My Afton Rose is 6 months old now. The time has passes so quickly it is beyond cliche. I wish I had written more...I like to say I spent all of that time LIVING instead of writing about my life, but some of it was just surviving. I told you of her difficult birth, I also think it has taken me some time to come to terms with how I feel about it. Every time I went to write about motherhood, I kept going back to that dark place, instead of sharing the wonder and the joy of being a mom, and the every day frustrations. Now I fear I won't be able to remember.
A friend's blog Turner Twins (http://turnertwins.blogspot.com) helped me realize I don't have to have a profound point (though she has hit several!) or go deep into my psyche in order to write a blog, and it doesn't have to appeal to everyone, because the point is to log the journey. :) So I want to get nostalgic here for a few minutes and share some moments of my little one's first six months.
For instance, for the first month of life, I called my sweet little girl "stinky face." She was just following her newborn instinct to root, but she scrunched up her face and shook her head back and forth as if she smelled something bad and was trying to get away. :) My mother was not pleased to hear me call her jewel of a granddaughter by that less than glamorous appellation. It's funny though, I miss my little stinky face. She has the biggest, brightest blue-grey (sometimes green? I don't think they've settled yet) eyes now, and she stares contempletively, wide-eyed at the world. But she will never again make that particular expression.
I can't describe to you how spoiled we were the first months of her life. Afton never cried. She made the tiniest, cutest little sound of displeasure. "Meh." I can't describe it, so sad and pathetic a noise, it got our attention perhaps as much as a scream. She's became way more vocal in the past few months, and let's us know her unhappiness with the world in new and unique ways; none of them as cute as that first communication--especially the vocalized grunting sound she is fond of now, lol! Speaking of talking...she's working on it! I swear she has said "mama" in a meaningful way, but my husband is disputing whether to count it!
Fortunately, she has always been a healthy baby with no worrying issues (though she had some rough cradle cap, and now some pretty bad eczema on her forehead). She's nursed well (and stil going) and loves to cuddle and be worn (in a wrap or sling, a carrier, anything that has her close to mom or dad!). Right now, though, she is going through aphase that she can't sleep without that physical contact, and then not well at all. My next research project is how to help her sleep better!
Just to describe her, she is an intelligent, curious little girl, always watching, and sometimes telling us about it. She is strong, but very uncoordinated. She didn't play with toys for the longest time. She first laughed before she was 3 months old--her dad was throwing this ball which changes color up and down in the air--apparently that was hilarious! She seldom laughs at the same "joke" twice though. She loves everyone still (no shy phase yet) and cries in empathy with other babies when they start. A sight of her friend DJ is the only thing guaranteed to make her smile.
She has unfortunate hair right now, though she was born with a head of thick, dark hair. As her head grew (90th percentile!) the hair didn't keep pace, and she's worn a bald spot on the back. The new stuff is coming in blond, or reddish brown, and she has a six-inch long section on the top of her head and at the back of her neck (what she was born with!). She's pretty though. She often looks like me, and other times like her father (or his mom!), and strangely sometimes like my twin sister.
Okay, enough rambling. I know I can't share it all in one post. Maybe someday I'll get to deeper meaning, but today, I just appreciated sharing a bit about my Bit. <3
