Four months in, her

 
F is growing fast. She's still small for a four-month old, but is nonetheless weighting about 13 pounds, having practically doubled her birth weight. She's wearing 6-9 months clothing, and I laugh when I look at her newborn clothes; they look like they were made for a doll. The era before she was born seems very far behind (it's just been an endless, slightly dreary winter ever since!), but at the same time, it's a bit of a perpetual shock to realize how quickly she's changing.

She's a sweet, sweet baby, who has a very inexplicably feminine way of charming us all. Her lashes are just endless, and I swear she already knows how to bat them! She's smiling (and now increasingly giggling) all day long, nursing well, but not sleeping through the night. She has short naps and probably won't be a great sleeper either, although she can sleep for hours while all bundled up in her car seat. You can tell her mind is already all there -her body simply hasn't caught up with it yet.

She's eager to talk already -no, really! I recorded the following when she was 15 weeks old; sometimes, I fantasize that this babbling would be perfectly understandable to a remote Laponic tribe in Greenland or something, that the only problem is that she was born in the wrong culture. She's been saying 'mama' for over a month, among a lot of different syllables (LP did that at 7 months); obviously, she has no clue what they mean.

Evenings are still tough. No one believed that I could possibly have a fussier baby than LP, and yet, she usually goes completely Mr. Hyde when nighttime comes. Despite us being used to try and calm an inconsolable baby, some nights we are just wrecks. We hate seeing her so miserable, we hate how this has more or less taken our family hostage since before the Holidays. We go through it one day at a time, just waiting for it to stop. This is what we learned from the first time: there is nothing you can do, unfortunately. It does pass. We try not to forget it.

She continues reminding me of her brother so much. They have distinct personalities, but also a lot more alike than I would have imagined. Every little stage, every little moment feels like a precious gift, getting to relive again what I hadn't even realized I missed so much. She's pure candy, this one.

She completes our family so beautifully. Whenever I look at her, I can't help but wonder why I hesitated so much. Why the hell was I so scared???