6 months...

 

Dear Clare,

Could you be any cuter?! You're killing me! 

Anyway, we've made it half a year and so far so good I'd say. It's been an exciting month for you, and after looking back at your 5 month letter, I realize how far you've come. At some point this past month, I think things finally clicked with me being a mother of two. Or at least it seems to have gotten a lot easier. Or maybe I've just forgotten how easy it used to be... Sigh... I still think having two of y'all around is much easier than having just one. You've got constant entertainment in your brother and that makes my job a little bit easier. But, back to you. Let's recap your month...

You have not only mastered sitting independently but you can now sit yourself up on your own. It's weird to come get your from your crib with you sitting up staring at us. It also means I've had to lower your crib down a level because...

You have also started, though not quite successfully, pulling up on things. The last thing I need is to not be one step ahead of you and have you falling out of your crib, sooo down it went.

Speaking of cribs.... And I mean this loosely, so very loosely, you are sleeping half the night in your crib. Woohoo! Usually you go down anywhere from 6:30-7:30 and then proceed to wake up between every 1-4 hours until I finally wave the white flag (usually between 2-4am) and bring you to bed with me. We've tried letting you cry it out, but that seems to have failed miserably in getting you to sleep longer stretches. I have my theories, but I'll save that for another day. Looking back at last month and realizing a month ago you were still in your swing and not able to put yourself to sleep gives me hope that maybe one day you will sleep long enough for me to get to REM cycle. Until then I will continue to keep all the coffee shops in business.

Since we're on the topic of sleeping, or really not sleeping, I should probably mention two of the reasons I think any 'sleep training' we attempted failed and those are your two bottom teeth. We said goodbye to that gummy smile and now you have two cute little teeth that are delightfully sharp and ready to chew.

And with those teeth, you've decided you are too old and mature for baby food. No ma'am. You will not be fed. You are a big girl and will do it yourself thank you very much. I have tried and tried and tried to feed you baby food with a spoon, but you break down into hysterics if I don't give you the spoon and "let you do it." You do get it in your mouth, eventually. It's only after all the baby food has been slung around the room. Tibi loves it. If only you could be fooled by us both having a spoon... So I've started cutting up things for you to eat with us, and you're happy as can be chowing down on an apple or pear or sweet potato fry.

You are still a huge fan of the raspberries and blowing bubbles. Each morning I wake up to you patting my face and blowing raspberries at me. It's cute... and I will probably miss that most when you finally sleep the night away in your room. You've also started babbling some. Hearing you say da da da da da has definitely melted some hearts. I'll let you in on a little secret... You've got daddy wrapped.

You aren't officially crawling yet, but using an interesting technique of sit, fall over and roll, sit, swing leg around, army crawl, roll, sit up, fall down, etc etc you can get wherever you want to go. I've lost number of the times I've witnessed you faceplant because you're legs go and your arms don't. I'm amazed at how well you take it in stride and keep moving right along. I went ahead and cleared out all of Damian's choking hazard toys. He wasn't amused, but I say it's pay back for how rough he is with you. He has no concept at all that you aren't a 3 year old little boy who loves to be tackled. I'm not sure what's going to happen once you're really crawling/walking and can go get back all those toys he steals from you.

In other news, I finally finished all your nursery bedding! I was hoping it's beauty would inspire you to sleep. I guess you just want to get up and look at it all the time. It's ok. I understand.

We haven't been to the doctor yet, so I have no official stats for you other than you are wearing 12 month clothing. I guess that means the 9 month dress I bought you before you were born for 4th of july will not be fitting you. Sigh. Maybe now that I'm not sewing your bedding I can make you one.

And that my sweet girl is about it! Keep being the sweetest little girl I know!

Love you, 

Mama