Seven Months

She can CRAWL

She had been rolling

and scooching

and then one day in January

she crawled for our phones that were

on the floor across the room

We don’t ever give her our phones

The forbidden fruit was the most motivating.

We hid the phones and she crawled

toward less fun things

Now she crawls everywhere

though not as fast as the older babies

at the programs we go to

She has learned to screech within the past couple days

So now we have happy screeches

Mad screeches

Excited screeches

Sad screeches

Tired screeches

Experimental screeches

She also pants with excitement

while balancing on her two feet

bent over, butt swaying in the air

hands clutching a nearby support

and smiles big

eyes crinkling at you

or wide-eyed as she talks:

“ba ba ba”

“ma ma ma”

There have been times when she

has crawled into my lap saying,

“Ma ma”

and looked at her father while saying,

“Ba ba”

But I think it is still her babbling

and not yet with purpose

She hasn’t yet named us aloud

Her hair has grown

Filling in the bald spot on the back of her head

The rest catching up with her mullet

and filling in the receding hairline, erasing her fuzzy mohawk

Her eyelashes are thick and beautiful

Her eyebrows full of personality

And while she nurses she closes her eyes

and gently takes four fingers and strokes her own brow and lashes

Sometimes bringing her whole hand up to tug on her lengthening hair

There is an outward notch in the cartilage of her ear that I trace with my eyes as I watch her play

and she occasionally gets golden ear wax

and the inner cup flakes with dry skin

and so I run a humidifier in her room

when I remember to refill it

Her laugh is a real laugh

a giggle

when I kiss her neck

and squeeze her tight

and buzz and sniff in her ear as she smiles

and use my nose to tickle her belly

When I start “This Little Piggy” she smiles big right away

and watches me as I make faces and change my voice

and braces herself for the tickle at the end

as the piggies cry wee all the way home

These are getting harder to capture her

So many details to include

to capture her every nuance

would require a 50 page chapter

per month now

She changes and grows more everyday.