Missed. Loved. Learned.

Not immediately, but not three months either.  Let’s call that a win and move forward, shall we?  We shall.  Addison turned six months old this month and has changed, and grown, and learned so much that I’m constantly left in disbelief.  Every little thing she does amazes me, even though she can’t wipe her own butt, which let’s be honest, is not THAT hard.  I do it several times a day…sheesh.  Anyhow, for this post I’m listing six things I miss, six things I love, and six things I’ve learned since I began wiping someone else’s butt.  There are far more than six for each of these categories, but I don’t have all day and neither do you.  Presumably you have your own mouths to feed, butts to wipe, and Netflix to binge. (Check out the second season of Punisher.)

Miss

• I miss being able to cradle her head in the palm of my hand while carrying her around in one arm, tucked against my torso, like a little pooping football – her entire body was barely the length of my forearm.
• I miss cradling her in both my arms – she, much like a cat, does not like being held like that anymore!  That cats won’t let me, she won’t let me, and the dog is too big…sigh.
• I miss when she would sleep for hours and hours at a time without resisting.  She’s got FOMO real bad now and doesn’t want to miss a thing, no matter how exhausted she is.
• I miss setting her down in the center of the bed while getting ready for work each morning without the fear of her rolling off it.  She can’t crawl quite yet, but she can roll and scooch herself backwards with the best of ‘em!
• I miss setting her down in her rock n’ play and not worrying about the damn thing tipping over from her squirming and kicking.  This girl has some strong legs!
• I miss bringing her out and about in her infant car seat (regardless of what ‘they’ say about doing that) – we always had a place for her to nap if we were out!  Now if she falls asleep while we are headed out to eat we face a serious dilemma – wake her up and bring her in, where she’ll be forced to sit upright in a highchair or skip the restaurant.  Mommy and Daddy got to eat kid, WAKE UP!

Love

• I love that she holds her arms out when she wants to be picked up.
• I love that she can sit up on her own and play with toys, books, stuffed animals, etc.
• I love that she can see things, decide she wants those things, and pick those things up.  Even if they end up in her mouth. I’m still amazed every time she sees her binky, grabs it, and is able to flip it around and put it in her mouth the right way with ease.  A true genius obviously.
• I love how chatty she has become and all the different noises she can make now.  Even at 4 am. Raspberries are her favorite.  Nothing makes me smile harder than when she chuckles though.  A baby chuckle may be the best sound I have ever experienced in my life.  Try it sometime.
• I love that she recognizes us, gets excited to see us, and is even sad to see us leave a room.  Unless it’s daycare of course, at which point she doesn’t even know we exist as soon as we hit the door.  So many friends, so many toys, so many things to put in her mouth – beat it Mom and Dad.
• I love that she’s developing her own little personality and can express some of her dislikes (pears) and likes (anything she can put in her mouth, with the exception of pears).

Learned

• I’ve learned that my wife is the most selfless, responsible, loving, protective, patient, resilient, amazing Mom in the entire universe – even when running on two hours of sleep after a full day of work.  (And referring to her as a Mom puts an ear to ear grin on my face.)
• I’ve learned that when going anywhere, or leaving anywhere, or doing anything at all with an infant, one should plan on everything taking up to three times as long as it would normally.
• I’ve learned to get less worked up about trivial things in other areas of my life.  Seeing my baby girl healthy, happy, safe, and cared for takes priority over everything else, everything, always.
• I’ve learned that even when running somewhere for even just a few minutes, ALWAYS have diapers and wipes on hand.  ALWAYS.  Learned this the hard (and stinky) way at the pediatrician’s office when I left them in the car.  Rookie move Dad. (Referring to myself as Dad puts a pretty big smile on my face too.)
• I’ve learned to be hyper vigilant of my surroundings when carrying Addie around.  Specifically, anything within her arm reach.  If she sees it, she’s going for it…cat tails, dog tails, coffee mugs, beer glasses, mirrors, paper towel rolls…anything she can reach, she must have!  She will settle for beard hair, chest hair, and my nose in a pinch.  She has the strongest grip known to man.
• I’ve learned that you do not need (or won’t need for very long) the vast majority of things “they” say you do.  So, shop and spend wisely.  Our little babe quickly outgrew all of her clothes, rock n’plays, swings, and even her infant car seat long before I anticipated she would.  The car seat was probably the most irritating because no one told me ahead of time that once they outgrow the infant car seat and you switch to the convertible car seat, there is no base system.  So not only were the two bases that we were using rendered useless, we now had to go buy two new car seats.  Something to take into consideration when deciding which car seat to get early on.  I can’t complain too much – our generous family came through big time at Christmas with car seats for us.  Not gonna stop me from complaining though…

I’d love to hear some of the top things you all miss, love, or have learned along the way.  If anyone other than my wife is reading of course – like I’ve said before, such a lucky gal.