Sweets
I’ve grown to love the routine of nursing Jolie, even at 3am when getting out of bed is the very last thing I usually want to do. This dear daughter of mine is sucking away at her middle of the night feeding while I admire the cutest parts of her personality that come out only when she’s doing her favorite task. She seems to smile while sucking and she’s never quite as content as when she’s here with me. In the hospital they taught me to move her arm around in circles, kinda like if she were swimming, to gently get her to wake up and continue eating. The other thing is that she, more often than not, skips all early hunger cues and just jumps straight to the screaming- even after having been nursing for an hour and you stop to change her diaper so transitioning to going back to sleep is easier. In the rare moments she decides to tell you she’s hungry without screaming, it’s the cutest thing, this is also true anytime she’s dreaming about eating. She’ll smack her lips while moving her arm in that circular motion, while also putting the opposite arm straight up in the air- because I’m always putting her arm up so that when I turn her towards me it’s in the right position for nursing.
I like to call her sweets, even though she seems to cry so much more than other babies and it’s been harder than expected dealing with her loud and fiery personality. No one can say I wasn’t warned though, 20 minutes after birth the nurse was already telling me that she was strong willed and maybe the other words used were high maintenance… I like to speak good and encouraging words over her feisty self because one can be sweet and wonderful while also feisty. I love who she is just the way she is.
Tonight is the first Friday night Jordan hasn’t had to work since early in our marriage. His schedule changed and even though it’s a hard change, I can sure get used to having every Friday night and Saturday morning/afternoon spent with him and Jolie. Tonight we took a walk and ate hamburgers with his parents. I sat outside a little while rocking Jolie in the beautiful weather and I have to say it was a proud moment as she lay in my arms so content with the breeze hitting her face and then fussed as I went inside. For the first several weeks of her life I was very worried she’d hate the outdoors since she fussed anytime we were outside. I’m looking forward to spending lots of time learning to garden together and exploring nature and doing one if my favorite things- laying in the grass on a hot summer day.
This momma is content- and at 4:30am very sleepy now. goodnight.
Reed had the same hunger habit! He never seemed to notice that he was hungry until he was very VERY hungry and upset about it (and also wouldn’t admit to being sleepy until he was so, so overtired). It made for a lot of difficulty despite his easy personality. I totally relate. But it sounds like you are doing a beautiful job of delighting in her as she is. I’m so happy for all three of you.