Happy 3 Month Birthday

I hold this little girl, I kid you not, and am amazed everyday by how sweet, gentle, loving and excepting she is.  She has already grown out of her 3 month clothes as the pants are now up to her shins, the socks no longer stay on and the sleeves reach mid-arm.  So the other day I went through her 0-3 month clothes and boxed them up and pulled out the warm weather 6 month clothes.  It made me sad looking at all of these beautiful clothes, thinking about the different days that had happened while she wore the clothes.  Some days just a sleepy blur and others very vivid.  Many of the clothes barely worn and will soon be given to a new home.  Why is it so hard to part with clothes?  I tell myself that they are nothing more than material but as I boxed them up I was almost saddened by the fact that our children will no longer wear these beautiful clothes.  That these are just one of many chunks of time that have both flown by and drug on.  That this 0-3 month chapter of Lillian and Rowan's life is now closed and Colin and I will never have a newborn again.  

Last night, not Rowan's 3 month birthday, but last night, precious baby Chloe Quinn Loftus was born to Colin's sister Brianna and her husband Dermot.  Such a special and blessed day.  It is so hard not to relive the emotions of a new born.  The purity, the absolute highs of holding your baby for the very first time.  I tried recalling some of the events of those days, Rowan's birth and actually had a hard time remembering a few things, how silly- it is only 3 months later.  And so I post these pictures filled with the emotions of a women, a mother and a daughter who is watching time slip through her hands.  Watching her babies grow older and more independent and her mother grow older and more dependent, lost deeper and deeper ever day in a terrible disease.  I have tried to embrace every day as I will never have a 1 month, 2 month and now 3 month old again.  Every day as it may be the last.  So with all of these emotions over clothes, changes, growing old and growing young it is so special that Brianna and Dermot had a baby girl.  Now I am able to pack up my favorite memories and send them to a new  home, as many did for us.  A new home where they may or may not be worn but they will be looked over, sorted, washed and selected with love just as they were here.

That is just it, they are not just clothes.  It is the hours of time spent buying, removing the tags, washing, placing them in drawers, realizing that placement was not going to work, then re-organizing, and re-organizing; NESTING.  Nesting for this little one that will change your life and world.   

In this last month Rowan has learned to hold her head up while on her belly, suck her fingers,  smile bigger and bigger and even snort at something funny, follow her big sister with her head and eyes WHERE EVER she is in the room, sit taller in my lap and grunt, chatter, oh and squeal.  I thought Rowan was going to be less talkative until this week.  She will talk constantly if you are around.  She actually smiles and engages more with me at this stage, than Lillian did-which is saying a lot.  She is excited to see me when I have been out of her eyesight for a period of time.  I remember coming home from work for the first time after leaving Lillian, so excited to see her and Colin greeted me at the door with her and I gave her a huge smile, hoping to get one in return and I got a blank stare.  That is not the case with Rowan.

This picture is ridiculous but I had to share it because this is the face she typically gives Lillian.  How can you not laugh?

So all of these pictures are taken a day before and a day after and this one actually on her 3 month birthday.  She looks about the same in all of them.  Round beautiful checks, engaging or surprised eyes, smiley or her typical thoughtful face.

Until you get to this picture which was taken literally 6 days after her 3 month birthday, today, and she is different.  She has grown her face longer and body taller.

 
And so with the passing of just 6 days I have this little girl whom has changed so much.  And so it is with that thought that I enter this week of change ahead.  I return to work.  So sad at the changes I am about to miss.  So thankful for the changes I have seen.  The times I have been present with both my girls and my mom that I have truly needed to be.  I enter the week well knowing that I am meant to work both in and out of the home.  Knowing that I have something to give that will help this world, that will make me a better mother and a better wife.   But at this point I give it quite reluctantly, because change is always among you when you have a little one or a mom who is fighting the battle of her life. I love you baby girl Rowan and I love you mom.  You are both a gift to all of us.