Peace be with you

You may recall a previous post of mine where I explain how Owen was at the age where he must be the easiest to take care of - sleeping through the night, immobile, eating well, etc. You may also recall a more recent post where Keith mentions how I noted how Owen is showing his own personality and becoming more independent. Well, I have a feeling his independence means his "easy" period is coming to an end.

Last weekend he showed the first signs of being uncomfortable with strangers. Marisa came over, and at first Owen stared at her and then turned away and cried a little bit. The good news is I kept holding him and talking to Marisa, and by the time she had to leave, he was smiling at her. Same thing happened this weekend. When Kate and Teague first came over, Owen wasn't sure what to make of them. But by the time they left, they were getting smiles too.

Owen is definitely taking more of an interest in things around him and wants to be involved. He has a hard time breastfeeding when people are over - he doesn't like being covered up, so I end up going upstairs to feed him. He normally falls asleep at church, but today he was very fidgety and too interested in looking around him to sleep, even though he was due for a nap (he finally fell asleep on the ride home).

He is very close to being able to sit up on his own, and could probably turn over from his back to his stomach if he wanted to. Crawling (or at least creeping) can't be too far behind. Which means that we need to start baby proofing. Which leads me to wonder how much do we really need to baby proof? We have one gate for the stairs which we haven't taken out of the box yet. But do we need to worry about the three stairs between the kitchen and the family room? Am I going to have to banish all of my plants to non-reachable places? How about all of the electronics that we have in the family room? Are we really going to have to start vacuuming more than once a month?

I'm also struggling with the move to solid food. I understand what food to offer him and how much, but I am unsure of the best scheduling. How do I adjust his breastfeeding given my work and Ultimate schedule?

I won't even go into how frightened I am of teething.

In the Catholic mass there is a section of the service where we turn to our neighbors, shake hands and say "Peace be with you". It's one of my favorite parts. Today Owen was in the baby carrier during that part of the mass. One woman, after seeing I had a baby with me, seemed to put more emphasis on the statement. It was as if she knew that I would have some not-so-serene moments in my future. While I know that is true, I'm taking it one day at a time, and thanking God for such a beautiful blessing.