Dear Lawton,
Tomorrow you turn nine months old which means that my body could theoretically be capable of birthing another baby eight weeks from now. Thankfully, that was not the recovery plan we were on. And we (your dad especially) are doing everything in our power to insure that you remain our last baby. Knowing that you are our last, I’ve been trying to savor every moment with you. To live in the present and not be obsessed with whether you can hear me perfectly or make the right number of vowel sounds. With your brothers I was so eager to get to the next milestone – anxious to know that all was well with their development, but with you – I only wish I could slow things down. And I’m not saying that because I know you are about to start crawling with purpose and change our lives forever. It’s just that I can’t rock your brothers to sleep anymore, or make them laugh by simply blowing on their faces. And so I want to enjoy these things with you as long as I can.
As you know, we haven’t totally settled on what to call you. Lawton. Lawton James. LJ. Lawton Jimmy. Plain ol’ Jimmy. It must be confusing to be called by so many different names, but you are responding to all of them. I keep wanting to call you Law, but it seems too grown up for you right now. I sometimes dream about hearing it over a PA system one day: “Law Ballbach for two points, two points Law.” It sounds so cool to me. I hope you end up liking your name(s) when you get old enough to have an opinion about it. Be glad that you weren’t born during the brief phase twelve years ago when I thought Forest might be an interesting name for a son. I doubt your Dad would have ever agreed to it during the name ideation phase (which in my world is a very long process), but I think I probably could have gotten anything I wanted in the 8-12 hours following childbirth – even Forest. That would have been scary had that happened though. Your nickname could have been Woody instead of Jimmy.
Your mobility is increasing with each day. We try to keep you contained to the living room rug, but you are finding your way to the edges of it with a combination of scooting and rolling. You have also decided that the edges of the rug are your MOST favorite thing to put in your mouth. I wish you could understand how dirty that really is. The rug mat has never been cleaned and it’s been lying in the same position since we moved in. Frankly I think it might be more sanitary to lick the bottom of my purse. You should know that as our third child, our hygiene standards are much lower than they once were. We do reuse unfinished bottles of formula and you are bathed sporadically at best, but we do feel strongly about keeping the rug out of your mouth.
You’ve been clearer recently that though you like virtually everything we put in front of you, that you would prefer that we stop feeding your yummy Spinach and Potatoes. I can’t say that I blame you; but when your Dad was at the grocery store two months ago he must have convinced himself that there would be no more jars of green vegetables until October or he was planning for lockdown. So needless to say there is still a lot of yummy Spinach and Potatoes to get through, and our family is all about finishing things off. This will become inconvenient to you one day in the shower when you are left with the shavings of a bar of soap. Ditto that for all the hand me down shoes with worn soles that we will be asking you to wear.
You have become quite a fan of Cheerios and other finger foods. It’s amazing to see how proficient you are with only those two lower teeth and how much you enjoy the quest of getting the food into your mouth. I know we have been a little slow on introducing the “messy” finger foods, but we’re hoping that your dexterity improves a little bit before we commit to things like bananas and avocadoes. This will mean that I will definitely have to start mopping and bathing your more often.
We are all in agreement that baby socks are for the birds. The only purpose they serve is to be lost or chewed. Even though you still love to chew on things, you are making it known that you’re even more interested in playing with real toys. You love to play with your stacking cups or interactive toys that have lots of buttons to push. You also love when we build tall towers of blocks for you to knock down, which I find cathartic too. Sometimes you get frustrated with your toys because you can’t make them work the way you want them to. Kind of like I get frustrated when I can’t get Colin to cooperate with me … although you get over it way faster than I can. I like that about you.
You’ve had a runny nose for over three weeks now. You’ve been such a champ about it – I don’t know that I would have a similarly good attitude about being utterly dependent on another person for tissue. I feel terrible when I’ve been multitasking and fail to notice when you start looking like a walrus with snot hanging all the way down to your lower lip. I would completely understand if you decided to make more of a stink about that. I can tell that it is bugging you a little because you now willingly allow me to use the nose plunger. I suppose you would rather surrender to the unnatural method of nasal irrigation than have mucous mixed in with your yogurt.
