mama

Dear Elle,

Yesterday you said "mama". It was so awesome! I asked you, "can you say mama?" and you just looked at me with those big beautiful eyes and said, "Mama" in this tiny little bubbly voice. Grandma and Grandpa heard it and they were so excited! We cheered and you said it again! Your little voice is so cute and you reminded me of a baby bird.

You are so beautiful.

Love,
Mommy

9 Months

Today we woke up to a few inches of snow covering the ground. You didn't seem to notice and as we drove over to our music class this morning you managed to pull off your socks and I think you ate them. You were singing and shaking your tambourine in your bare feet, shaking it like you had been rehearsing for this moment for a long time and you couldn't be bothered by having to actually put on socks. You always manage to get those socks off so I just let you have your way. Grandma tries to sneak them on you when you aren't paying attention and then you pull them off when she's not paying attention. You give Grandma a run for her money and yet she simply can't get enough of you. She has socks that she keeps at her house just in case you get yours all wet while you are visiting her and she gives you clean dry ones to wear home.

Over the weekend you turned 9 months old. You have officially been on the outside living in our house as long as you spent living on the inside, in mommy's belly. You had your very first Christmas and it was very special and you got some very lovely gifts from the family, like this little pink ballet slipper tree ornament with your birth info on it that you got from Aunt Joan and Uncle Bob. You got your first nativity set from Tia and Uncle Pete and you got a Baby's First Christmas Pooh ornament from Auntie Traci and Uncle Paul. You got so many things from Grandma and Grandpa, like a bunch of fun outdoor activity things to keep at Grandma's house, a sandbox and water table, a slide (oh boy!) and a mini picnic table because after all that playing you are going to need to sit down and rest have a fruit roll up and some animal crackers. Nana and Papa came down and stayed with us and gave you all sorts puzzles and games and a giant singing Moose. You were mostly interested in eating all the wrapping paper and playing with the dogs. You thought there were so hysterical. These huge balls of fur that move and roll around and sniff me?! It's brilliant!

Today we put our house on the market and it is a very adventurous time in our lives. We don't know where we are going yet. We have lived in this house for 5 years, your dad and I and we are going to move closer to nyc so your dad can be closer to his work. I doubt you will even remember this house but it's pretty great. We have had a lot of great memories in this house, mostly with you. We have spent a ton of time out on the Connecticut river which is very close to us, and lots of great summer nights we have spent on the back deck after a day of sky skiing and foilboarding. We will miss it. We remodeled most of this house ourselves, the kitchen and the bathrooms, finished the basement, planted lots and lots of bushes and plants. I had a pretty awesome garden every summer we have been here, with tons of organic vegetables and herbs. Auntie Jules and Uncle Adam have helped me plant it every Memorial Day weekend, it's tradition. I hope there is a sunny spot for a garden at the new house!

You can cruise around on the furniture now and you can climb up one step onto the fireplace hearth. I call your name and you turn back and I say, "no, no" and you just smile and go right on doing what you are doing. You are very independent. I asked for a kiss yesterday and I can't be sure but I think you shook your head "no" at me. You may have even rolled your eyes. On Thursday we went to a playdate at the Library with your friend Charley and there was a little playhouse set up in the Children's Room. Everything was kid sized, the little door, the little windows, the tiny fireplace. It was kind of dark inside because the fireplace was just painted on the wall and apparently there were no kid electricians around that day. There were a few toddlers gathered around on the outside of it, peeking in and hiding behind their mother's legs but not you, you just crawled right up to the door and without a second thought you pushed right through without even looking back to see if anyone was following you. You are the bravest little girl I know and I hope you never lose that.

Love,
Mommy

Month 6

Dear Helena,

Happy half birthday! Today you turn 6 months old! Right now you are upstairs napping because you caught your first cold and you have been wanting to sleep a lot and lounge around on the couch and not do much of anything, kind of like a little teenager. We went to Mother Goose story hour at the library last week and you thought it was pretty fun. There were lots of babies there and they were crawling around and scooting on their butts and you just kept looking at all of them wondering how you could get around like that, too. We sang songs and clapped and practiced our nursery rhymes and one little chubby baby named Claire crawled on over to you and licked your dolly and I am blaming her for the cold you have now.

Now you can sit up pretty well on your own and you can play with all sorts of toys with buttons that play music and light up. You press the buttons because you know what they can do! And you can sit up in the tub and play with some tub toys that squirt water and you think they are pretty cool. Water! Your new best friend! Your dad took you on your first hike last weekend and you stopped at a stream and you watched the water flow over all the rocks and bubble right by you and you were amazed that you didn't know about this sooner. Did you see that, Dad? It's so cool! You are putting every single thing you can get your hands on in your mouth but you still haven't gotten any teeth.

You love to play peek-a-boo. You laugh and laugh these big belly laughs and it cracks your Dad and me right up. I run around the corner from where you are so you can't see me and you stay very still and your eyes get big and you raise one eyebrow and you watch the spot where I left and it makes you scream when I pop up out of a different spot. You laugh so hard. I bet you are peeing in your pants you laugh so hard. And I am so happy to know that you know just what will happen when Mommy goes around the corner… you know that I will always come back.

