Dear Millie,

Yesterday was your three month birthday. This past month, you changed in so many ways and I could really start to see your little personality start to shine through. Your dada and I are always learning, and you continue to be patient with us as we adjust to your likes and dislikes and try to be the best parents we can be.

This month I learned you really enjoy your independence. Sure, it’s weird to hear that a three month old loves independence, but you do. You are still a great sleeper, but we started to find you struggling to fall asleep, and you started to cry beforehand. We kept telling one another, “She’s just fighting it, she’s so tired!” Truth is, you were fighting us! The image you get of most babies being cradled and rocked to sleep…yeah, that’s not your thing. You’re ok with us settling you down a bit and making sure you’re calm, but you prefer us placing you in your crib and letting you soothe yourself. It’s cute, but sometimes it also makes me yearn for you to want to sleep on my chest like you did when you were first born. So now, instead of us placing you in the crook of our arms and holding you closely, we face you outward and give you space to settle down and then lay you into your crib. You move your head back and forth in your crib and sometimes “talk” until you fall asleep. You like to know that I’m in the room with you, I see your little eyes looking for me and once you find me, it makes you feel safe and ready to drift off into dream land.

You also discovered your hands, and you are fixated on them! You spend a lot of time crossing and intertwining each little finger and then sucking on your entire hand and fist. It’s baffling, because you actually don’t seem to like it–in fact, you often gag yourself doing it–but in your independent way, you continue. I have offered you multiple different types of pacifiers, and each time, you act like I’m offering you some sort of rancid milk. Instead, you place some or all of your hand in your mouth. In the past few days, you also started to realize that your hands can do cool things like touch objects and feel them, and you love it! If I place my hand in the hair by yours your little hand reaches out to touch mine and feel my hand and the look of concentration and determination on your face is priceless.

You love to smile and smirk, but you don’t freely give your smiles away. You like to study people before you’ll smile for them, but you sure love to give me your adorable smiles. Whenever you wake up from a nap and I go to get you, your face turns from super sleepy to super happy, and it’s moments like those that fill my heart with a love that is indescribable. We still spend so much time together since I don’t have a nanny or daycare set up for you yet (I know it would be helpful, but I keep putting this off), and we haven’t started bottle feeding, so there’s lots of mama and Millie time. Sometimes you look at me with such love in your eyes and I feel like I might explode, it’s truly magical. A lot of people have told me it only gets better as you keep developing your personality, and I can say that this third month was really rewarding. Don’t get me wrong, I loved you in month one and two, but there was a lot of take and very little true interaction. Every time I woke up to feed you, I loved those moments and knew I was taking the best care of you that I could, but when you look at me and smile or ‘talk’ to me, the bond is so much deeper.

This month you went through your three-month growth spurt starting about a week ago, and you wanted to eat non-stop and woke up more often in the night than your first week home from the hospital. Dada went to NYC for work during that same week, and while you and I did fine (with lots of help from grandma and grandpa), we both wound up pretty exhausted. You love when grandma plays the piano for you, and she and I think you might really be into music. I played multiple instruments growing up, but it was never my forte. You also love the cradle at grandma and grandpa’s house, which is a family heirloom brought over from Hungary from your great grandparents. It is really loud when we wind it up, and at first I thought it would jostle you about, but you seem to like it!

After you finished your first round of vaccines this past month, we started taking you out in public much more. You went to lunch with friends of ours in Miami, followed by shopping (funny story: we took you into Hermés and our usual sales associate wasn’t in. I asked if they had any Birkins or Kellys and was told a swift and stern no. Looks like you were welcomed early on to the game of shopping for luxury bags!). You still rarely cry, and when you’re tired, you have this really adorable whimper that is telling us that you’re tired or hungry but you rarely go into an all-out cry. You’ve sat through lunches and dinners barely making a peep so mama and dada can be out and about a bit more.

Oh, and everyone, I mean EVERYONE, tells me how much you look like your dada. The resemblance is major, and it’s not just in your looks–it’s faces you make like him and smiles that we call “Vladi smiles” that are 100% your dada. I love that you look like him, but I keep waiting for someone to tell me you look like me too. However, I’ve heard that a lot of babies start out looking very much like their dads and then their mom’s features show later, so I’m holding onto that! This past month has been the most fun yet, and while some days and moments are quite challenging, the reward far exceeds the hard moments. Mama and dada love you so much, and I’m looking forward to all the changes in store this next month!

Love,

Mama

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