Clapping is your new favorite thing to do. You always seem genuinely surprised and delighted when your hands successfully find each other. Your brothers are especially excited about this new development because now they can get you to do a trick on command. Since we don’t and probably will never have a dog, I’m afraid that this might be a recurring theme in your life. However, because you think that your brothers are the best thing since breastfeeding, you appear to not mind the “wrestling” and dirty four year old fingers in your mouth as much as I do just watching it. Thanks goodness you are a sturdy boy with above average balance. Any other baby in our house might spent a lot more time toppled over screaming for that big boy to please stop assuming that just because you can clap, you are not yet able to catch blocks.
You have a lot of amazing skills as a baby, but one of them isn’t sleeping on the run. You really seem to need to have your bed to find sleep. I suspect that a big part of that is because you don’t want to miss anything when you are out and about. Your Dad says that running in the Baby Jogger is just about your favorite thing to do. I haven’t done that with you yet because I’ve been on a running hiatus for about a year now waiting to “get my body back” so that less of me is jiggling when I finally decide to strap on the running shoes. Since we stopped breastfeeding, there is a very important part of my body that has started to dramatically decrease in size which gives me hope that I will be able to run again without a lot of extra bouncing. I’m quite happy about that even though I do miss our special cuddle time. It’s not quite the same with the bottle, but man do I love how you lock in on me with your big blue eyes when I’m feeding you. Your eyes are such an amazing blue. People always mention that about you. I hope they stay that way because believe me, the ladies will find those irresistible one day.
You are babbling so much more now. I think you’ve figured out that to be heard, you need to pump up the volume. You don’t seem close to any discernable words yet. Like any mother, I’m hoping that you decide to make “Mamma” your first word but I do think that probability is higher that “Daddy” will be it. Not only is it easier to say, but just like your brothers – I think you’ve already figured out that your Daddy is extra special and that he too will be your hero.
With love,
Mamma
Tomorrow you turn nine months old which means that my body could theoretically be capable of birthing another baby eight weeks from now. Thankfully, that was not the recovery plan we were on. And we (your dad especially) are doing everything in our power to insure that you remain our last baby. Knowing that you are our last, I’ve been trying to savor every moment with you. To live in the present and not be obsessed with whether you can hear me perfectly or make the right number of vowel sounds. With your brothers I was so eager to get to the next milestone – anxious to know that all was well with their development, but with you – I only wish I could slow things down. And I’m not saying that because I know you are about to start crawling with purpose and change our lives forever. It’s just that I can’t rock your brothers to sleep anymore, or make them laugh by simply blowing on their faces. And so I want to enjoy these things with you as long as I can.
As you know, we haven’t totally settled on what to call you. Lawton. Lawton James. LJ. Lawton Jimmy. Plain ol’ Jimmy. It must be confusing to be called by so many different names, but you are responding to all of them. I keep wanting to call you Law, but it seems too grown up for you right now. I sometimes dream about hearing it over a PA system one day: “Law Ballbach for two points, two points Law.” It sounds so cool to me. I hope you end up liking your name(s) when you get old enough to have an opinion about it. Be glad that you weren’t born during the brief phase twelve years ago when I thought Forest might be an interesting name for a son. I doubt your Dad would have ever agreed to it during the name ideation phase (which in my world is a very long process), but I think I probably could have gotten anything I wanted in the 8-12 hours following childbirth – even Forest. That would have been scary had that happened though. Your nickname could have been Woody instead of Jimmy.
Your mobility is increasing with each day. We try to keep you contained to the living room rug, but you are finding your way to the edges of it with a combination of scooting and rolling. You have also decided that the edges of the rug are your MOST favorite thing to put in your mouth. I wish you could understand how dirty that really is. The rug mat has never been cleaned and it’s been lying in the same position since we moved in. Frankly I think it might be more sanitary to lick the bottom of my purse. You should know that as our third child, our hygiene standards are much lower than they once were. We do reuse unfinished bottles of formula and you are bathed sporadically at best, but we do feel strongly about keeping the rug out of your mouth.
