Samantha Jane turns 1!

Today is Samantha Jane’s first birthday.

I’ll admit, I was worried about her, ever since before she was born.  Diana was (barely) diagnosed with gestational diabetes, but it turned out to be nothing.  Then there was something where the umbilical cord wasn’t exactly in the center of the placenta, like it should be.  Then the C-section birth less-than-perfect Apgar scores.  Then her sleepiness and lack of weight gain in the first few days of her life.  She was given some tests and even an ultrasound of her brain to check for bleeding, but all came back normal.  She was just a sleepy baby.

But I worried.  I didn’t worry much about Allison, but mostly just out of ignorance, I guess.

I read that babies typically have their first social smile somewhere around 4-7 weeks.  When Sam’s 7 week birthday rolled around without any smiles, I worried.  Then her 8 week birthday.  It was the day after that when Allison and I went to Disneyland.  I remember thinking to myself “It’s going to be a great day...  Allison and I will have a fun day at Disneyland, and Diana will send word that Samantha smiled for the first time.”  And that’s exactly what happened.  And the best part is that she hasn’t stopped smiling since then.

The last two months have really been a huge change for her.  She wasn’t much of a roller, but somewhere around 10 months she started crawling.  And in just a matter of a day or two, she went from totally immobile to cruising all around the house.  Now, she cruises all over everything, and can now easily pull herself to standing.  She’s taken a few wobbly steps, but I wouldn’t really call it walking by herself yet.  More like falling forward with a few steps.  However, with just a couple of fingers for support, she loves to walk everywhere.  One of my favorite things is coming home from work, where she sees me and squeals and crawls over to my leg and tries to climb up them.

She sleeps well.  She recently had a bit of a hunger strike, but is now eating well.  Diana does a fabulous job making and freezing healthy baby food, and she’s starting to drink cow’s milk.  She’s starting to point at things, and seems to be able to respond when we ask her to point at various pictures (as in, “Where’s the dog?”  *point*)  Diana said today that Samantha was very interested in the face on the mug she was using.  Diana showed it to her, and then put it away.  Sam clapped her hands (for “more”) and then pointed at the mug.  Her first sentence (kind of).

All in all, she’s the happiest, calmest, most easy-going baby I’ve ever known. Likewise, Diana and I are much more calm and relaxed as parents the second time around.  In spite of my worries above, with a bit of experience under our belt, we no longer stress out so much about how much she’s eating or how well she’s napping.

She’s a good little baby, and we love her.