5 "Are we there already?" moments

Number 1. Perhaps most startling of all, Zoralee now looks and acts like a GROWN UP baby. She has a whole range of decipherable emotions. My brother, Dave, is home for a bit between graduating from college and going to live in Portland (yay for my brother! That makes all my siblings to stick with one subject and stay in one or two locations long enough to obtain a bachelor's degree, butcept me! And I'm the oldest, the supposed example setter! How 'bout them apples! Yay!). Anyway, Zoralee was quite confused about Dave's presence in the house. Every time she'd see him for the first few days, it was clear she thought, "You're still here?! You are a nice boy, but you do not belong." By now she's diggin' him, but yeah, she crossed over some new threshhold of awareness about life around her, and it's just weirding me out a little.

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If Zoralee doesn't want to talk to you, or she's done

with a photoshoot, this is what she does.

Number 2: Zoralee's dresser has five drawers. So far, her currently-sized clothing have taken up two drawers (0-3 months, for instance), and the next size up took up two more drawers (3-6 months). I put receiving blankets in the fifth drawer and labeled them because it's an old dresser that's awkward to open, I have a poor memory, and I got sick of opening multiple drawers to find one item.

Last week, I had to take off the tape. I realized we are at the point where Zoralee's currently-sized clothing (roughly 6-9 months) needs an entire dresser. I wish I could emphasize to you how incredulous I was to grasp this. She's got a drawer's worth of long and short-sleeved onesies, a drawer for shirts and sleepers, a drawer for pants, one for dresses, and one for jackets and outdoor clothing. Her dresser is tall and skinny, so the drawers aren't huge, but still! All future clothing must stay in boxes in the closet. There's no way in the world that she NEEDS all these clothes, mind you. But I have already been selective, if you can believe that. And plus, her clothes take up more room now that she's bigger, a small nuance I hadn't considered. What it all means is that it will be a high crime if I ever put her in something non-cute or non-perfectly-functional-for-this-exact-moment-in-history.

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Number 3. I used to couldn't envision the time when we'd have to babyproof the house on account of Zoralee. Well, we're not totally there yet, but I can see it coming. And soon. She is rolling multiple times in a row, which means she could theoretically make it anywhere. Even up stairs if it weren't for a little thing we call gravity.

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Number 4: I think she's transitioning from three naps to two. She's five and a half months old. Does that seem about right? I haven't consulted a friend or a book or google on that specific issue.

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Number 5: Yesterday was the final reckoning of Zoralee's progress toward childhood (Well, for now. What's next - crawling?! Oh yeah, it is.) She snotted on my bath robed shoulder. It is her first real cold, with snot that comes out of the nostrils. So surprised was I that I had to take a photograph. It's faint in the picture; look closely.

Oh, that's another thing. The t-shirt she has on here is a REAL shirt, like real children wear, not a onesie with snaps.

Anyway, Aaaaagh!