(scroll down to read about her)
The Saturday before Kelsey turned 6 weeks, she fell asleep at 10:30 that night, and didn�t wake until 6:00am the next morning. She slept through the night, for 7� hours! The next night she did it again. I had not encouraged her to do this, in fact it was physically painful for me as my breasts became terribly engorged when she didn�t wake for a middle of the night feed. Some nights I would hang over the sink and spray milk down the drain, while others I�d attempt to arouse her for a snack. I rubbed her back and spoke softly to her until she stirred, then I�d gently change her diaper in the dim light, then sit in the chair to nurse� and she wouldn�t even open her eyes once.
She routinely pushed up on her elbows while holding her head high, at a 45 degree angle, and really strained to look at things going by, following sounds. She loved to look at pictures of babies that hang on the walls in our house, and she became aware of (and addicted to?) the television. She made her first few little vocalizations that could be classified as "cooing," especially when Daddy held her and talked to her.
She grew out of size 1 diapers (for up to 14 pounds, supposedly) and into size 2 (for 12 to 18 pounds). She quickly moved out of 0-3 month size and into 3-6 month size clothes, entirely for the length. Her body was absolutely gorgeous, perfectly proportioned for a month old baby. Her lower legs, arms, hips, bottom, hands, and feet remained delicately slender, but the rest of her body was beautifully padded with delicious baby fat. I especially loved her belly when it was round after a feed, and the creases that formed as her thighs filled out with each pound of weight she gained. My first baby was so painfully skinny that she resembled a wizened old man, so I really savored the fact that Kelsey was robustly healthy, and utterly normal.
She had her first fingernail clipping. She didn�t scratch her face as most newborns did, so I never needed to use "scratch mitts" on her hands. She certainly didn�t have measured control of her arms or hands, but she seemed to instinctively know to not scratch herself. She didn�t have her hands up at her face constantly, as her sister had, and Kelsey only occasionally sucked her fist for comfort.
She received her first bottle of expressed breastmilk on 10/26/01. Daddy offered it to her, and she guzzled it like a pro, with no hesitation about it feeling "different." The next day she downed another 2 ounce bottle, so I no longer worried about how she would cope if we had to be separated while I went to a doctor appointment or ran errands and left her in the care of someone else.