Milestones

These pleasant photos belie a hard truth.

Claire is teething.

Gone are the nights in which we all enjoyed uninterrupted sleep. Claire has gotten us up nearly every night in the past two weeks (last night brought a welcome respite), and she's hard to get back down to sleep. Sleeping on her back, apparently, bothers her, as it does many teething babies. She either keeps us up for two hours at a time or gets us up repeatedly through the night.


Two nights ago, to keep her down, one of us held her as she slept from about midnight to 6 a.m. Sleeping with a baby girl on your shoulder or next to your chest can be a wonderful feeling for a father, but that sleeping baby also fidgets and starts from time to time, making sleeping for longer than 45 minutes at a time impossible.

Some of our new parent friends are now chuckling and saying to themselves, "I told you so."

We're not completely sure teething is the culprit here. Parenting books/experts tell us it could be separation anxiety. Could be simply a new phase. But on several occasions, we've we walked up to the side of her crib in the middle of the night to find her fidgeting and whining with her eyes shut. That suggests gum pain to me.




So, enjoy the lovely photos of developmental milestones -- the toes and socks in the mouth, the fascination with chimes, the simultaneous holding of two different blocks while sitting up. We're trying to focus on the good times, too. Even through bloodshot eyes.