Stretch

It is hard when you have a newborn not to think about the future. At the same time, panic strikes me as I think he’s growing up too fast. This push and pull will no doubt continue throughout Austin’s life. His dad does this hilariously. He speculates on Austin’s future – from the type of tennis player he’ll be (like Federer obviously, because whether he will be a tennis player isn't up for a debate...now) to how he’ll be so bored of his parents’ banter and find us terribly tedious when he’s a teenager. This morning Hayden said to me as I was changing Austin’s diaper, “look how muscular his legs are. That’s muscle, right?”

Well, I’m not sure if it’s muscle or pudge, but what I do know is that it has changed since he was born almost 4 weeks ago. Ahh! I can’t believe he’s changing so much. His cheeks are now super chubby in that perfectly baby way.

We are on the precipice of saying goodbye to his newborn onesies. He’s in his second favorite today, a brown striped number with monkey feet. Tomorrow I will dress him in his favorite (and by his favorite, I mean the favorite of his dad and me): a green striped number with monkey feet and a monkey patch on the butt. I look at him now and see that the material is stretched. Hayden asked, “Can he even stretch out his legs all the way?” I feel a little guilty about this. I think he can. He doesn’t seem uncomfortable. Just…one…more…day of these onesies…

A more practical a growth issue is buying new diapers. Environmental fretting paused in favor of mental health, I’m making sure we have ample supplies of diapers, but this has led to a debate about how many to order. We went conservative and got a couple of small packs of size N. He went through those in a week. So I ordered a big box of N. Shortly after placing the order, I noticed that the N diapers are becoming snug. So now I guilty stretch these diapers over his belly and hope that they are not too tight to cause discomfort or the dreaded diaper rash.

Developmentally, these are exciting times. I put Austin in his swing yesterday and saw that he was noticing the soft plush birds rotating above him for the first time. His awake periods are longer and he focuses on things a bit more. How exciting when he gazes at me. If I stick my tongue out, he mimics me. What a great little reward! Or as Hayden would say, “he’s clearly in the highest percentile for babies in the newborn mimic category.”

Other outfits going the way of the dodo: