6 Months

That's a whole half a year since Val's arrival. How did we get here? One day at a time, of course. In many cases, after one long night at a time.

There are so many exciting things in Val's world today.

• Val has slept through the night (10 pm- 10 am, with interruptions only at 8 am to eat) the last two nights. This is awesome, execpt that the only way to acheive this is to have her in our bed all night. Which means that we don't sleep as well. But Val does. Chicken, egg?
• She's *this* close to crawling. She jacknifes her butt up, then moves her arms forward only to flop over to one side. Then try again. She also scoots on her butt to get a little bit further.
• The laughing. Oh god the laughs. They melt my heart. Every time.
• The arms and legs, they flap with glee when she's excited. So hard that when we put her in her new hook-on highchair she nearly flapped the table over with the excitement.

  

• We started solid food. Sorta. We mixed up some rice cereal, and she ate maybe a half a bite, then said 'screw this.' And that was that, though we'll try again soon.
• We were randomly inspired to hand her a sippy cup with water in it. She grabbed the thing, immediately drew it to her mouth and had a sip. She also played with the cup for a good long while, until she bonked herself on the head with it and we took it away.

There's no way to say this and convey everything behind it. But I have to try.

Val, becoming your mom is the coolest thing that has ever happened to me. We are so lucky to know you.