Ruby: 6 Months*

I’m back! It’s amazing what a little late night venting can do for the soul.

First off: I promise I’m not depressed. I’m okay. The reason I felt ready to write about what I’ve been feeling is because I feel like I’m through the worst of it. It was a particularly challenging couple of weeks with Ruby, and everything just compounded on top of one another. My sweet bean was/is teething and wasn’t sleeping, which made for a very tired, stressed momma.

Anyway.

This morning I realized that I haven’t done a little update about my wee-bean in a while, and I thought I’d introduce you to my amazing six month old daughter. Lovelies, here’s Ruby:

Each month I’ve taken a photo so that I can mark her progress, though I’ve neglected to write about it here. Nowadays it seems like she is learning something new each day, so I really should be better!

I have deduced that my wee-bean is the most inquisitive child I’ve ever met. She loves to see and touch everything, and she doesn’t seem to be afraid of anything, or anyone. Ruby just loves to be held, and she hasn’t started making strange with people yet. Generally she’ll let you hold her and she’ll play with you as long as you give her a big smile when you take her.

She also loves to laugh, but she makes you work for it. She won’t just laugh if you make a silly face, but she’ll laugh and laugh if you play with her. She is extremely expressive with her facial features and has the one eye-brown raise down pat. In general, she smiles and babbles all day long.

She has always been a vocal child–from coos, to dinosaur sounds, to chirping like a bird–and she just began talking this week. She has been making the “ma” sound for a few days, but she just began chanting “Mum” and “Mama” over and over when she sees me or wants me, which absolutely melts my heart.

Ruby also loves to play. She adores her “bumper jumper” and swings / jumps until I finally pull her out. Right now she loves any toy that she can put into her mouth–we have a big collection of colourful teething toys that feel good on her gums. She has been “teething” for weeks, but her little teeth have yet to make an appearance.

She loves music, and will curl into my shoulder if I hum or sing to her. She also is really into Elmo’s World and the Wiggles, and dances away in her jumper when music comes on.

She is almost crawling, but isn’t quite mobile yet. She rolls all over the place, and can get up on all fours and push herself along, but she isn’t quite crawling yet. (Thankfully. ha)

Lastly, in the past few days my little wee-bean finally learned how to fall asleep on her own.The Hubster and I have been trying some new sleep strategies for her all week, and we are starting to see results already. She is almost sleeping through the night, and now I can put her down at night while she is still awake, and she can put herself to sleep in a matter of minutes. After months of it taking me anywhere from 1 – 3 hours to settle her at night, this is huge for me. I finally feel like I can get a bit of my life back in the evenings.

The few weeks were admittedly very challenging for me as she wasn’t sleeping well, and her teeth were making her very uncomfortable. Thankfully we seem to have turned a page and life seems to have gone back to normal. I am so enjoying being home with her, and am sad that I go back to work (part-time) in six short weeks.

In short, I am completely in love with being a mom. I seriously have the best kid in the world.