::Sagan's Monthly Newsletter, June 2010::

Dear Sagan,

This month has been amazing. We’ve found our groove, you and I. Our days have been busier – we’ve left the house on at least half of them – but I’ve learned how to anticipate your needs, so you’re less fussy and I’m less psychotic. You’ve been to restaurants, REI, Costco (you’ll go there a lot), and four funerals. Yes, four. But you certainly don't mind being in the car:


You’ve come a long way physically; you have your two-month checkup (read: First Dose of Shots) tomorrow, and I expect your height – well, heh, length – to be at least 2 inches greater. I am not anticipating a report of “he’s not thriving,” because you totally are. You also remind me of what you’ll be like as a teenager: you’ve got acne, and your hairstyle is indefinable. I will call it “The Beiber Mullet,” because it’s short in the front but is great in length and sweeps grandly to the side in the back.


I may not remember who Justin Beiber is when you read this. You can use Google to find out. If Bing has won the search engine game, you’re probably not allowed on the Internet.

You’ve graduated to your crib, which means you’re about 10 feet further from us, though there’s a wall between, the primary purpose of which is to block your little nighttime sounds that don’t actually signify lucidity. (I hope you don’t remain such a sleeptalker. It would get you in a lot of trouble.) After a brief bout of congestion – I don’t know if you should thank me or slap me for the jobs of nasal aspiration I did – you’re regularly sleeping 7-9 hours a night. Without waking up in the middle. You don’t know what it means now, but THANK YOU. Having parents who have slept means that we’ll take fewer exhaustion-induced parenting shortcuts. I hope.

You may or may not have some control over your limbs. I play a “punch me/kick me” game where I challenge you to hit my hands with your limbs. While I have no idea if you can control where your fists or feet go, it sure seems like you’re trying. I’m using some of the same techniques I used teaching Oscar to roll over, but since I can’t give you treats, I just clap my hands excitedly (which sometimes startles the shit out of you, literally) and encourage you to do the same. With my help.

The most miraculous change since last month is your fantastic smile.


It comes easily, when you see me or Dad, when Uncle Josh makes crazyfaces at you, or when Pitter’s voice climbs two octaves. You seem to entertain yourself sometimes, even, grinning at your stuffed neuron that hangs from the arch in your bassinette, accidentally making yourself bounce in the bouncy chair, or looking at ceiling fans, which remain The Most Fascinating Objects in the House. My favorites are the ones that saunter across your lips when I wake you up and my smile greets you.

You seem to really enjoy leveraging your smile when you torture your Dad and me with your elimination habits. Three times – three! – you’ve pooped while we were changing your poopy diaper, and each time you smiled before you did it, like, You guys are gonna LOVE this! Watch! We, of course, encouraged your behavior by laughing like hyenas. Your first public explosive poop happened when Uncle Josh and I went to lunch. I thought I’d gotten mustard on my pants... but it was not mustard. You once went 3 days without pooping. The end of that run (pun delightfully intended) was one for the record books.

You’re also cooing with delight and trying – I assume – desperately to make words come out. I’ve tallied most vowel sounds, and you can make the hard g sound. I’m tempted to say that “goo” was your first word, referring to your poop. That, or “mmm geh,” which I won’t accept as your coming out, at least yet. You’re at your most delightfully vocal when you’re on the changing table. One night, after your bath, your grin – one that touched your whole body – entranced me. I didn’t want to put you to bed, because I knew I’d miss you too much until you woke up in the morning.

Gran arranged for you to be baptized, and you were very, very welcomed. You also exerted an amazing amount of control over your noises and bodily functions during the service.


People keep telling me to treasure these times – and while I can’t wait for you to talk, walk, and feed yourself (nevermind take care of your own toileting!), I do take time to enjoy the moments we share first thing in the morning when I feed you, when we’re alone and the world’s still quiet. I take mental snapshots of the times when you fall asleep on me. And, believe it or not, I’m trying to wire the sounds of your cries into my auditory cortex permanently. They’re strangely sweet and lovely when I think about how I won’t hear them again when you grow up.

We spent a few hours outside on the deck a few days ago, and I couldn’t get enough of you. I gazed at your face, the perfection of it. Your perfect nose, your perfect bowed lips, your perfect eyelashes, your perfect fuzz of blonde hair. And I see my own eyes looking back at me, but blue, so they’re also your dad’s eyes, and time stops.

I can’t wait until you can understand what it means when I repeat I love you, I love you, I love you while I stare at you in your crib.



Love,
Mom


SNAPSHOT:

Dislikes: Having stuff pulled over your head, being hungry, Dad’s loud sneezes
Likes: Hanging out on the changing table, being tightly swaddled, saying “good morning,” staring at dangling toys, your bouncy chair, my boobs, playing “bicycle” you’re your legs, pooping inconveniently, peeing on Gran when I warn him and yet he still doesn’t expect it
People You’ve Now Peed On: Pitter, Gran, Bethany, Megan
Things You Can Do: Hold your head up mostly steadily, lift your head to a 45-degree angle, track small objects, turn your head toward our voices, reply to us with “talk”