The Good Things

Dear Hazel,
Today, you turned 6. As in 6 weeks. And your father and I cannot believe that A) You're 6 weeks already and B) YOU'RE ONLY 6 WEEKS?

It's been the longest, and also the shortest 6 weeks of our lives. Really... it must be said that you coming into our life has been like a bomb going off in The House That Daddy Built and Your Mama's Cat Soiled. A Hazel Bomb... heretofore referred to as "The H-Bomb of 2009."

Really... it doesn't matter how many people tell you that having a baby will change your life completely. Until you go through it... until your entire world begins to revolve around dirty diapers and Please, God... Let her sleep!, you have NO IDEA what new world awaits you when you finally get the baby out of your body and into your lives. It's madness, I tell you. MADNESS!

I realize that the majority of my letters to you so far have been complaining about your crying. And, again... keep in mind as you read this that your father and I were total rookies with you when we brought you home and our baby knowledge-base is expanding every day. Every minute of every day, actually. And, again... please forgive us our mistakes in handling you these first few weeks... just know that all of our mistakes were mistakes born out of love and a lack of aptitude for parenting. But we're learning. We're growing. And we're getting by on less and less sleep.

Anyway, to prevent you from thinking you brought nothing to our lives besides screaming, crying and boogies, I thought I would let you know other things about yourself at 6-weeks of life.

• You LOVE light. Are fascinated by it, actually. We know if we need to distract you, we can just turn on a light or walk you past a room with a light and voila! You're entranced. Your Daddy is even considering leaving the Christmas Tree up year-round just to have that distraction on hand.
  
• You adore your Daddy's beard. When he holds you while you sleep on his chest during Movie Night, you like to rub your face against it. And then you get a cute little beard burn.
• You love your shapes book that our friend/coach Debbie gave us. Your favorite are the black and white polka-dots and the black and white squares.
• You are fascinated by the Santa statue I have next to the Christmas tree and spend quite a bit of your day in your bouncy chair staring at it.
  
• You love walks. You do, however, hate getting in the car seat for the walk... but once you're in, you usually pass out and enjoy the ride. Unfortunately, it finally snowed here today so it looks like our walks in the stroller are going to be few and far between for the rest of winter. However, you do love to sleep in the Bjorn when your Daddy puts it on and takes you for a walk. Actually... we've been cheating on getting you to go to sleep in the last couple of days by using the walk (stroller or Bjorn) to lull you to sleep.
• You're starting to have more social smiles and make a TON of different faces... all of which your Daddy has captured on camera. Your Daddy... he's a bit obsessed with taking pictures of you.
• You sleep well when you're sleeping on me or Daddy. And your favorite position appears to be The Frog.
  
• When you sleep in your crib, you sleep most peacefully when your arms are waaaayyyy up above your head.
• The only hat you will let us put on you is a hat that Aunt Lindsey knitted you. If we try to put on the hat that your Daddy bought you, your screams will melt steal.
• For some reason, you can go 4 hours without feeding if your Daddy is holding you while you sleep. But if I'm holding you, or you're in your crib asleep, you will insist on being fed every hour or 90 minutes. Thus... Daddy does a lot of holding in the evenings. Which he loves... as do you.
• You are capable of producing the biggest boogers known to man.
  
• You're a tad gassy right now... but the good news is that you're finally able to start pushing them and they come out without a whole lot of screaming anymore. The result are huge farts that would embarrass me if we were out in public and you let one of them rip. And I would totally blame it on your Daddy were you to do this in the future. To protect you. And me.
  
• You currently fit in 3-month-old baby clothes. We have to roll the legs and sleeves up on a few of the outfits, but trust me... in a few days, we won't have to bother. You're a long one, baby girl.
• You get the hiccups after almost every single meal.
• You sleep more soundly when there's a ton of noise (like Daddy listening to a football game, or going to dinner with friends) than if it's silent.
  
• You quack like a duck to let us know you're ready to get up. No. Really. Exactly like a duck.

That's really all I've got for now. I just put you down for the night and I fully expect you to be up in 20 minutes or so, so I'm going to go take a quick nappy-poo.

Love,
Your Mama