Little Miracles
What’s so great about being a parent?
What I find fascinating is watching Mallie grow. Just recently she has started to try and sit up. She no longer stretches out her legs when I hold her up in the air facing me. Instead she curls up in an attempt to push herself up into a sitting position. Laying down is no longer her preferred position of existence. When she’s flat on her back she’s flat on her back, there’s nothing much she can do about that just yet, although today she’s been managing to do a half belly flip. But when there is the slightest hint of incline in her position, she immediately starts curling up not realizing that her head is still to big for her body size to carry.
Most recent are her attempts at grasping things. There was a time when her tiny hands clenched and unclenched reflexively. I could tap her knuckles with my index finger and she would open her hands for me to slip one of my fingers in and for her to close her hands into fists once again. Than came the open hand, just twitching randomly, waiting like a venus flytrap for a finger to land so it could close in on it. That was a week ago or so. Three days ago, I noticed something new. Something much more intentional, something which I could easily have missed in the absence of patience. Since her vision has improved significantly and she now can see and follow objects with her eyes, she can see things placed in front of her. I started placing things, small toys, in front of her hands, which still twitch in random directions, and after a couple of seconds of Mallie looking at the thing I was holding in front of her, her clenched hands start to relax, open and she tries to grasp
She’s located her fists about a week or so ago. They became a part of her existence, and they spend a lot of time in her mouth. Teething is on the brink. Today I gave her a toy to hold and noticed a slight shaking in her grip. She was sitting on my lap and I had to lean over to see her face. Her open mouth was aiming for the toy and the visible effort she was putting into coordinating her arm movement with the aim of placing the toy into her open mouth was to die for. It was like watching an elastic being tensed with the sole purpose of releasing the tension at one particular target. The first couple shots missed ending up on her cheek and nose. But she finally managed to get the toy in her mouth and cover it with baby drool. What a moment of triumph. I can just see the gray matter grow with baby steps such as these.
Still a bit out of sync on the grip.
It also made me appreciate the every day things I constantly take for granted, like the ability to hold a utensil and safely place it into my mouth with food on it. Babies are babies, they’re learning, I’m just thinking about those who no longer are babies and their brains have already forgotten. Little things.
