Four months.

Life with a four month old is nothing like life with a two month old. Parker could stay this age forever and I would be okay with it. He's pretty happy, full of giggles and snuggles, independent enough to entertain himself, and a good sleeper. He's still small enough to be the cutest thing ever, and heavy enough that I get a major arm workout every time I pick him up. It's all in the brain box, though, for Mr. 97th percentile.

Yeah, we're sleeping through the night now (thank you, Jesus!), no longer afraid of going anywhere in the car seat, and playing with toys. He's at that magical age where he can grab and put things in his mouth but not at all mobile. That means he can entertain himself with his toys anywhere and everywhere (but sometimes they get into screaming matches with him and and make him cry) but isn't actually getting into anything yet. Again, thank you, Jesus.

It's great watching him grow up, though, and oh, I could kiss those cheeks all day every day. Sometimes I just want to take a big bite out of them to keep forever. That's normal, right? And his sausage toes? I die with happiness every time I look at those chunky little feet.

Basically what I'm saying is, four month olds are great. Everyone should have one. Their thighs may not be as soft as a newborn's, but it's well worth it for everything else. Forget therapy dogs, I should bring Parker to old folks homes and physical rehab centres and show everyone how he feels about zippers. Remember the paper ripping baby? It's basically that. I'm pretty sure his giggles could cure cancer if bottled and injected into infected cells.

We have finally finally finally hit a groove where I feel like a normal human being. I may have said that before, but I actually feel so much like myself again. I'm no longer afraid to take him out in public. I can go out visiting and not have to worry about how he'll do or if he'll have a meltdown or need to go home to eat or nap. Feeding him only takes ten minutes these days, and I don't have to arrange my whole schedule around it.

I was never one of those people that always knew they wanted to be a mom. When we decided to try for a baby, I knew I wanted one, but was slightly (hugely) terrified about what that would mean. Could I do it? Would I survive? Would the baby survive me? Mostly I just tried not to think about it and then, nine months later, boom. Baby. Motherhood.

Now that I have Parker there are days where I think I could have six of him right now and life would be so good. The first eight weeks, though, believe me when I say that they were hard. H-A-R-D. Hard. Days that were so hard that made me wonder if we should have waited a little longer to have a kid because I was sure I was never going to sleep for more than four hours at a time for the rest of my life, and that I was always going to be so consumed with painful worry over Parker's well-being. Maybe I should have appreciated those pre-baby days a little more. There are still really hard days, but the good ones far outweigh them. And I get it. I so get it.

Being a mom is great. Even though I feel kind of bad for Parker for having such weirdos as parents, I'm excited for the little weirdo that he's becoming. And he's totally weird. I mean, who thinks zippers are funny? Weirdos.