You’ve been clearer recently that though you like virtually everything we put in front of you, that you would prefer that we stop feeding your yummy Spinach and Potatoes. I can’t say that I blame you; but when your Dad was at the grocery store two months ago he must have convinced himself that there would be no more jars of green vegetables until October or he was planning for lockdown. So needless to say there is still a lot of yummy Spinach and Potatoes to get through, and our family is all about finishing things off. This will become inconvenient to you one day in the shower when you are left with the shavings of a bar of soap. Ditto that for all the hand me down shoes with worn soles that we will be asking you to wear.
You have become quite a fan of Cheerios and other finger foods. It’s amazing to see how proficient you are with only those two lower teeth and how much you enjoy the quest of getting the food into your mouth. I know we have been a little slow on introducing the “messy” finger foods, but we’re hoping that your dexterity improves a little bit before we commit to things like bananas and avocadoes. This will mean that I will definitely have to start mopping and bathing your more often.
We are all in agreement that baby socks are for the birds. The only purpose they serve is to be lost or chewed. Even though you still love to chew on things, you are making it known that you’re even more interested in playing with real toys. You love to play with your stacking cups or interactive toys that have lots of buttons to push. You also love when we build tall towers of blocks for you to knock down, which I find cathartic too. Sometimes you get frustrated with your toys because you can’t make them work the way you want them to. Kind of like I get frustrated when I can’t get Colin to cooperate with me … although you get over it way faster than I can. I like that about you.
You’ve had a runny nose for over three weeks now. You’ve been such a champ about it – I don’t know that I would have a similarly good attitude about being utterly dependent on another person for tissue. I feel terrible when I’ve been multitasking and fail to notice when you start looking like a walrus with snot hanging all the way down to your lower lip. I would completely understand if you decided to make more of a stink about that. I can tell that it is bugging you a little because you now willingly allow me to use the nose plunger. I suppose you would rather surrender to the unnatural method of nasal irrigation than have mucous mixed in with your yogurt.
Clapping is your new favorite thing to do. You always seem genuinely surprised and delighted when your hands successfully find each other. Your brothers are especially excited about this new development because now they can get you to do a trick on command. Since we don’t and probably will never have a dog, I’m afraid that this might be a recurring theme in your life. However, because you think that your brothers are the best thing since breastfeeding, you appear to not mind the “wrestling” and dirty four year old fingers in your mouth as much as I do just watching it. Thanks goodness you are a sturdy boy with above average balance. Any other baby in our house might spent a lot more time toppled over screaming for that big boy to please stop assuming that just because you can clap, you are not yet able to catch blocks.
You have a lot of amazing skills as a baby, but one of them isn’t sleeping on the run. You really seem to need to have your bed to find sleep. I suspect that a big part of that is because you don’t want to miss anything when you are out and about. Your Dad says that running in the Baby Jogger is just about your favorite thing to do. I haven’t done that with you yet because I’ve been on a running hiatus for about a year now waiting to “get my body back” so that less of me is jiggling when I finally decide to strap on the running shoes. Since we stopped breastfeeding, there is a very important part of my body that has started to dramatically decrease in size which gives me hope that I will be able to run again without a lot of extra bouncing. I’m quite happy about that even though I do miss our special cuddle time. It’s not quite the same with the bottle, but man do I love how you lock in on me with your big blue eyes when I’m feeding you. Your eyes are such an amazing blue. People always mention that about you. I hope they stay that way because believe me, the ladies will find those irresistible one day.
You are babbling so much more now. I think you’ve figured out that to be heard, you need to pump up the volume. You don’t seem close to any discernable words yet. Like any mother, I’m hoping that you decide to make “Mamma” your first word but I do think that probability is higher that “Daddy” will be it. Not only is it easier to say, but just like your brothers – I think you’ve already figured out that your Daddy is extra special and that he too will be your hero.
With love,
Mamma
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