So, my baby girl is almost four months old and my grandmother is 101. That’s quite a spread of living relatives!
She’s been a joy, and cute as can be. It is thrilling to see her developing new skills. She has unfortunately been a bit sick this winter, with mild flu-like symptoms and accompanying discomfort and fussiness. A doctor friend told us that babies born late, with meconium and the amniotic fluid, were often “snurfly.” That fits baby Veronica – she’s often full of snot. We have been running a humidifier, and suctioning her nose out with a rubber squeeze bulb (she really doesn’t enjoy that very much, although she is getting used to it and doesn’t seem to be so frightened by the process any more). We might try taking the nurse’s advice and putting a little bit of salt water up her nose with the bulb to help loosen up everything, although I get the feeling that she will be even more unhappy about that.
She has also forgiven me for slipping while trying to trim her tiny baby fingernails and accidentally cutting off some of the flesh on her finger. Her fingernails are a source of endless difficulty because we have to keep them extremely short, or she scratches up her face (or our faces). We’re afraid she’s going to scratch her own eye. But cutting them, even with a baby-sized clipper, is difficult. It is easiest if she is sound asleep, but turning on a bright light will wake her up, and in dim light it is very hard to see what we are doing. So I tried to do it while she was awake, with Isaac distracting her. But she is wiggly. Oops.
Then of course I had to clean the wound, which added insult to injury because of the sting. She was pretty upset about that. Fortunately it is a small wound and is quickly healing. Forgetting my guilt over hurting my innocent baby girl will take considerably longer!