Status report: Month 1 (Maia)

Maia's first month has been a blur of feedings and diaper changes. And more feedings. The feedings are going fine; she seems to be healthy and happy, except in the evenings and also, when she's not feeding. Ahem. I am a little biased on this topic. We're leaving Maia and Chloë with their grandmothers for a few hours tomorrow to celebrate our anniversary and I don't know what I'm going to do with myself, not having a baby attached to me that long.

Maia came into the world smoothly, after an induction and a happily short labor with an extremely precipitous delivery--her father didn't have to catch her, but possibly only because the midwife decided not to leave the floor after I was six centimeters dilated. She was born mid-afternoon and met her sister, one grandpa, and two grandmothers not long after, and has been meeting more people all month. We woke her up more than we apparently had to her first couple of days, for feedings, to make sure she didn't get jaundice the way her sister did. I miss that lost sleep. Ah well.


Her sister has been and continues to be fascinated by her; she's been kissed and prodded and her hands and feet touched and examined more than any baby not in the hospital probably ought to, but it's all been in the name of love, or at least interest. She's just started smiling, and half the time it's at Chloë rather than at us.


We're all starting to settle into the routine, or at least the routine until I go back to work. We feed every hour and a half to two hours; she sleeps sometimes, often on Mama or Daddy's chest, sometimes through Chloë's "indoor voice," sometimes not. She gets cranky in the evenings, and prefers to be on the move. Eric and I expect to get plenty of exercise if this keeps up. She likes to be shushed (apparently it mimics the sound of my heartbeat in the womb) and swung back and forth, but isn't keen on her swing unless she's already mostly asleep. She does like baths, as long as she's nice and warm and not slipping down--sponge baths were bad, but the new baths in the tub are great.


She's starting to grow into her skin, filling out and looking less like Gollum and more like, well, a baby. I can see her sister in her, and sometimes have to remind myself that this is an entirely different baby. It's not so hard to remember when she screams; her scream is different. People say she looks like me; the technician at the hospital, who was the same one who helped out at Chloë's birth, said to Chloë when she first visited, "I don't think Mommy and Daddy make babies that look like Daddy." But Eric's mom and some other people say they see him in her. That's only fair. I don't see either of us in her (I didn't with Chloë either until relatively recently). I see a baby of ours, and that's all. That's enough.