Letter to our 10.8 month old

Dear William,

This week on November 1, 2012, you turned 47 weeks or 10.8 months old. I took the day off from work as a floating holiday because November 1st is my birthday.   I debated doing my fantasy of leaving for work in the morning as usual, calling in sick and going to a hotel room for sleep. But I decided instead to spend the day with the most amazing miracle in my life — you  — and we went to Disneyland. Highlights of our day were:  Breakfast at the little cafe on Main Street, going through the Haunted Mansion, and hanging out with Jack Skellington and Sally Ragdoll.

This past weekend you had your first haircut.  We took you to Cool Cuts 4 Kids and it was the best place ever.  Their waiting room had fun cars for you to play with and a TV for you to watch. The stylist chair you sat in was a cool red fire truck/car with a steering wheel and bell on the hood.  When the stylist touched your head for the first time, you gave her the once over and then let her proceed without any further protest.  She was amazingly fast and really good with you.  Mostly, you were sharing how cool the experience by verbalizing with well placed melodic “ooohhh!” and “aaahhhh!”  Until she used the electric clippers, those scared you a little bit.  My mom asked me the next day if I had cried, and I honestly told her no.  The thing is, when you were born your hair was already over your ears, so basically you came out of the womb needing a haircut.  Mostly, I felt relief to have finally gotten it done!  What had been holding me back from doing it was that I wanted to find a  place that made it special without charging a bunch of money.

We attended Dr. Werlin’s annual Halloween themed miracle baby reunion last Saturday.  He truly is one of a kind — he remembers every single one of his thousands of patients and greets them in the same unique way he always greeted us when we were undergoing treatment.  I don’t know what most doctors do, but I honestly don’t think very many of them host an annual Halloween party and then stand in a tent for 3 hours so that all of his former patients and their miracle children can get a picture with him.  It was great to see him and we also met my friend there who I referred to Dr. Werlin, and the result of their treatment with Dr. Werlin: 6 month old twin boys.  I dressed you as a leprechaun, and you were the cutest little leprechaun I’ve ever seen!

You are weighing in at 27 pounds 3 ounces this week.  Also, you got your 5th tooth, your lower left lateral incisor, on 10/30/2012.  Wearing 18 month sizes, some 24 months.  You continue to practice standing on your own (without support) for longer & longer periods of time.  You have linked “uh oh” with something going wrong, and will now intentionally drop things and say “UH OH!”  You have also linked that adults will get up if you  are touching something you shouldn’t, so now you reach for something and then look at one of us to see if we’re getting up.

First foods this week:  Cheerios — no one told me these are baby crack.  Your father gave you some on Saturday afternoon and couldn’t get them to you fast enough, and when you would finish one, you would lean forward and peer around him, looking to make sure the next one was on its way.  Chicken — at Dr. Werlin’s reunion.  Beef stew — made in the crockpot. Pineapple (at Disneyland). Lemon (at Red Robin), you ate it with no unusual faces, which kind of bummed me out.
Regular staples in your diet:  Bananas; Plums; Apples; Banana oatmeal raisin bars; Avocado; Broccoli; Onion; and other samples of food from whatever we’re eating.
I continue to be impressed with just how much you enjoy food.  If I didn’t think you were so cute, I’d be embarrassed at how loudly you vocalize about how good you find food.  The better you think the food, the louder you moan and groan while eating it.  Some foods, like bananas, even rate an enthusiastic squeal and smile when you see it coming at you!

Naps: 1 nap a day starting around noon, we let you sleep as long as you want with a hard stop at 3pm.  You are averaging about 1.5 hours for those naps, and every now and again you throw a 2.5 hour nap in the mix. Bedtime is at 7pm, wakeup for the day is 6:30am.

Things I want to remember about this week:  How funny you are when you go crawling along while pushing a toy, or a bowl, or a book.  Instead of holding  (whatever you’re taking with you), you push it along with one of your hands on the floor.  That you figured out how a your little bathtub toy bucket fit inside another bucket this week.  The way you grabbed one of my breastpads and were SO EXCITED about it because it’s round.  It was even funny to me when you bit it.  The way you love your little book nook in your room and it’s a great place for me to set you when I’m cleaning up your diaper or prepping your jammies for bed, because I know you’ll be interested in it for longer than a minute.  The way you snuggle your head against me when I wear you in the Lillebaby carrier.  How if I lay down on the floor near you, you come crawling at me with your mouth in a wide open smile and crawl up on me and lay your nose against mine, giggling the whole way — we jokingly call game we play infant CPR, because that’s what it looks like — you are saving my life!

I walked through the house this morning, it was dark and quiet, illuminated only by the kitchen light.  Your ball was up against the kitchen table leg, your little racecar was upside down under the table so you could play with its wheels, an empty pretzel container was in the middle of the floor (you beat it like it’s a drum), your egg shaker lay next to it, your activity table was pushed up against your feeding chair and I resisted the urge to straighten these things to their proper positions.  Instead, I stood there and imagined you playing with them, the way your eyes light up and you greet them every morning as if you’ve never seen them before in your life.  I took a moment and basked in the knowledge that you are our baby… and that is so cool.

Love, Momma