dear clara (three months)

You've been our roommate now for 3 months, and I don't think we shall be evicting you anytime soon. True, you're still pretty demanding, with the wanting-the-boob every two hours during the day, and the unbearable cuteness that makes it pretty much impossible to take my eyes off of you and get anything productive done. Luckily, you're starting to give back a bit, so we'll accept your rent in the form of wonderful gummy smiles, long babbly conversations about nothing in particular, and increased hours of sleep. I think we've got a pretty good balance going here.

We've been dealing with a bit of gender confusion over the last month or so. Most newbornish babies look like, well, babies. Take Johnny, put him in a fluffy pink gown, and you've got the cutest baby girl ever seen. In our case, when we put you, our adorable baby girl, in your car seat with fuzzy blue kitty/otter accessories, it's only a matter of time before the nice but misguided comments from strangers roll in.


"Oh my! Your little boy is adorable! But why is he wearing pink pants?" Sigh.

This month we started your early indoctrination into all things Disney. Say what you might about the Mouse brainwashing machine, Disneyland is a pretty cool place. We went with my good friends Kim and Jedd, who were visiting with their family from Washington. Even though you weren't tall enough to go on any of the good rides, you weren't alone. Kim was in the same situation, as she's expecting a baby girlfriend for you in March. So the two of you got some quality bonding time. Look how much fun you were having together!


If you and Kim got to spend more time together, I'm sure the screaming on both ends would stop. She's definitely one of the good ones.

But I think the best thing about the past month has been the smiles. Oh my God, the smiles. This is one of those things that I've read about, seen on TV and in the movies, heard testimonials about from other parents, and have even witnessed with my own two childless eyes, but could never understand until now. When you're ogling the world with those big baby blues, and all of a sudden catch a glimpse of me or your daddy, the resulting smile you bless us with, like "Hey! It's you! I know you! I like you!!", makes me swoon. Every. Single. Time. I don't have a photo of your smile to share with your friends, because I'm either too distracted to grab the camera, or once I do, you're too puzzled by the mysterious black box with the flashy-in-the-face thing to continue smiling. So in most photos we have of you, you look incredibly cute, but a little startled.


Your daddy and I met eight years ago on December 18. And last year at this time, as we were preparing for the holidays and our annual pilgrimage to Tahoe, we had no clue what the next year would bring us. If someone had suggested that we would have a three-month-old daughter the following Christmas, we would have checked their eggnog for barbituates (and then asked if we could have some too.) But as this Christmas is rapidly approaching, and we've been making our lists and checking them twice, I don't think anything your daddy or I give or receive this year will come close to the gift that you are in our lives.


You are the sweetest surprise, and oh how we love you, sweet droolybird.

love, Mama