Hesselblogger: Ryan: Month Two

Ryan's second month brought some fun developments for all of us. Here are the highlights:

The biggest and best development of the month is that he started to smile - and not just gas smiles! Ryan started responding to our faces and voices with sweet little baby smiles. It really floored me the first time he recognized me: Matt was holding him and I walked by and said "hi baby!" He lifted his head off of Matt's chest, turned towards me and grinned the biggest smile. It was incredible! It is so rewarding to have him recognize and prefer us - makes all of the hard work worth it :)

On top of that, he started to find his little voice during month 2. Tiny coos and gurgles come out whenever he is calm and content. He just sounds so sweet and amazing by everything when he "talks" to us. Since I am writing this a month late, I suppose I could update and say the talking has only gotten more frequent and intense. He cracks us up with his early morning vocalizations that sometimes border on excited yelling! Love to talk to our little one.

Baths are another one that Ryan started liking in month 2 and has only grown to love more. As a newborn, he despised bath time, so we limited it to every 3-4 days as a necessity. Somewhere along the line, he made a hard shift and started really enjoying baths. He kicks his little feet and smiles at his reflection in the mirror while he bathes. Now we have made baths part of our nighttime routine before bed: bath splashing, lotion and massage, new PJs, then food and bed. And for the 4th month update - now it is like being in a splash zone at Sea World when we give Ryan a bath. He is crazy about kicking the water while he grins at me and Matt.

The ceiling fans became Ryan's biggest interest this month. I had heard a few moms joke before about how much their kids loved fans and now I am seeing it first-hand. He is crazy about all of the fans. All of them. No matter where we are, if there is a ceiling fan, he is smiling up at it like a fool. Doesn't matter if the lights are on or off, or if the fan blades are moving. Love.

He also started experimenting with finding his thumb this month. We don't have much luck with getting him to take a pacifier, so we were excited at the concept of him being able to self-soothe with his hands. It is really funny and cute to watch him try to coordinate getting his thumb to his mouth. Most of the time, he would give up and just suck on his whole fist or whatever fingers happened to be nearest to his mouth. He still hasn't perfected the thumb on a regular basis, but can get it from time to time as he lays down for naps. We'll keep trying!

And finally, we got our first glimpse of his giggles this month. Ryan was sitting on Matt's lap facing him while I was in the next room. Matt started saying "boop!" in an excited voice while he tapped Ryan on the nose and brushed his cheek with his fingers. Apparently that's hilarious to babies, because I suddenly heard adorable giggling and squealing and ran in to find both boys cracking up over the exchange. Now it's become a goal of ours to get as many giggles a day as possible. It melts my heart!

Month 3 update to come and then I will be caught up for now... :)