May 2018 – Peanut Smiles

Dear Kate,

I had it all planned out in my head. Today, you are 11 months old and tonight was going to be my last night nursing you. I’ve been holding onto nursing by a thread. We’re down to one session right before bed each night. I’m sure you’re barely getting anything but I’m having a hard time being ‘done’. You are my last baby and I’m never going to nurse again. There is a big part of me that is so ready to be done. For the last 5 years (minus a few short months) I have given my body up to you three babies between growing you inside or feeding you outside. I’m ready to have my body back to myself again. BUT there is another little part of me that can’t believe it’s over. I am proud to have carried you inside of me and nursed each of you for an entire year (minus 1 month for Kate). It takes a lot of work, dedication and sacrifice to do that. I never had the option to sleep through the night, unless you did. There was no taking turns between Daddy and I on who would get up with you in the middle of the night. I did it several times a night, every single night. But I also bonded with you and felt your little breaths against my chest when you feel asleep being burped. I smelt that sweet milk breath and listened to you snore in my arms. I heard the ‘hupe hupe’ noises as you gulped the milk spilling into your mouth. And because of all of this, I can’t just ‘be done’. I need to know, enjoy and savor the last time I will nurse one of my babies. And tonight just wasn’t that night. You bit me, were squirly, and kept crying as you were trying to nurse and I just can’t end on a note like that. So, we continue but will imagine that it will end at some point before your next post.

Another huge milestone this month was crawling. You were army-sliding backwards last month and this month you kind of figured out forward progression by reaching for things from a sitting position. The crawl started out with the the dead leg pull, where one leg made no contributions to moving forward but was just drug along. Eventually you figured it out and crawl everywhere pretty quickly. The bigger thing is you just want to pull yourself up on everything. You have no interest in toys but love to pull yourself up on furniture, my legs, sides of counters, tables and have even attempted the stairs.

This month you cut a couple more teeth, another two on top and one on the bottom for a grand total of 7 teeth!

For as long of a winter as we had, the spring has been pretty amazing. We pretty much went from 2 feet of snow to 80 degrees. You love being outside and feeling the wind in your soft baby hair.

IMG_E0114

Sleep continues to be awesome. You go to bed around 8 and wake up around 7ish. Still taking 2 naps a day, each one lasting 1.5 to 3 hours long!

Finding enough food to keep you full is a challenge. You just shovel everything into the good old hatch. You are obsessed with berries and avocado–like you diminish and entire container of berries in one sitting by yourself and just keep signing ‘more’

Lately, I have felt like you are a twin to Lexi, just 5 years later. So I pulled up some pictures of Lexi at 11 months and then of William too and was SHOCKED at how similar you look to both of them. All three of you at 11 months.