A Pat on the Back

Nothing makes us happier than seeing how much Kai has developed cognitively, physically, and personality wise. Each new delightful discovery is like a pat on the back, reassuring that we've done right and didn't screw up too badly.

Kai has reached, if not exceeded, many of the typical milestones for infants his age (hey, I'm his mom. Of course I'm gonna brag a little). First off, he's a real chatterbox (surprise, surprise). One of our most joyous time of the day is when Kai gets up in the morning. He smiles, giggles, and makes all kinds of silly sounds. Once he's fed and his diaper's changed, I usually put him in bed next to Bill so they could share some time together before daddy goes to work. And Kai LOVES talking with his daddy. He doesn't talk to me that way at all. With daddy, Kai talks a lot more and experiments with a wider range of sounds, intonation patterns, and exclamations. And daddy makes up silly remarks and questions to encourage him to "tell (him) more". The funny thing we've observed recently is, since Bill's been encouraging Kai to say "Agoo", that's what Kai says as soon as he sees daddy now (maybe we should start teaching him "daddy").

Kai doesn't show such excitement when he talks to me. I'm the mommy, so most of the time, he sounds sleepy/needy/whiny/all of the above. Even when we're playing, he smiles flirtatiously and talks in a gentler tone. He giggles and sometime squeals when I sing to him and grab his hands or feet to "dance". He almost never says "Agoo" to me, but he kicks and throws his arms around when I call him by his name.

Other than his parents, Kai also talks to his toys. Over his crib is a mobile that has four really cool elephants on bicycles. Kai's eyes light up when he sees them, and he can hang out and talk to the "cycle elephants" (as daddy calls them) for quite a long time. He also liked studying Mr. Doggy and Miss Kittycat on his chair. However, I noticed the two animals were quite high up and therefore far away from him. He was sort of losing interest, so I strapped a felt mobile that has different vehicles (a car, a bus, and an airplane on one side; a space shuttle and a big Earth on the other) dangling at various heights so Kai could try hitting, reaching for, or grabbing them. He LOVES it!! He talks his toys and smacks them around. So far, we've observed that he uses almost exclusively his left hand to do the smacking, and he smacks the big Earth while watching intently the movements of the space shuttle. He seems to have figured out the way to make the space shuttle move is by making the Earth move. This is great for us because now we can leave him alone and be left alone. We're now able to enjoy one pocket of freedom at a time and many pockets throughout the day.

One other developmental milestones for 2-month-olds is the ability to open and close their hands. Kai makes full use of this new found ability (mostly his right hand) as a sign of intense emotions. For instance, he grabs and lets go his shirt with one hand while keeping the other hand clenched close to his face when he's excited. When he's stressed or in pain (i.e., when there's a gas attack or when he's pushing to poop), he grabs and lets go his hair (makes us wonder if he's gonna be one of those kids who twirl their hair when they're nervous). He also does this on our left arms as we hold him upright patting his back to calm him down after a colicky fit.

Sometimes, especially after we frantically try to figure out what's upsetting him and how to comfort him, I'd like to think of this rubbing on the arm with his tiny hand as a reciprocal gesture, "a pat on the back" if you will, to show us that he knows we love him and he loves us too.