Six months
Dear Hazel,
Today you are six months old, or as Ben put it, ‘zero and a half.’
You have changed so much in the last month. (I think I say this every month, but it’s extra true this month.) You can sit up unassisted. You can get around by rolling and pivoting. You have teeth. You have started to belly crawl. You have one tooth on the bottom and another to come soon. Your might even have a tooth coming in on top, but you’re not real keen on letting me examine it. You have had your first taste of food.
Squash.
It was appropriately named. You thoroughly squashed it and then smeared it all over, including in your hair. It seemed to do good things for your hair, it was extra crazy the next day.
You are going through a very vocal stage right now. By “very vocal” I mean you shriek. A lot. Loudly. Ear-piercingly. Papa says you are talking to Buster, because clearly the sounds are nearly out of human hearing range. These shrieks seem to have many meanings including “look at me,” “play with me,” “I’m happy,” “I’m frustrated,” “I’m playing with a toy,” and “I’m making sure the entire newsroom is entirely aware that I am visiting.”
Right now you and your papa are asleep as I type this. I just came in from staring at the moon, which is slowly being covered by the shadow of a total eclipse. The eclipse coincides with the winter solstice, the first time that has happened in 372 years. As silly as it sounds, I wanted to wake you up and take you outside to look at it. Of course, waking a sleeping baby is absurd. So, I let you sleep. But just a few years from now, there will be something cool, and I’ll wake you up. I’ll bundle you up in something warm and carry you outside so we can see. I look forward to that. I look forward to a lot of things with you.
As I was reading about the eclipse today, I found a quote that enthralled me: "If you were on the moon during totality, you would look back at the Earth and see a ring of red light around the perimeter-the red light of all the sunsets and sunrises going on at Earth at that moment," astronomer Benjamin Burress said.
Isn’t that a stunning image? I can’t wait to share things like this with you.
Papa and I have been pulling out the video camera a lot lately. You’re so much fun to watch. Usually when the camera comes out, you clam up and stare at it. But you must be becoming immune because we’ve actually caught snippets of you being adorable.
Your papa, who is just a smidge proud of you, predicts each time we post a video or photo to Facebook that “This is going to crash the Internet…”
Yesterday we got a rare bit of precious sun, so we took you for a walk at Japanese Gulch. Your papa wore you in the carrier and you were a very happy baby. You threw your head back to stare up at the trees for most of the trip. You talked to the birds a bit. And, with your head tossed back to admire the tree, that’s how we discovered you had even more teeth coming in.
You seem to be slowly adapting to your new tooth. When it first came in, you spent several days sticking out your tongue all the time. I can only imagine you were testing out the feeling.
The tooth - and probably all the heavy-duty connections your brain is forming right now -- has meant an interruption in your near perfect nighttime sleeping. Sleep is overrated, right? We’re adapting, and things seem to be settling down a bit. (Wait, did I just write that? What was I thinking? Where is some wood to knock on?) For awhile there, though, I was one exhausted mama. Coffee, Hazel, and I have become good friends again. Happily, you don’t seem to react to the caffeine. Good thing, too, because for quite awhile there it was filling in for sleep.
You went swimming for the first time. Ben’s birthday party was at a pool and you had a great time. No surprise there. You are my daughter after all, and so therefore you are at least part fish. Or dolphin. You loved the water and happily flapped and splashed and kicked. You got so excited and played so hard I could feel your little heart pounding away. You slept really well after that. Maybe I should take you swimming every night before bed.
You laugh a lot now. I have pretty good luck getting you to laugh. It’s simple, all I have to do is toss any dignity out the window. I will do anything to make you laugh. Lately, you love loud noises and will shriek your own laughter in response.
You still smile a lot. You have this new expression that I can’t get enough of. You smile a wide, happy smile, but with your lower lip kinda tucked it. It makes you look very self-satisfied. Self-satisfied and adorable.
You are more interested in toys now. Your Grandma Sun bought you a little table with lots of buttons and lights and noises. When I brought it home I took the legs off of it, so you could play with it on the floor. You played with it for a moment and I started doing some chores. After I realized it was rather quiet, I investigated. You had abandoned the fancy toy and were playing with the legs. Typical baby.
Christmas is very soon, and I’m really looking forward to unwrapping presents with you. I’m sure you won’t care as much for what inside as you will want to play with the wrapping paper. That’s OK, I’ll just try to see if I can keep you from eating too much of it.
Good night, Hazel, it is the longest night of the year. Before I join you in bed, I’m going to go outside one more time to check on the moon. I’ll tell you all about it tomorrow. I’m sure you’ll be an appreciative audience.
I love you. Always. A little more every moment.
