Dear Paisley: Month 8

December 30th, 2010

Dear Paisley,

Hi! Hello! Hey there! You started waving the week of Christmas and are just too darn cute when you do it. Your Barbie hand faces you and you just wiggle and stretch your fingers into an adorable little wave. Sometimes you wave toward the person you’re saying hi to. You definitely “get” what you’re doing and smile so big!

Yes, I said Christmas. We made it to Christmas with you and we’re all still standing. We actually kept your first Christmas relatively tame. We’re realists when it comes to this kind of stuff so we didn’t exactly bring out the fireworks and ponies. We even asked Santa to take it easy and he obliged, filling your stocking with new socks that will actually fit you, a jar of puffs, some new barrettes (for when you have hair), and a cage to keep you in and off of the stairs. Aunties and friends were also asked not to get too crazy, considering you would be content eating tissue paper and have no recollection of this day. So, you received a lot of new story books and diapers. Not sure if you cared, but mama was really happy! I can remember waking up pregnant the Christmas before saying to myself, “this time next year I’ll have a baby.” I won’t lie, it was pretty special waking up with you on Christmas morning, all cozy in your “Baby’s First Christmas” PJs. We celebrated with Grandpa Dean, Grandma Lori, Uncle Kyle and Aunt Larenda, Aunt Jenna, Eric and Cousin Ellie, and of course, mommy and daddy.

It wouldn’t be Christmas without a visit to Santa. Your daddy very generously volunteered his time to play Santa at Heartspring, because that jolly old man needs lots of helpers out here. We thought it would be rather sweet that your first visit with Santa was your daddy; you thought it was pretty awful. The second he touched you you freaked out screaming. The pitiful look on your face said “why would you do this to me?” as tears streamed out of your eyes. We of course made you endure it long enough to snap a few classic photos!

Before I had to leave for a week in LA to cover the Biggest Loser finale, and maybe hide out in a beach house for a few days, you started acting like you might want to crawl. By the time I got back you were fully mobile. It’s not a hands-and-knees crawl, but an army crawl that suits you just fine and gets you from A to B to C all the way to Z. When we walk away, and you want us, here you come!

Your walking has improved and I expect you to take off any time now. Cruising furniture is old hat, now you like to transfer from piece to piece, whether that be chair to chair in the dining room or hearth to toy basket along daddy’s leg to the couch and over to mommy.

One of your new favorite things is to sit in your high-chair and eat puffs or Cheerios. 90% of them end up on the floor, 5% of them in your diaper, 3% of them under the cover of your seat, and the other 2% are lucky to make it in to your mouth! And your solid foods are slowly moving out of just purees to some other fun stuff. For instance, you love to take bites off of a whole bananas. Sometimes it’s a bite that sized just right for your tiny mouth, other times it’s 1/3 of the banana. I’ve also given you chunks of frozen pear and you love to suck and chew on these… like a baby popsicle!

The detachment has started and it’s making us crazy. You only want one of us and no matter how happy you are, if we try to hand you off or walk away you break out in to hysterics. We’re doing our best to not really acknowledge the situation, we just keep smiling, tell you you’re fine and go on with what we were doing. Sure, it’s heartbreaking to her you cry, but I also can’t hold your hand forever. And it’s not like I’m leaving you in the hands of freaks… it’s always some relative, or, wait I take the freaks back….

Other than that you do so much and change so much every day that I honestly can’t keep up. We’re both putty in your hands and love you in a way that is completely indescribably and, honestly, incomprehensible. I can’t believe we’re just a few short months away from your first birthday. When I marvel at how much you’ve changed in just eight months, I don’t think my heart can take what the first part of 2011 has in store for us.

I love you my bug!

Mama