Last week your dad got a big promotion at work which means he will be traveling to NYC quite often and we are thinking about moving to Brookfield or Newtown. I was reading the email that they sent out announcing your daddy as the new CTO on my Iphone and you just reached up and with your dainty little pointer finger you touched the tiny trash icon which deleted the email. That is just like you, to so delicately remind us that anything we thought was remotely important is just a tiny little star that burned out 50 million years ago in the solar system of Elle.

Grandma is so very excited that we are moving closer to her, since she counts her days in "sleeps until Elle". Last Monday she called to see if she could come see you on Wednesday, because that's only "2 more sleeps until Elle". We went to visit her today and she sang you lots of fun songs on the guitar and piano and she let you strum the strings and bang on the keys. You got to go in her fancy room, you lucky duck. When Auntie Traci and I were little we weren't even allowed to put one toe on the carpet in the piano room, but you? She'd let you in there with fists full of lipsticks and socks full of chocolate popsicles.

Love,
Mommy

Month 5

Dear Helena,

Next week you are turning 5 months old. You have mastered eating baby veggies and you just love sweet potatoes and squash. We tried out carrots yesterday which i think you aren't really crazy about. I mean, who is? They are carrots and they kind of just stick around in your mouth, long after you wish they weren't there anymore.
You can pass toys back and forth with your hands and you are getting really skilled at rolling all around. You have a little dolly that you play with and try to eat and it's so cute because it looks like you are trying to give her a hug.

Last week we got hit with a bad hurricane named Irene and we lost power for 5 days. We packed up Mommy's car and went to live with Grandma for a few days so we could take baths and wash bottles and watch tv and play on the computer. Daddy came too, after he got done working. You and I slept in mommy's room that she lived in as a little girl and I think you really liked it at Grandma's house. She plays the piano for you and reads you lots and lots of books. Auntie Traci and Uncle Paul were there too, and we had big family dinners every night and you sat right up at the table with everyone and sucked on your toes and told us stories and made our hearts burst with happiness that you have come to join our family.

Everyday I can see your personality starting to emerge and you are beginning to show us who you are. You have an activity center that has a little lion puppet on it and i was using it to talk to you in a silly lion voice and then i said something to you in my regular voice and you looked at me with this face like, "mom, you are embarrassing me in front of the lion!" I am sure that is only the first of a trillion times i will embarrass you, but I will really try to not do or say dorky things in front of your friends. I promise.

The biggest news I have to tell you is that for the last few nights you have slept all the way through the night, from 7 to 7. At first your Daddy and I were shocked that you just decided you were too grown up to get up for a midnight snack, but the next night we were so proud of you. "She did it!" we would say. We have waited a long time to be able to sleep through the night cause we were kind of tired from all the night activities, but as soon as you stopped waking up, we missed you.

Love,
Mommy

Vacation

Dear Helena,
Today you are almost 14 weeks old. Today is also Mommy's birthday and we are having a great day together, just you and me. We have been playing and you have been telling me stories in your baby talk which I think are about shoe shopping but I can't be sure. For the last week we were on vacation in Martha's Vineyard, you, dad and me. It was a trip of firsts for you, first vacation, first sleepover away from home, first time to the ocean. Dad hung your tiny legs just over the water and dipped in your big toe and you pulled your legs right up into your chest, and looked at dad with your "are you crazy?" face. maybe it was a little too cold for you. So, instead of swimming you both took a long nap in our beach tent.

Grandpa and Grandma came to join us for a few days and they couldn't stop talking about you. Look, she's blowing spit bubbles! Look, she blinked her eyes at me! Look and how she holds onto my finger and tries to eat it! To them, you are about the coolest thing since VCRs. (Grandma still uses VCRs, she is not really interested in DVDs or the internet if you can believe that. Maybe I can take you to a museum when you are older and we can look at all the VCRs and answering machines and you will be able to tell your friends all about them because you see them all the time at Grandma's house.)

Grandpa taught you a little trick he was calling "the flying cork". Your binky is on a pink ribbon so we can clip it to your clothes and he was hanging the binky right in front of your mouth and you would open your mouth really wide, as wide as i have ever seen anyone open their mouth, and he would try to get the binky into your mouth, like he was fishing for a baby with binky bait. You played this game with him for a while, and you were making him laugh so much that he almost fell out of his chair. And when he would laugh, you would laugh and we all would laugh, because your laugh is infectious.

Over the last few weeks you have grown so much, you are wearing 6 month old clothes like a big girl and have outgrown two bathing suits this summer! Funny that you wear bathing suits, considering that you don't swim, but we like to put you in them so you don't feel left out. You have found your hands and like to stare at them while you wiggle your fingers and then shove your entire fist into your mouth. You have started laughing, long hearty laughs when something strikes you as funny and when we try to do the thing that made you laugh again, you just stare as us, because you are over it, you've moved on.
Love,
Mommy