Saturday, December 17, 2011

Daddy's girl

It's amazing how much more I can fall in love with Scott by simply watching (or hearing about) him care for Claire. After two months of him filling the role of stay-at-home dad, I have one word: amazing. Considering that he had never diapered, fed, dressed, bathed, or anything more than held a baby before becoming Claire's dad, he is doing a rockstar job!

Our day starts with me waking Claire up at 6:30am. I love watching her rub her eyes with her chubby little fists, peering up at me standing over her crib. On the way out of her room, we stop at the hallway mirror, so she can laugh at herself (she's quite funny in the morning) and lightly bump her forehead against her reflection in the mirror I nuzzle my nose in her fuzzy bed-head hair, entertained by her two-tooth smile and laughter in the morning.

I usually deposit her in our bed at 7 am to snuggle with dad....well, Scott would like to snuggle with her (he's constantly commenting how "I just wish she'd want to hug me!"), but she's much too busy to have time for snuggling and hugging. I play peek-a-boo a few times before I head out the door.

Scott is not one to just loiter at home with Claire all day (which I must say I'm impressed by because taking an active 9 month old out is can be an endeavor, as all of you who area already parents well know). Just this week they had lunch at Panera with a friend (apparently three college girls at the table beside them got very little studying done while Claire was there), visited the guys at FastTrack trucking, and frequented Target several times.

Here's one difference in Scott from the pre-Claire to now with-Claire days. Scott still loves the toy aisle at Target, don't get me wrong, and I'm almost certain he and Claire strolled down it yesterday, but he didn't come home with Legos for himself (my man loves his Legos!). No, he came home with two pink, fleecy outfits for Claire (cute yet practical!), a red Sock monkey doll (because "I've always wanted to get her a Sock monkey!"...sounding like he's been waiting years, not just 9 months), a round tub for her toys (one that's big enough that he can empty all the toys out, put Claire in, and push her around in it. I know that alternative use factored in to which toy bin was purchased), and a monkey hat with matching brown mittens. Technically the tag on the monkey hat did say "Infant Boy", which I gently pointed out to him, but he won me over when he said, "Well, you can take it back if you want, but I just love the hats with little ears!" I must admit, it is quite adorable, so I'll just make sure that she's wearing pink when she has it on.

Scott commented that as he walked around Target, he was thinking to himself that he was about the only guy in the store, it seemed, and probably the only one pushing around a little girl in the cart. And to hear him talk about how the cart could be better suited for babies ("the strap to buckle her in needs to be lower. It goes up into her armpits and then she slouches down, putting her feet up on the handle"), and how he has to bend over the cart while he pushes to make sure she doesn't slip out....I know, I know, I'm such a sappy mom, but I can't help but smiling when I picture it in my mind!

Perhaps the most entertaining Daddy moment of the day yesterday involved the new sippy cup. Lately Claire has been losing interest in the bottle. Food is just more appealing these days, but don't worry, she's obviously still getting enough, as her chubby thighs and cheeks will prove. We decided it might be time to try a sippy cup, so Scott also picked one of those up at Target. Watching him figure out how to use it was priceless. In his defense, it was tricky, being the "stage 1" cup which is similar to a bottle nipple in the fact that Claire still needs to suck to get liquid out (hard to explain...if you could see the cup, you'd understand). So he filled, turned it upside down, tried to drink, realized that if you pushed your nose on the center part by the nipple, the water came out better. Problem being that the distance between his mouth and nose is much greater than a baby's. Eventually Claire would hold it up to her mouth and suck, but we don't have much confidence that she actually got any water, since she loves to just chew on stuff these days. The cup went back already last night, so we'll have to try a different style.

Anywho, I suppose I've rambled long enough. Yes, I'm that mom who is absolutely enamored with my child, so don't complain that you haven't been warned! As I watch her crawl around (which she's quite fast at these days) and pull herself up next to things (mostly on her knees, but every so often up to her feet...yikes!), I can't believe that our little Claire is already nine months old. I can't wait to spend two uninterrupted weeks (thank God for Christmas break) with my little girl :)

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]

<< Home