minutes later, on the dot. Nights continued to be awful. Finally, we were beyond the point of exhaustion, so one night when she woke at midnight, after two unsuccessful attempts to pacify her back to sleep, I removed her from her sleep sack, put her on her tummy, and made her cry herself back to sleep. Lo and behold, she sleep til 7:00 that morning. Since then, some nights she sleeps until morning, other nights she still wakes during the night. On those nights I just repeat what worked before: remove from sack, place on tummy, and let her cry. Naps the last few days have been stretching past 30 minutes, up to as much as an hour and a half or more.
On Friday, she took a trip to see the doctor. She received 3 vaccines and barely cried a bit! She literally whimpered for only a few seconds. And finally, her 4 month stats: 14 pounds 2 ounces (63rd percentile) and 25 3/4 inches (94th percentile). Oh, I treasure her so.