. . . a tumble and a goodbye

She's a walker, but even so the baby-sweetheart is not quite the most balanced toddler on the beam. She manages her way around on two feet nearly all the time these days, and is much faster on her tiny legs than she used to be. She is, however, a bit wobbly, and is often found hands down, bottom up as she struggles to stay upright. Many more times than not, this wobbliness leads directly to a (mostly) graceful crash and the subsequent and variable punctuation of laughter, stunned silence or tears.

Her most recent tumble of note began with the 30.5 inches of baby girl chasing the 70 inches of daddy around the bedroom. Alas, baby-sweetest is not so adept at changing direction quickly, and she lost her footing during an atempt to turn on the proverbial dime. Her tiny feet got tangled and she fell, ka-boom-splat, face (forehead) first into the (metal) bedframe.

Although babymama moved with lightening speed, she was not able to swoop in before the collison, and only arrived in time to gather baby-goose-egg in her arms just as those first, horrible screams started. Thankfully, this injury, (unlike her recent lip puncture) did not draw blood, but it did leave a 2 inch wide purple and red line across her little head, and a sizeable knot accompanying it.

As you may well imagine, babymama is not accustomed to the sounds of her baby-adorable crying in fear and pain, and mama's immediate response to all of the baby's wounds is to insist, with tears in her eyes, that babydaddy drive the family to the doctor immediately, now, this second.

Babydaddy, on the other hand, is definitely in the 'let's take a moment to see how this looks and then decide if she needs an x ray' camp. You may be able to picture how this little scene unfolds again and again - much to the entertainment of the baby, who after a short cry and some hugs is happily chewing on her shoe and watching her parents debate whose philosophy of emergency medicine is the best.

Suffice it all to say that in the end, babydaddy called the nurse, who gave firm instrutions to watch the baby, wake the baby, and wait to see how the lump progressed. Which is what we did, to find the following truths:

1. Babies heads really are tougher than we think. This appeared to be a serious knot - and even so, a mere 24 hours later, the red mark from the edge of the frame was nearly invisible and the bump was beginning to go down.

2. There is no procrastination like the procrastination of two sleep deprived parents who know that they must go in and wake up the very baby who they just spent two hours preparing for bedtime. Each time we had to do it, we sat on the edge of the sofa contemplating just what the nurse meant by "check to see that she can still perform age appropriate actions like walking, talking, etc."
Does she really mean walking, or just moving her legs? Does a sigh count as talking or do we need to sing "itsy bity"? Um, what does she mean by "etc"?
And what if she won't go back to bed?'***

3. Our baby is fine - walking and tumbling normally, eating normally and playing normally. She's even sort-of sleeping normally, which is amazing in itself as we are in the middle of the 'transition' to big-girl-crib in big-girl-room. We, too, are fine, though watching these types of injuries is enough to shred and nearly stop our hearts.

. . .

It's been a heart-shredding kind of week here at the house, and while babymama usually does not high-jack the baby blog with other happenings, it feels somehow wrong to leave a space empty of the mention of one of our other babies, our little cat Darlin'.

Dar', as baby-sweetheart so lovingly dubbed her, was with us nearly eight years, and was, until the baby girl arrived, strictly her father's cat. Averie's arrival, however, saw a softer side of Darlin' who loved the baby as much as the baby loved her. She was a good cat who never bit, scratched or even hissed at the tiny girl who daily pulled her tail, pinched her toes and often fell directly on her furry tummy. She left us suddenly a week ago tonight, not sick or ailing, not really old, just gone. We all loved her much, and miss her terribly. Here is a photo of our Darlin' One with the baby who was her constant companion.



*** The baby girl does not go back to bed. Not really. Once awakened in the night and made to do things like walking, moving, talking and other age appropriate actions, baby-princess fakes sleeping in her crib for about two and a half hours. After that, she will only sleep if allowed to first cuddle on mama's chest and then sprawl out horizontally in mama and daddy's bed - no covers or socks allowed.