12 weeks

I think the reason I am shocked every time Grace reaches a time milestone, like 12 weeks, is that with a baby, one becomes acutely aware of how quickly time passes. These moments of babyhood are precious as Gracie rapidly grows and changes. I thought I would remember all the little details of her being a newborn, but already some things are fading so I started a sort of journal. I'm planning to do a baby book, but we'll see how it goes since I still haven't made a wedding album... and the blog is certainly a good chronicle of her development. However, this journal, which I'm going to try hard to keep up, should be a good way to keep track of all the random things that don't get posted. Not that I have ever been good with journals, but here's hoping that some day in the future I'll have something to share with her that tells her how scared we were when we brought her home and how she transformed our lives with a difficult to describe and overwhelming love.

And then, yesterday afternoon, this whole passage of time thing hit me from another angle. We went with another mom and baby to one of those wonderful little roadside summer ice cream stands on the north shore. We were waiting in line (or "on line" as they say out here) behind a huge crowd of elderly men and women on what appeared to be a field trip from an assisted living facility. After the last gentleman ordered he turned around and saw the two little ones sleeping in their carseats and exclaimed, "I can't believe I was ever that little! 96 years ago!"

So here we are at twelve weeks. The end of the "fourth trimester" and oh what a difference 12 weeks makes. This morning at 5am I was feeding Grace and marveling at the long baby stretched all across my lap, her pudgy little legs hanging off the edge of the chair. She laughed on Monday and it was spectacular. We sat laughing at each other for a few minutes, until I was laughing so hard I was crying (or maybe I was crying anyway?). I have been trying crazy antics and songs all week to amuse her enough to get her to do it again, but no dice except one little courtesy 'heh' yesterday.

She continues to sleep beautifully and has even slept late a few mornings this week. She loves to ride in the moby with her head out and the wind ruffling her hair. Often when she smiles, she gets so excited that she kicks and wiggles her whole body - whole body smiles, we call them. She loves to stand, with help, and is talking like crazy. She gets a kick out of having "conversations" and her favorite sound to make seems to be a "ggggg", which we naturally take as a sign of her superior intellect, knowing G is for Grace.

Here she is this morning at the park. She liked the swing!
A few new pix posted.