Not so little anymore

By Published On: June 14th, 2016

Time moves too quickly. I remember in elementary school when […]

Time moves too quickly. I remember in elementary school when the weeks between Thanksgiving and Christmas seemed like an eternity.  Now I feel like entire years pass before I even know what’s happened.

This week the 6-year-old learned to ride her bike without training wheels. The very next day Baby No. 4 (3 months old) rolled over from her back to her belly for the very first time.

My babies are growing up in front of my very eyes!

FullSizeRenderNow that the baby can roll over, we have stopped swaddling her when she sleeps.  Instead we plop her in a sleep sack (since blankets are outlawed and we don’t want her to be chilly). But this means that we’re done with swaddling forever. It means I can pass along all the SwaddleMe bundle wraps that we’ve relied on so heavily with each baby to help them sleep, effectively protecting them from their own flailing arms that, without a swaddle, terrify them and keep them from ever sleeping. I have a friend who’s having a baby soon, so I’m passing all these lifesaving swaddlers on to her. But it means that I can’t say to the baby at bedtime anymore, “Are you ready to bundle up?” Because we don’t bundle her up anymore. I can ask her if she’s ready to “sack up,” which—now that I think about it—is funny, and I’m definitely going to start saying it.

She has outgrown her newborn and 3-months clothes. The 6-months footed jammies are too small on her on account of her giant feet. At just about 13-and-a-half pounds, that means that my not-so-tiny-anymore baby is wearing 6-months bodysuits and 9-months jammies. And it also begs the question: WHY IS THIS HAPPENING TO ME?

One good thing about Baby No. 4 getting a little bit bigger is that her rotten cheese neck is going away. You know how babies hide milk in their neck rolls and then that milk spoils and leaves them smelling like a foot? No? Is that just our baby? I don’t actually remember it happening to the same degree with our other children but Baby No. 4 spent a good several weeks reeking of old cheese. No matter how well I washed in between her rolls and really got in there to make sure it was dry after every bath and after every time she spit up, she still smelled like stinky cheese. I had to apply diaper rash cream TO HER NECK on a regular basis because the rolls were that cavernous and impossible to clean. Because we couldn’t solve the problem, we just decided to embrace it and call her Stinky Cheese Neck. Now that her neck is getting stronger, her rolls are less pronounced, and I guess she’s hiding less spoiled milk in there because her odor has really improved. I no longer have to apply butt cream to her neck.

Rolling over, outgrowing her clothes, no more stinky cheese neck … all of these are definite signs that our littlest baby isn’t quite so little anymore. When I realized it the other night, I looked at my husband and announced that all our children are fully grown now, and I have nothing else to live for.

Because I never overact or exaggerate. To anything. Ever.

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