Maria Mikaela's Beautiful Surprises

Let me start my December blog with a sharing about my favorite daughter (hehehe don’t get me wrong I only have one child…a baby girl…and that’s how I jokingly call her lately).  You see she thrills, excites and surprises me in so many ways.

1.     Weight and height

Being premature was something that I did not expect of her.  But then she really soared so much in height, shape and weight making her level of with those that are exactly of her age (4.5 months…she is supposed to be 3 month old if she was born full term).  I can see that she is taller than a baby neighbour that is 5 month old.

 

2.     Focus

I was so amazed at how much she could focus with anything.  The moment I observed almost 2 months ago that she could see already,  I saw her  growing curiosity with anything including her undivided eye contact once she gets to be captured by any house guest’s eyes including mine and my husband’s. I learned though that babies get to be captured with black, white and red colors so I try to give her the opportunities of having those  in her midst.

And oh you would be amazed at her listening ability ( I tell you not to underestimate babies capacity to do that).  One time when I and my husband was into some heavy discussion over something in front of our daughter, we both stopped  when we realized that  her two tiny eyes has traveled between me and my husband listening as if she understood what we were talking about.  From then on, we decided to hold our heavy discussions out from our daughter’s sight (oh sorry for that Mikaela:-))

3.     Giggles and laughter

From both her waking moments and sleep I could say that she is a happy baby(displays random smiles and giggles). Despite some brief tantrums when there is a strong bout between hunger and sleepiness, generally she has a very happy disposition.  She giggles when you tickle her, laughs a lot and is so easy to entertain.  Oh I love so much to hear her doing that over and over again.

4.     Started to talk through her baby “language”

I like so much talking to Mikaela since she joined us last August 25 from her almost one month of incubation period in the hospital.  It’s like…whatever I touch  in front of her, I tell her about it.  I did not mind at all if she did not understand them. I just wanted to tell her.  And it has become like that since then. 

And  when she started to see, I had so much fun since I could see how she reacted to what I was telling her  even sometimes with some blank look in her eyes.  And just three nights ago, she surprised me with her rather “long discussions” using her baby  language called “mumbling” something as if explaining to me whatever she had in mind. 

And oh I just acted as if I understood what she meant by responding “oh really…that is so beautiful mikaela… you can tell mommy more about it…I am listening”…and she continued to discuss things.  There were those random short moments of mumbling.  But that one was the longest and with that little drama in my heart, I was moved to tears.

5.     Patience

One day I just placed Mikaela on the couch on top of a U-shaped pillow while I fixed some mess on our dining table.  It took me almost 30 minutes to finish what I did including the washing of plates and some sweeping of the floor.  I was checking her of course from time to time from where I saw she was just observing what I did  together with her flashes of cute smiles. 

That was not all.  One time I knew that she was already hungry and she was observing me preparing for her milk while she just placed both hands on her tummy looking at me waiting patiently.  Truly I was so moved by that.  But I was more touched and moved when some relatives – in laws came to have dinner in our home and was joining us later at the bedroom.  Our daughter was just there on bed observing everyone with flashes of her giggles.  I then left her for awhile while I tried to bid goodbye to our guests.  When I came back she was all eyes at the door giving me that “I am waiting mommy” look. 

I was so moved again by that which really prompted me to hurry in preparing  myself so that I could stay beside her for the most awaited breastfeeding moment where she dozed off to sleep like a snap of my fingers.  I then told and asked my husband how MIkaela our daughter has gotten so much of that patience to generally wait for her “turn”.  That is something so beautiful for a baby. 

Hehe please don’t get me wrong.  She has her episodes of crying, too.  Like when wakes up too hungry and realize …perhaps ( per observation) that she is still too sleepy.  Her tantrums though comes in sometimes and when she is being hugged or cuddled she dozes off in my arms (Oh so beautiful tiny creature in my arms). 

Really and truly she puts me to lots of tears as she surprises me in a lot of ways and I thought and wonder why I married late ( hahahha which I shared to my husband).  Having lots of children can be very challenging and yet so beautiful and so rewarding.  That’s why I envy so much one photoshoot we had with Mikaela’s cousins made me and my husband think that having many children is truly a blessing and God’s beautiful gift to a family.  

 Well, we are now a family even with just our one favourite daughter ( only child hahaha).  Any additional child is God’s beautiful gift to us …a small …growing family:=). 

And this first Christmas together as a family…God just gave us in advance His truest promise of a new life through our daughter…God’s greatest and beautiful surprise gift this season of Advent...

Advance Merry Christmas everyone …Let us continue to be Joyfully Hopeful in this wonderful season of the year…J Amen…