little black journal

Parenthood has made me so much more aware of the passage of time.  Thirty seconds at a stoplight can feel like an eternity with a crying baby in the backseat, but then she calms down and time flies and before you know it, your little girl is two months old and weighing in at a hefty twelve and a half pounds…  It’s bittersweet to see Juliette growing and changing so quickly, but definitely more sweet than bitter.  The highlights:

Her highlights!  Her soft brown and blonde locks are getting longer and more out of control.  They often lay nice and flat in the front and stick straight up in the back – we’ve shared some good laughs over her morning bed head.  And I’ve logged some precious hours running my fingers through this hair while she nurses.

Bathtime!  Now that Shane is back at work and I don’t have an extra set of hands around in the morning, we’ve traded showers for evening baths.  Juliette loves the tub and often flashes some of her best smiles when I’m shampooing her hair.  And no more post-bathing meltdowns!  She’s mellowed out a bit in her old age.

She continues to eat like a champ and is packin’ on the pounds – I feel like I discover a new crease in her chubby little legs every time I change her.

She is rockin’ her tummy time these days, holding her head up like a pro and rolling over almost every day now – here she is, makin’ a break for it:

She’s got lots of nicknames – I thought we’d call her Jules most often, but we’ve come up with a number of other terms of endearment that get a lot more use:  Flock of Seagulls (that 80’s hair!); Bag of Books (because she’s heavy, and because this is what came out of Shane’s mouth when he drew a blank on the phrase “sack of potatoes”); Stinkpot (have you ever gotten a whiff of spit up that has crusted itself in a baby’s neck creases and gone sour?  oooof.); and a smattering of Sweetheart’s and Hon’s, for good measure.

Finally, she’s just lots and lots of fun right now.  After a few weeks of feeling like we were constantly trying to get her to stop crying or to sleep, she’s taken a turn and now loves to just stretch out on the floor and babble and smile and kick those chubby little legs.  And praise the Lord, she’s sleeping more!  On her best days, she naps for a couple hours in the morning and a couple hours in the afternoon.  On her OK days, I settle for one nap or the other.  And then there was yesterday, when she celebrated her two-month birthday by refusing to take a nap at all.  But dang it, she kept making these sweet little faces, so I forgave her…

Happy two months, Stinkpot.  It’s an honor to watch you grow.