Hannah is 5 months old today.
I still don't see how it is possible for 5 months to have gone by already. Jeez.
I think the natural thing to do as parents is to compare your children's characteristics, especially when they are babies since the differences are all innate. It's not a matter of saying one is better than the other. They're just different.
Comparisons happen even before the baby is born. People ask how the pregnancy is compared to the last. For us, the real difference happened at birth. When the doctor placed Hannah on my chest right after she breathed her first breath, John and I looked down at her lovingly and said to ourselves, "Who are you?!"
She looked so different than LE. She still does. It's amazing how much we think LE's perfect and so, so beautiful. But yet, we think Hannah's perfect and impossibly cute.
Look at our little baby. Those cheeks and neck that make her give the widest smile when squished. Those lashes... the one thing she shares in common with her sister.
Hannah is loud and loves things that are loud. She wakes up happy but loud... yelling or screeching with excitement while slobbering on her hands or grasping for her toes. The sound of the vacuum cleaner, hair dryer, coffee grinder, or a running bathtub makes her flap her arms and legs with excitement. LE, on the other hand, is just getting over her fear of those noises and still clasps her ears in expectation of noises that aren't even that loud (like the Kitchenaid mixer on medium).
Hannah concentrates very intently on bringing things in with her hands. She played contently in the jumperoo for 45 minutes the other day. Another day, she played on her play mat for the 40 minutes that LE and I worked on a craft for her daddy.
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She's a happy baby who doesn't have to be held nonstop. My back thanks her. On the other hand, John and I are a little sad that she doesn't like to melt her whole body into us and snuggle a while. Sometimes I just squeeze her anyway even though she tries with her whole body to push up off of my chest in an effort to get out of the snuggle hold. I'm thankful that she doesn't need me to hold her constantly, though, and that when it's nap time, I'm able to put her down to do other things.
Despite not wanting to cuddle, she won't take a bottle (or pacifier, but I don't care about that). Sigh. I'm not giving up hope! Two weeks ago, we had Hannah's 4 month check-up and got the go-ahead with rice cereal. We're hoping that the cereal will be the gateway to the bottle.
Here she is right before her first bite (out of focus):
Success! She didn't hate it. She actually does quite well with it now, opening her mouth for bites.
Sweet baby, Hannah. I can't smell her or squish her enough. Her coos are endearing, her arm flapping funny, and her giggles contagious.
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(On a side note, Hannah is long and lean for her age. She's at around the 90th percentile for height (half inch taller than LE at this age), 50th for weight for age (LE was 40th), and 15th percentile for height to weight (LE was 11th). She's supposedly extra strong for her age and healthy all around.)
Those pictures are just precious. I agree with you about comparing your kids - it is just natural. I think it happens even more so when they are the same gender. My two girls are very much opposite of one another but still get along quite well as they are getting older (8 and 3 1/2).
ReplyDeleteThat is so funny Nicole, we said the EXACT same thing to ourselves when Sally was born. I don't know why, but I just imagined her looking a lot like Sophie or a lot like me. But it was neither! I couldn't see either myself or Ryan in her. We were like, are you sure this is OUR baby?!?
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