6 weeks!!

Originally written on June 12-2012

We’ve been married for 7 months and our baby girl is  6 weeks old tomorrow.   I don’t want her ever to get any older but I still think about what life will be like when she is big enough to fit in the 5 million outfits she has that are 0-3 month sizes =- but somehow still enormous for her.    What will life be like when she eats finger food and sits in a high chair.   What will life be like when she can MOVE?  Or TALK???   Crazy.   It is fun to fantasize about but I don’t ever want it to get here.  I want her to stay small and perfect and adorable for a very long time.

Her smiles are like crack.  And I am a total addict.  It isn’t enough that I get a huge smile first thing in the morning.  I want ten.  Or twenty.   And I want that cute little smirk she has that is off to the side.   She talks constantly.   She has spoken to a picture of her cousin Dane, the fan in the bedroom, her stuffed giraffe,  and us, of course, the two of us.    I was doing that thing today when I was trying to work by holding her in one hand and typing with the other hand.  She was doing that thing where she looks like she is sleeping but she is actually wide awake when you lay her down.   Suddenly she was talking.   As if she woke up, discovered where she was and couldn’t imagine her good fortune to be so close to me and immediately wanted to chat.   I love that.

Sleep is awesome.  But somehow every night is different.   As Angie said “it is always a guessing game!”  She pretty consistently gets up once between 2 and 3, and then again at  5 or 6.   I feel like I am only up once in the dead of night, and I am getting 7 to 8 hours of sleep a night.     I don’t even feel tired all day anymore     Tessie has had a few nights of really long spells between eating On those occasions I would have gotten more sleep if I had gone to sleep with her at 7 or 8 or 9.   As it were, I went to bed at my regular time and got 3 or 4 hours of sleep, which was fine too.  Last night I was all excited because she ate at 10:30 and I was sure I’d get a 5 hour chunk of sleep.  Instead, she was up at  2 and 4 and  5 and 6 and 9.  Of course this got me off to a late and slow start which made my whole day crazy.    I told Steve about it when we woke up and he just said  “That rascal!”  Hilarious.  

During the day Tessie eats ever 3 hours.  Like clockwork.   She is consistent and predictable and I love it.  At night -- like I said - she can go 4-7 hours without eating.  No matter what, she goes to sleep immediately after eating in the middle of the night, or she puts herself to sleep so I don’t need to go through any big fiasco to put her down.   This means I am usually up 15-20 minutes tops when I get up.   We get up, eat, change, eat some more and then zonk out.  We are all business in the night; barely even looking at each other.

During the day she isn't such a good napper.    I feel like I need to do a better job at  putting her down while she is a awake and letting her fall asleep on her own.   Especially because I know she can do it - but during the day she cries and I am not good with the crying.   If she cries I will go to her and hold her.  If I hold her all day instead of working fine, I can't take the crying.

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