Walking, Talking and Weaning

In the past week, Xury has started crawling, started walking and started trying to repeat everything we say. She grabs the phone and says "HI! HI!"  She's playing peek-a-boo and pointing to my nose, mouth and eyes (with a loud "eyeeee")  She's also weaning. I know she's nowhere near total weaning but she is beginning the weaning process, nonetheless. It was my intention to nurse exclusively for as long as possible and, for the most part, she hasn't had a lot of experience with solids. But lately, she wants FOOD! She grabs things off my plate. She grabs things out of our hands. She tries to steal what's in my mouth. She's even, much to my dismay, rejected nursing so that she can sit up and lunge for the things on my plate. She's 10 months old. She's got 6 teeth. She can chew and swallow. She's obviously ready, but there's something about not being her total source of sustenance that makes me sad. I housed her inside me for 9 months, I provided her only nourishment for 8 months and right now I'm still her primary source of nutrition but that's beginning to change. Already, I know, she's eating more and nursing less. In fact, she's needing me less in other areas as well. There was a time when she only slept in the sling, pressed against my chest, but lately, after nursing and snuggling for awhile, I sneak away and she naps in the bed by herself.  I knew this day would come. In fact, when she was smaller and I had the choice to keep her snuggled against my body or try to lay her down, I chose keeping her with me because I knew this day would come. And here it is.

 She's also in the sling, less and less.

She likes to play on the floor with her brother and sisters, to chase the cats, to experiment with how her body moves. I've tried to cherish and hold on to every fleeting moment of this precious, hazy, warm, snuggly, less productive, personal hygiene deprived time but I still feel like these moments have slipped through my fingers like sand. And while she's absolutely adorable and fun at this age and I rejoice with her in all her recent accomplishments and milestones, I miss the warm, floppy baby I brought home from the hospital,

her first lopsided smiles, her sweet little coos.

They already feel like a lifetime ago.  Everything she is and will become takes her one step further from what she was.

 It's life. Babies get bigger. Children grow up. It is precisely because they are so fleeting that these times are so precious.