Eight months!!

So, last night I really wanted to write - but I was too tired. So I went to bed, and then I thought about wanting to write. And I couldn't decide if I wanted to write about the really awesome cookies I just made (with the fresh jam I had just made), or if I wanted to write about my son's ashes, and the anger that is again welling up. Some of it at the pediatrician who I will not sue, and some of it just at that feeling of being ripped off. Losing a child - it feels like the ultimate rip-off, Dh once said. He was right. Anyway, that is how crazy and emotional I have been feeling lately - going back to work is part of that I think - cookies or ashes?
Then I realized that both would have to wait.

My baby is eight months old today.
Time flies when you're having fun, and we are speeding along at breakneck speed to the - gulp- one year mark.
You, dear Bubbles, are the most fun baby in the world, and every morning when you wake me up about one hour too early, grinning and drooling, I cannot believe my good fortune. It makes me feel very confused about the universe and her tricks.
But no confusion surrounds you at all, just joy, discovery, and immersion. It is easiest to become immersed in you, in our dance of interaction together, in our moments and seamless days into nights that will soon give way to more structure, more demands, more developments...but for now we get immersion.
Like just about an hour ago, when you called me back upstairs for a little more nursing, please, and you closed your eyes immediately upon latching on, content with the universe. And I decided that curling up with you was more important than grabbing a moment while you slept, and I was content with the universe. And after you were done eating, you turned the other way so I could spoon your little body, something you had never done before, and reached up to touch my cheek with your hand. You rested it there, your tiny hand felt like a flower- a flower that smelled like applesauce- and we slept, immersed.
I don't think it ever gets better, and then the next day I wake up and there you are...and it is! Every wonderful stage makes me nostalgic in advance, worried I will miss this when you move on to the next thing - because I love it so much. And then the next stage comes, the next new thing, and WOW! It is just as fun! I love it just as much! I remember this with the first two, but it is brand new all over again. And perhaps filled with more wonder, if sometimes bittersweet, as there were so many things that Elijah never was able to do that you can.
A week ago, you got your first tooth. Tiny, razor sharp, and anxious to try out some serious chewing, it comes with both excitement and some trepidation on my part.
Baby food is not your thing. The closest thing I have found you will eat from a spoon is Trader Joe's organic berry applesauce. You do love finger food, mostly non-nutritive sucking from pretzels, celery, carrots and things...all will become much less frequent offerings now that a tooth is present. Last night I got you to eat some of your sister's mac and cheese after putting it through the baby grinder. Yum, you said, in your own special way. You love flavor! Grilled cheese or pecan-crusted chicken smashed into a teeny tiny schmear, are voraciously lapped from my finger. Farmers market peaches are a fave, but only whole. I swear you are signing 'milk'. I have been using a few signs with you since you were born, milk being one of them. When you are upset or hungry, your little hands go wild, grasping and searching. You talk all the time, babble babble, and have some special sounds you make when playing or trying to get someone to play with you - like the dinosaur roar and the freaky-shriek.
You sing! Oh, how you sing! You love coming to class with me (to the extent of your patience, hunger, or state of awakeness), and especially love the babies class, where I can spend more time gazing into YOUR eyes, which I can understand is your favorite best thing of all. I sing to you, you sing to me, we dance and you ask for more - it's a symbiotic relationship. You love classical music the best, second to us making music with each other, and you will stop mid-fuss if we put it on and put you next to the speaker - unable to maintain your displeasure once you realize the music is on.
You are a long and lean boy, the pediatrician tells us you are 75th% for ht, 10th% for wt - which is really funny to me - just to have a child on the charts at all!!! (they say Supergirl is 3% and 3% but I suspect they are just saying that so I won't worry.)
Oh crawling! The access to the world is in store for you, my boy!! You are so close - realizing that the downward dog position is far more effective when starting a good roll than just a simple roll over. You get farther. And now you have your knees and feet all ready set to GO! Except that your arms haven't quite caught up and you end up sliding along in a faceplant, smiling the whole way and extremely pleased with yourself for the progress you've made.
Your love for Supergirl is matched only by hers for you. You two look for each other first thing when you wake up, adore snuggling and wrestling together, reading books together, taking baths, eating celery, playing, jamming on instruments - all together. Not in my wildest dreams could I have imagined such interactions and adoration already taking place between my four-years-apart children.

I am so glad you are both here, to remind me so often that life is good.
I heart you.