End of the Day

This will probably be short. I'm tired, and TJ will be home soon from buying an anniversary gift. I got his earlier today--E and I went to Breed Hardware and found a beautiful blue glass vase/pitcher.

As of today I'm going to start feeding E solid food twice, once around lunchtime and once around dinnertime. I'm also going to do the solids right before he would normally breastfeed instead of in between. I tried it today and it worked wonderfully. He ate more solids and it didn't seem to impact breastfeeding at all. This week has been the first time I've felt like he wasn't full after one or two of his daytime nursings. He can drain both sides of me in minutes, and has been able to for a while now.

I've posted a few times about him taking longer naps, but he's mostly still napping for thirty minutes. Today he only took two thirty-minute naps. Ugh. But he slept for eleven hours last night! I get the sense that he's too excited about life during the day to sleep. This week has brought with it a big change: reaching. He's reaching for everything suddenly. The mail, my water, my wallet, my wine, my arm, my face. Anything and everything. It sounds like it would be tiresome, but I love it. When I carry him he holds his arms straight out from his sides with his fingers extended, at the ready. And he can hug. He buries his face in your neck and pulls his arms tight, tight, tight around you.

I remember visiting TJ's sister last year in PA when her baby, Julia, was just under six months. TJ and I were sitting on the floor playing with her, and she made a sound--what I thought of as a typical baby sound. A sweet exclamation of delight. TJ's sister came running in from the kitchen, because apparently it was a new sound. She'd never heard Julia make it before, and she was amazed. I didn't quite get it. Sure, it was cool and all that she made a new sound, but was it really *that* exciting? It's not like Julia had just busted out with a complete sentence at the age of five months.

Right. Well, I get it now. It's different when it's your baby. I knew it was even then, but I didn't *know* it. I didn't know that every new thing they do is a revelation. And the joy that comes with those revelations . . . I didn't know about that either.