Six months

Weight: 15 pounds 10 ounces
Length: 26 3/4 inches



How's Dylan? My typical responses usually begin with "he's sleeping well" or "he's had bad sleep today". I'm still stuck in the land where my mood and energy level is entirely dictated by our infant's ability to sleep. I'm very happy to say that some light has turned on for Dylan this month. We are getting good solid naps almost every. single. day. In fact, I can nearly set my watch to his afternoon nap. Oh and getting to sleep? I am no longer pleading to the sleep gods to make him just give up the struggle to keep his red rimmed eyes open one minute longer and drift off into a peaceful slumber. The night? The sweet glorious night? Ya, the nights I get all to myself these days too. Woot! Woot! Woot! Ok, I can't get too excited over here, something will come along and ruin all this wonderfulness... like perhaps teething... and all of the wonderful sleep will be packaged up in it's handbasket on it's way to you-know-where. In the meantime, let's crack open the champagne, get a little light headed and pass out like the dead.


There are so many changes this month that it feels like we have a different baby. I wasn't sure that he could get any happier but he has. He is curious about everything and everyone. Also, we can leave him alone for just a minute, or 20, and come back to a baby that has entertained himself. Just like that, no need to be in his face making goofy faces and noises, all it takes is the exersaucer and a few hard teething toys. Not that we don't still spend a significant amount of our time making goofy faces and noises. That's just fun.

He's become a master of rolling over. He's rolling over with a purpose. What's that?! A toy, now if I roll once to my back the kick my legs then back to the front and kick kick kick... then all the way over and bam... I can almost reach that toy.


The other day I noticed that of all the posts in 2009, most of the titles end in an exclamation point. Needless to say, I've been in a good mood so far this year. Actually Dylan's turning 6 months has made me reflect a lot on the last year and boy, how life has changed. One year ago we'd just shared with our families that I was pregnant. I couldn't go to the bathroom without checking my belly in profile just in case it had grown since my last trip to the toilet, only 24 minutes previously. I was worried about the bad things that might happen and how heartbroken I'd feel if it did. I would announce every day that there was a baby inside me. I was excited for the adventure and the challenges ahead. I was eating cheese. Lots and lots of cheese.
Well, the experience has been nothing like what I expected. I knew that you love your baby but I didn't realize how consuming the love would be. That I'd feel it from head to toe. That when he'd sleep I'd miss him and when others told me how beautiful he is that I'd beam with pride. This feeling is addictive. I can tell why people do it again and again. Then there have been the challenges. I can't say having a baby has been the most difficult thing I've ever done but shifing all of our priorities has been tough on all of us. For a while, like every day, I would whine that I wanted my old life back and then one day I realized I wasn't ever going to go back to that. We were permanently changed and since I spent so many years doing the same things, well this new reality is a very scary adjustment. Now though, now things are feeling so different. I've gotten used to it, yes, but the biggest difference is that I don't want my life back. I want to keep this one and I want it to change and grow and teach me more and more. Most of all, I no longer wonder "what have we done?" but rather I wonder "aahh, can it get better than this?".