Love,
Mama
Today you are six months old, or as Ben put it, ‘zero and a half.’
You have changed so much in the last month. (I think I say this every month, but it’s extra true this month.) You can sit up unassisted. You can get around by rolling and pivoting. You have teeth. You have started to belly crawl. You have one tooth on the bottom and another to come soon. Your might even have a tooth coming in on top, but you’re not real keen on letting me examine it. You have had your first taste of food.
Squash.
It was appropriately named. You thoroughly squashed it and then smeared it all over, including in your hair. It seemed to do good things for your hair, it was extra crazy the next day.
You are going through a very vocal stage right now. By “very vocal” I mean you shriek. A lot. Loudly. Ear-piercingly. Papa says you are talking to Buster, because clearly the sounds are nearly out of human hearing range. These shrieks seem to have many meanings including “look at me,” “play with me,” “I’m happy,” “I’m frustrated,” “I’m playing with a toy,” and “I’m making sure the entire newsroom is entirely aware that I am visiting.”
Right now you and your papa are asleep as I type this. I just came in from staring at the moon, which is slowly being covered by the shadow of a total eclipse. The eclipse coincides with the winter solstice, the first time that has happened in 372 years. As silly as it sounds, I wanted to wake you up and take you outside to look at it. Of course, waking a sleeping baby is absurd. So, I let you sleep. But just a few years from now, there will be something cool, and I’ll wake you up. I’ll bundle you up in something warm and carry you outside so we can see. I look forward to that. I look forward to a lot of things with you.
As I was reading about the eclipse today, I found a quote that enthralled me: "If you were on the moon during totality, you would look back at the Earth and see a ring of red light around the perimeter-the red light of all the sunsets and sunrises going on at Earth at that moment," astronomer Benjamin Burress said.
Isn’t that a stunning image? I can’t wait to share things like this with you.
Papa and I have been pulling out the video camera a lot lately. You’re so much fun to watch. Usually when the camera comes out, you clam up and stare at it. But you must be becoming immune because we’ve actually caught snippets of you being adorable.
Your papa, who is just a smidge proud of you, predicts each time we post a video or photo to Facebook that “This is going to crash the Internet…”
Yesterday we got a rare bit of precious sun, so we took you for a walk at Japanese Gulch. Your papa wore you in the carrier and you were a very happy baby. You threw your head back to stare up at the trees for most of the trip. You talked to the birds a bit. And, with your head tossed back to admire the tree, that’s how we discovered you had even more teeth coming in.
You seem to be slowly adapting to your new tooth. When it first came in, you spent several days sticking out your tongue all the time. I can only imagine you were testing out the feeling.
The tooth - and probably all the heavy-duty connections your brain is forming right now -- has meant an interruption in your near perfect nighttime sleeping. Sleep is overrated, right? We’re adapting, and things seem to be settling down a bit. (Wait, did I just write that? What was I thinking? Where is some wood to knock on?) For awhile there, though, I was one exhausted mama. Coffee, Hazel, and I have become good friends again. Happily, you don’t seem to react to the caffeine. Good thing, too, because for quite awhile there it was filling in for sleep.
You went swimming for the first time. Ben’s birthday party was at a pool and you had a great time. No surprise there. You are my daughter after all, and so therefore you are at least part fish. Or dolphin. You loved the water and happily flapped and splashed and kicked. You got so excited and played so hard I could feel your little heart pounding away. You slept really well after that. Maybe I should take you swimming every night before bed.
You laugh a lot now. I have pretty good luck getting you to laugh. It’s simple, all I have to do is toss any dignity out the window. I will do anything to make you laugh. Lately, you love loud noises and will shriek your own laughter in response.
You still smile a lot. You have this new expression that I can’t get enough of. You smile a wide, happy smile, but with your lower lip kinda tucked it. It makes you look very self-satisfied. Self-satisfied and adorable.
You are more interested in toys now. Your Grandma Sun bought you a little table with lots of buttons and lights and noises. When I brought it home I took the legs off of it, so you could play with it on the floor. You played with it for a moment and I started doing some chores. After I realized it was rather quiet, I investigated. You had abandoned the fancy toy and were playing with the legs. Typical baby.
Christmas is very soon, and I’m really looking forward to unwrapping presents with you. I’m sure you won’t care as much for what inside as you will want to play with the wrapping paper. That’s OK, I’ll just try to see if I can keep you from eating too much of it.
Good night, Hazel, it is the longest night of the year. Before I join you in bed, I’m going to go outside one more time to check on the moon. I’ll tell you all about it tomorrow. I’m sure you’ll be an appreciative audience.
I love you. Always. A little more every moment.
Love,
Mama