Charlotte, the Genius Baby, and a List to Prove It

I have a couple darling pictures of Miss C that I have been trying to upload for the last half hour, but Blogger just won't have anything to do with them. And I say it's their (er, its? What sort of possessive pronoun is appropriate for "Blogger"?) loss, because Charlotte is just a DOLL.

Really, she's amazing. Don't believe me? Here's a list to prove it, because lists are, as we all know, infallible documents of proof, or at least they are in my blog world:

• Charlotte can put herself to sleep. THIS IS AMAZING. Never underestimate the value of your baby learning to put herself to sleep. I just put her in her crib, she smiles and coos at me, continues smiling (I assume) and cooing after I leave, perhaps cries out once, and then is out like a light by the time I sneak back in to check on her after a few minutes. You should know that this skill was really hard for the twins to grasp. We took the "let them cry themselves into exhaustion" approach at bedtime, and while I definitely stand behind that approach, it was exhausting for us, too. We experienced weeks of them crying each and every night for 45+ minutes straight before they finally figured out that, hey, we can just sleep, we're in bed and all, it all makes perfect sense! It probably doesn't help to have a brother in the next crib over, egging you on, but still, in comparison, CHARLOTTE IS A GENIUS BABY.

• That was long. Moving on.

• Charlotte pacifies herself throughout the day by sucking on her fingers. Her digits of choice are her index and middle fingers. No discernible hand preference yet. Anytime she gets fussy for any reason, she just pops those fingers in and buys herself (and her mama) a few extra minutes of peace. This is further proof of a genius baby at work, as the boys took pacifiers, which forced Stephen and me to undergo many months of playing the Midnight Search for the Pacifier Without Waking Up the Other Brother While the One Impatiently Waiting for Said Pacifier Begins to Grow Increasingly Agitated game. De-lightful.

• Charlotte is generous with huge, beautiful smiles. She is already learning how to charm us all into giving her exactly what she wants. Clever.

• Charlotte is a little more stingy with her laughter, but when she chooses to laugh, boy, is it ever worth it. Her laughter wouldn't qualify as "giggling" as much as chortling. It's deep, bubbly, and comes right out of nowhere, surprising its fortunate hearers.

• Charlotte loves to eat baby food and seems a little puzzled as to why I have held off just so long introducing it to her. She is (nearly) five months going on two years.

• Charlotte is so very close to sleeping through the entire night. I suspect this has something to do with the extra food in her tummy. Whatever it is, it's making her mama do internal cartwheels.

• Charlotte's two-month long Period of Extreme Colic is but a distant memory. Enough said.

• Charlotte enjoys watching her brothers play. She takes in all of their blustery, boyish activity with wide, serious eyes, as if making mental notes about what to do when she has the ability to move on her own. Occasionally something that one of them does will strike her as funny and she will let loose with one of her unexpected chortles. What's really funny to watch is one of the boys interacting with her, like when she and Baylor got into a laughing contest a couple weeks ago. Too. Cute.

• Charlotte can hold her head up, support herself on her arms when she's on her tummy, stay sitting up for a little while, grab anything in her immediate vicinity, roll over, and even do a very little bit of crawling. Plus she is in 6 and 9 month clothing, which just astounds me. (The boys were still in 0-3 month clothes at her age.)

• Charlotte is, and always will be, my sweet, sweet baby girl. She only has eyes for her mama at this stage, and that's just fine by me. I love her all the more for it.

And after all of that, Blogger still won't take my word for it and let me post pics proving my Charlotte's sweetness. Oh, well. Like I said, not my loss. I have her to cuddle with any time I want!