5 months old

Dear Milo,

I can't believe you're 5 months old already. Where did the summer go? Those hot days have been replaced by much more temperate ones and cooler nights. You'll soon experience your first autumn.

At this stage in your life, I really shouldn't be surprised by the number of firsts. This past month you got your first cold. You went to your first baseball game. You experienced your first evening with a babysitter. You got your first kiss -- from an 8-month-old baby girl in your Little Gym class. You petted the dog all by yourself for the first time. And you had your first food that wasn't breast milk -- brown rice cereal -- and your first taste of sweet potatoes.

Your first sweet potato mask

You handle new experiences so well that when you got sick and had a few fussy days, it caused Daddy and me a lot of anxiety. If you weren't normally so happy-go-lucky, we probably wouldn't have worried so. Still, even with a stuffy nose, even through your restless nights, you managed smiles for us and allowed yourself to be soothed with songs from Mommy (your current favorite is "Too-Ra-Loo-Ra-Loo-Ral").

You've been working really hard at sitting up and even standing with support (until you got sick, then standing seemed like a little too much work).

Like father, like son

At the Little Gym we do an exercise called the flagpole (your feet rest on Mommy's tummy while she stands and holds you around the waist) and you have been rocking it. You make the older kids look like amateurs.

Not your best flagpole, but look at the bubbles!

You've started reaching for me when I go to pick you up. Daddy was holding you one day, and I said, "Do you want Mommy?" and held out my hands. You reached for me. I almost cried. Of course, you also reach out for my water glass and coffee cup, insisting you can drink out of a cup now. You've even given it a try -- with your own sippy cup, of course -- with some success.

Note the water down your front

With all the firsts and the fact that you're such a big boy, I sometimes forget that you're still so young. Sometimes I feel like it's taking too long for you to sleep through the night or to sit up on your own. But then I think about not getting up with you in the middle of the night, I think of not holding you while you drift back to sleep, and it makes me realize how quickly time really is passing. Someone said, "The nights are long, but the years are short." How true.

Just a year ago you were a tiny little creature, little more than a bean with a heartbeat. And now you're you -- giggly, cute, chubby-checked (the pharmacist called them "grandma cheeks" because "grandmas like to squeeze them"), playful Milo. My love.

One day you'll read these letters and probably roll your eyes at my sentimentality. But I hope one day after that, you'll read them and realize how much you are loved.

Always,
Mommy