Losing Track of the Days

I cannot believe our baby girlie is already three weeks old!? BTW, I took her to the peds office for another weigh-in today, and get this [drumroll, please]... In the last week since her 2nd peds appointment --it's been just 8 days-- she gained AN ENTIRE POUND!?! = that's an average of 2 ounces gained each day! TWO OUNCES PER DAY, PEOPLE!?!! And tah think, at some point last week, I was worried she wasn't getting enough to eat! Guess I was worried for nuthin', eh? She's growin' like crazy!

So yeah, she's three weeks old now... Over the last three weeks, especially after we brought our lil' baby home, I've had to seriously modify my expectations in terms of what I think I can (and should) get done in a single day. During the first week, of course, this was expected, and during the second week, still really healing from my c-section (plus that NASTY surprise allergic reaction to the steri-strips glue, what fun), well, there were physical limitations keeping my to-do list ambitions at bay. Over the previous weekend, feeling much better physically, I did become more active, and I did manage to get a number of things done... and then those things caught up to me, and I was exhausted the better part of this week.

I'm one of those personalities that really likes making lists (what an understatement this is), especially to-do lists, and I really like checking things off my lists (another understatement). Over the last three weeks, naturally, my to-do list has only gotten longer and longer, and the checking off of items from the to-do list, um, that's not happenin' so much these days. I've got to be okay with this, and I've been struggling with it over the last couple days. Today I finally came to the realize that my days and nights are now truly subject to a whole new set of standards --intellectually, I already knew this would happen, but I hadn't yet FELT IT until now, baby in arms. Tonight I realized the way in which I measure my days' worth needs to become more dependent upon how well I spent my time with my daughter, and not how well I may manage (or not) to whittle away at some ridiculous to-do list. Again, I knew this already, intellectually, but saying and thinking and then doing are different things.

So yesterday? Yesterday was absolutely wonderful, measuring the day by the 'time-well-spent-with-my-daughter' scale. We slept in together another couple hours after her 7am-ish feeding... I sang some songs to her from the Beatles' Sgt. Peppers album while cleaning up the kitchen... She had her first bath in the big bathtub with mommie... And we had an afternoon nap together on the couch while listening to some mellow Ray Charles tunes... The highlight of that day was definitely the bath though, for sure. Her lil' umbilical cord stumpy had finally fallen off on the 10th, so a real bath became do-able (no more sponge/washcloth baths). And what a lil' water baby she is, man! Nearing the end of bath time together, I gently poured water over her face four separate times, and other than some initially frantic (and adorable) blinking action, she was totally chill about it and she actually cooed the last 2 times I did it. Very promising behavior! At some point, I was holding her lil' head in my hands while supporting her neck and shoulder above the water surface, and I let her little body free float in the water... She closed her eyes, all slow-mo like, and practically purred! Tell me, how can she be so freakin' cute?!?

And today? *sigh* We had another wonderful day together... And again, I'm so dang proud of her ONE POUND gain over the last week!!! Have I mentioned yet that we've decided we're gunna keep her? ~ hee hee