One Month

Benjamin,

Today you are one month old!

You are doing SO well being a baby, and Mommy and Daddy are so proud of you!!! You are growing and changing every day. You're nursing great (we finally figured it out so it wouldn't hurt Mommy anymore - yay!) and you're already up to 10 lbs which your doctor can't believe! You hardly ever cry, and when you do, it is very predictable ... you're either hungry or need to be burped. You're VERY strong for your age, holding your head up often and doing lots of arm and leg "exercises". When you have "tummy time" to strengthen your neck muscles, you like to scoot yourself along the ground like an army crawl if we put our hands against your feet. We can tell there is a very active boy inside just waiting to be old enough to scoot around!

One of the neatest things that has happened towards the end of your first month is that you have become much more alert. You have longer periods of awake time, and you are SO wide-eyed and curious about the world around you. You pop your head up and fix your eyes on things around the room. Your head bobbles around after you've had it up for a while, but it's just the practice you need to hold your head up on your own.

Ben, you love looking at your books and toys. Your favorite is Swirl the Snail, which has a black and white swirled shell. You also held a toy for the first time this past week - you were moving it around and didn't want to let go! Mommy and Daddy couldn't be more proud :)Mommy takes you for a walk almost every day, because we have had a lot of nice sunny days over the last few weeks. As a family we have even ventured out to dinner with friends, the grocery store and a local park. Mommy was very nervous the first time I took you to the grocery store with me ... I realized once we got home that I hadn't taken a deep breath the whole time we were out!

This whole month has been an amazing adventure! In many ways it's harder than we ever anticipated, but it's also brought more joy than we could imagine or ask for. You are a precious angel, Benjamin. Happy one month birthday!