Sam is three months old this very day. Ta-da!
It’s been a week of milestones here, too. If I had been thinking ahead, I would have sent out “Baby Bingo” game boards with the birth announcement, along with the URL for this site. The grid cells would have included milestones like “first smile”, “rolls over on own” and “first explosive bowel movement while we were changing her that gets on everything within five feet”. Kind of like this, except I couldn’t fit that last one on (click on it for a larger version):
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Those of you playing from home this week would have gotten to put tokens over “grasps and shakes rattle for the first time” and “first laugh”. I’m particularly happy about that first laugh, doubly so since I had to work so hard at it. If I set my mind to it, I can produce a one-way, stream of consciousness conversation that rambles from inane topic to inane topic. It kind of freaks Ger out, but Sam loves it. The laugh happened while discussing the merits of a movie where Sylvester Stallone plays famous scientist Erwin Schrodinger and performs variations on his famous cat experiment, some of which would involve beer. There were impersonations involved. Sam took a deep breath, gave me a huge grin, and let out an explosive “Ha ha he!” It wasn’t just a coo caught on her tongue, it was a genuine laugh. In perfectly dignified parent fashion, I shrieked and called Ger in from the other room to witness. Of course, Sam wouldn’t do it again …until Ger left the room. I’m still not sure she believes me or if she’s just (pardon the pun) humoring me.
And now, as an intermission, this week’s pictures:
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Anyway, at three months I think Sam has officially graduated from “newborn” to “baby”. Yay. She’s generally alert and starting to grab and pull at things. We’re preparing her for her next stage, though, which includes weaning her off nursing and getting her ready to take a bottle. As part of this grand experiment, I’ve started giving her a bottle for her mid-evening meal. This took some getting used to, as Sam did not agree with this plan.
The first night I tried, she started off okay, sucking along at the bottle and gazing around the room. Eventually, though, she turned her head and looked at me. Realizing that I was in fact not Geralyn, she gave me this kind of “What the hell are you doing here?” look and started shrieking her head off in protest. And she would not STOP. To imagine what this is like, try the following exercise. First, you’ll need the following materials:
- A sharp, #2 pencil
- Several pieces of brightly colored construction paper
- Some Elmer’s Glue
- Glitter
Now, take the #2 pencil and jam it in your ear repeatedly, hard as you can. Burp it every few minutes and that’s about it.
Fortunately, Sam warmed up to the whole bottle feeding thing in subsequent nights and we’ve just about got it down. In fact, I’m kind of looking forward to them now. I’m glad my nipples aren’t involved, and it’s still a nice quiet time with her.
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