Dear Baby Girl,
A year ago, right around this time I was getting ready to go out and take some photos out at Echo Lake or maybe Watchung Reservation as I had normally done on weekends.  I was delayed because I had to use the potty, a word I haven’t used in many years, when I heard your mommy call out for me.  You were on your way to meet us in person.  You were supposed to show up on Monday, but I guess you just couldn’t wait another day.  We made the phone call to the Dr., to grandmas and grandpas and got ready to leave.   When we returned home, we would be a family.

On that day, you changed my life in ways I could never imagine.  I love watching you grow, you falling asleep in my arms, the changes that occur at an alarming rate.   It is truly amazing, how in just one year, you have gone from that tiny little baby I saw naked, to this little girl, that fights back when we need to change you, crawls around screaming,  standing, almost walking, eating, well, tasting, everything you can fit in your tiny mouth.

I look forward to seeing every new joy you bring us in the next year of your life.

Happy First Birthday Baby Girl!

Love,
Daddy

This past Sunday night marked another milestone in our little one’s life.  She polished off the last of the formula that got her to where she is today nutrition wise, well after the first couple of months of bm.
It is both a happy and sad time – our little girl is growing by the second.  Sure she has had real food but that is mainly a learning experience for her with formula being the main source.  We’ve been mixing in and fully substituting a whole bottle of regular milk and sneaking in her vitamins for about a month now.  Luckily (knocking on wood) she took to it like a champ and we don’t have to sneak the vitamins in either.

She is also eating and throwing more and more diverse foods, and now we are starting to ween her off the bottle too.  Something that doesn’t seem to be going as smoothly as the real milk transition.  I don’t think I’ll be writing “the last bottle” too soon.  Diapers getting more “interesting” too

Just this time last year, I was assembling a crib and making what seemed to be daily visits to the doctors that would deliver our little bundle of joy.  It really does go by quickly.  She will be one year young soon, but will always be my baby girl.

Last night, my 9.5 month old daughter was sitting with me and she figured out that if she puts her hands together, they make an interesting noise, what we call clapping.  I asked my wife when she started doing this and she said just now.  Such a simple act brought a tear to our eyes as yet another milestone in her development came out.  I know we take these sorts of things for granted, but the coordination involved shows her motor skills are developing still further.  I truly enjoy these simple little steps in her life.

It also makes me proud as one of her primary teachers that all the things we and other teachers in her life do, work.  Things like the silly song I fondly remember my grandmother singing to my younger sister, and that both my mother and mother-in-law sing to her, the song, albeit rude and short goes like this:

“Clap hands, clap hands, till daddy comes home, daddy has money and mommy has none”.

After doing a little research on the rhyme, I found that it most likely has roots in a Sicilian rhyme, Manu Manuzzi, which makes even more sense as that was my grandmother’s heritage.  Later on in her life, I think I will use it as a means to teach her about women in history and feminism.

I guess Pat-a-cake is up next…