Miss 3 Months

Mila is 3 months old - well, she was about a week ago, but I'm a little slow documenting this, I guess.  A few things about Mila at 3 months:

Her nicknames are: Miss Mila, Miss Mees, Mila Bean, Bacon Ears

Mila is smiling all the time now, and Daddy is getting sooooo close to being able to get a laugh out of her - it's like she can't quite figure out how to laugh yet, but she's getting there and she's trying, and to see her coo and smile with her big dimples and blue eyes makes me happier almost than anything.

Mila is still all about her hands, though she's still trying to figure them out.  She is sucking on them a lot and waving them around in the air...she's still too young to really hold toys or understand them yet, so for now it's mostly just her hands that keep her entertained.

Mila is already starting to sleep through the night.  Seriously, who do I need to praise for this minor miracle??  I don't want to jinx it, but for the past 2 weeks or so, she goes to bed around 10:30 and doesn't wake up until 7:30, and even then, she wakes up for a bottle and goes back to sleep until 9:30 or so.  Could I even ask for more??

I am not breastfeeding Mila anymore.  I quit once she was 12 weeks because honestly it just wasn't working.  I must be a TERRIBLE milk producer, and I'm just grateful that nowadays they make such excellent formula for them, because I know that while breast milk is still preferable to formula, she will be okay and healthy and thriving just fine on bottles.  She was never satisfied when I was breast feeding her and she'd pull on and off again because she was frustrated she wasn't getting enough milk.  She was always hungry and needy and dissatisfied and I was always grouchy and feeling guilty that I couldn't give my baby more.  So, at 12 weeks, we kissed breast feeding goodbye, and I haven't looked back since.  So far, all is well with bottle feeding; Mila took to it like a champ.

Mila still sleeps in our bedroom in the bassinet, but probably in the next week or so I'm going to transition her to her crib in the other bedroom.  I feel nervous, though, having my baby be so far away from me, but I know that it's probably time...

Mila seems to be a little less high maintenance than she used to be.  She used to cry a lot, even when all her needs (aka demands) were met, like being fed and kept warm and having her diaper changed etc...she just cried a lot, and I was mystified as to what my child actually needed, if anything.  But now she is more content to just chill (she's lying beside me on the bed as I type this, waving her little fists around and staring at the lamp) and even just a week ago, I don't know that she'd have been as content to just sit here.  So I'm grateful that she is giving me a reprieve from the constant attention I had to give her every second of every day that she was awake.  It was sooooo hard to get anything done.

I love having Mila here.  She's only been here 3 months, but I already sometimes can't even picture my life without her here.  I know this sounds cheesy, but bear with me:  Miss Bacon Ears fills something inside me, some hole in my heart that nearly killed me when I lost Kendall.  It's like a huge piece of me was missing, but with Mila here, I'm whole again.  That doesn't mean that I don't love Kendall and miss her and still think about her every day, but it means that I was meant to be the mother of two beautiful daughters, but maybe on God's timeline instead of mine.  And I think I'm okay with that - I'm getting there.

I love you Mila.  Happy 3 months, babe.