Eight Months Old

Yesterday my little guy turned eight months old. There's a quote about how 'the days are long but the weeks are short' and that couldn't be more true. It's so strange to think that eight months ago today I was sitting on the ward, feeling rather shellshocked and sore, post-surgery and blood transfusion, swollen, exhausted, achy like you wouldn't believe, and suddenly responsible for this new little person who I barely had the energy to lift, let alone stand and change his nappy!

He's just the most incredible little person. He's growing and changing all the time and it just fascinates me.

I love that he can sit and study my feet, reach out and touch them, hold my toe, try to put it in his mouth, blow raspberries at me when I wrestle it away from him (because, yuk! suck your own toes, kiddo!) and then sit and study it again. Or get distracted by the table leg. Or a mark on the carpet. Or the trees blowing outside the window.

Everything about the world is so intensely interesting for him. And it's making me look at the world differently too.

Suddenly I'm seeing everything through his eyes. Imagine being so small that you're just one tiny little person in a sea of giants. You spent your life in people's arms, or lying on the floor (at least until you get the hang of sitting up), or perhaps somewhere around waist height in a pram. And a lot of what you're seeing is brand new. Even if it's something you've seen one hundred times already, your brain is working really hard making connections all over the place, so as it develops your view of the world will change and develop too.

It's pretty mindblowing. And I know it happens with all babies, but getting to watch my very own son go through it makes me realise just how incredible he is.

I went to a baby and toddler group with him yesterday (loads of new toys to play with and of course he spent the first ten minutes playing with my shoes) and after a while he asked to be walked around. Obviously, he doesn't ask. It's not like comes up to me and says 'Mother, kindly hold my hands to help me walk around the room' but he's got his little ways of letting me know what he wants. Sometimes it feels like a kind of telepathy. I'm so used to doing it that I didn't think twice, but a couple of the mums commented on how little he is to be doing that and told me he'd be walking soon.

I don't have anything to compare these milestones to though, so to me it's just normal. I'll carry on celebrating the stuff he does do, and worrying about the stuff he doesn't, and reassuring myself that all babies follow their own schedules.

At eight months Laurie sits confidently and only occasionally topples over backwards. He can go from seated to on all fours/his belly. He can move around on his belly, rarely going forwards but mostly in circles and sometimes backwards. He can roll over and sit himself up from lying on his back (sometimes). He'll walk miles holding onto your hands (especially if there's a vacuum cleaner at the other end of the route).

He waves (all the time). He sings (loudly). He can pick things up between his fingers and thumb. He feeds himself. He knows how to use a spoon (though those spoons are tricky things to catch in your mouth). He says 'heh-woh' like a little parrot when it suits him and follows Tara shouting 'wu-wu! wu-wu!'

And as of today, the contents of his wardrobe are looking rather more like the clothes a little boy would be wearing, rather than a baby. I have to confess, I shed a little tear finally packing up some of his first outfits that he wore in the hospital.

The thought of parenting a little boy seems so much more daunting than parenting a baby. But at the same time, it's kind of exciting. I've loved getting to know this little guy over the last eight months. I can't wait to meet the little boy he's going to become.