Dear Tristan - 5 Months

Dear Tristan,
We are all so in love with you. If I could save a memory to play over and over during times of despair it would be the little nose wrinkle thing that you do before you smile. It’s beautiful… and most amusing. I also might include a clip of the excitement you seem to feel when your feet are released from your footie pj’s and you grab them to bring to your mouth. “These THINGS! They are SO SOFT! They taste a little bit like BOOB!” Today I sat on the bed and folded two loads of laundry as I watched Ice Age II as you lay next to me wriggling with delight, playing with your new toys. I will be sad when you are like, “These old things? No, let me destroy the living room instead”. That day is coming.

I say this because you are starting the motions of crawling. You push up with your elbows locked and look around the living room at your new perspective. Sometimes when you are in the bassinet, you pop up with your eyes and forehead showing over the rim like a little prairie dog all, “Why did you guys put me in here again? What’s going on out there?!”

You really want to be able to get from one place to another, but you can’t quite figure out how. You know instinctively that it involves moving your feet, so you teeter-totter on your little belly back and forth, kicking your feet and flapping. I’ve seen you put your feet under you and push a few times, but I don’t think you quite have the coordination to pull it off yet. Never fear child, its coming. Leave the fear to me.

You’ve also been delighting in your rice cereal in the evenings. At first when I would feed you, you would start flapping and wiggling so that I had to pin your arms to get a bite into your mouth. You’re getting better at eating it now, actually swallowing instead of pushing it around with your tongue, reveling in the feel of something that isn’t milk. Don’t worry, we got the entire 15 minutes of your first cereal feeding on film… it’s riveting. I have to take a minute here to tell you that your brother pretty much wants anything that you have… even if it’s rice cereal. He wants anything that I have too, so don’t take it personally. Yesterday after demanding a bite of your cereal over and over again, (although he knows that he doesn’t like it) I fed him a spoonful. His face turned beet red and he started gagging. Now, your brother will eat anything. Even salad. But apparently the taste of rice cereal is too much for him. In between gags he was trying to make out a sentence. That sentence was, “Mommy, maybe Connor sick?” I really tried not to laugh. Really.

You brother is still having some issues with your arrival. Sometimes he’s cute about it, “Mommy! Put Tristan down... hold Connor”. When I say, “No, I want to hold Tristan, Come sit with us.” he responds with, “Connor go get the bouncy seat” and brings over the bouncy seat insisting that I put you down. I don’t. I can’t, simply because it’s not fair to you. You are only 5 months old and I’m already trying to balance the fairness between siblings. One thing that I feel may be a lifelong trait in your brother is determination. He’s sometimes so relentless in his tantrum that I consider putting your down just to make it all stop. But I can’t. I fight for you. For my right to keep you in my lap as long as possible, because you are just growing so damn fast.
I fight for you.
I will always fight for you.
Love,
Mommy