Letters From Me, To You: Clueless

Hello.

Well, tomorrow marks eleven months. Eleven months that we've had a baby on the outside. My dear friends, Rebekah and Mark, just welcomed their sweet baby boy into the world this week, and it's caused me to reminisce on those first few weeks often during the last few days. It's staggering.

My baby is walking around. She fi,fi,finally learned how to drink from something other than me. (It's a straw cup, and something about her little puckered lips when she drinks is ridiculously cute.) If I ask her where her water is, she will look for it and go get it. She is eating food that a couple weeks ago, I would have been terrified to give her.

What happened to my little munchkin who would fall asleep on us at any time? Who sounded like Abu from Aladdin with her little squeaks? Who would take a good five to ten minutes stretching before she could open her eyes to wake up?

She's grown into a hilarious little girl who will mimic and play and laugh and follow us from room to room and wave to strangers instead of scowl at them and climb stairs and keep us on our toes (and write terrible sentences).

~~At the risk of~~ I know I'm being redundant, I loved those early days, but I find her to be more and more delightful the older she gets. We still can't help but sneak in to watch her sleep at night. As tired as we may be when she wakes us up in the morning, she makes us smile as soon as she starts babbling or giving kisses.

Sometimes she really lets me think I have this mothering thing down. I mean, we've really lucked out with an easygoing baby, so it's not that I believe I'm just awesome at this- I know it's mostly due to the fact that she is just easy.

I mean- she wasn't easy allll the time- we had our days when she would cry and cry and want anyone BUT Mom, and I will never forget how horrible the nights were around Christmas when she was waking up every two hours to eat, but all in all, she's been easier than I anticipated.

But then the easy baby starts teething again. Or gets a random upset stomach. Or goes through a growth spurt? And starts waking up at 4:45 am on the dot and decides that now she wants to cry forever (ok- our forever is probably quite short compared to other parents' with not-so-great sleepers) before falling asleep at naptime.

I realize we're probably just going through a short phase. Today she went down for a nap without any hesitation, but in that moment yesterday, when I felt like texting Jered to ask what I should do when she wouldn't go to sleep, I remembered that I'm a first time mom with an eleven month old, and I'm still new at this.

And there's nothing like a normally easy baby deciding to switch things up on you to remind you that you are still clueless and make you wonder why you thought you could do this again.

But then she smiles and gives you a kiss when you ask for one, and you remember. Because of that. Because of the scary amount of love you carry for that little human and the overwhelming joy they bring everyone around them.