Milestones & Comparisons

Second kids totally get overlooked when it comes to milestones and their development. I find myself constantly comparing Iain to Ada when she was his age, and ignoring all of his "firsts". Just this past weekend, I wrote up an instruction manual for the grandparents detailing how to take care of the kids, what they eat and their sleep schedules. Rick's parents were a bit shocked when they put Iain on the floor in their living room, went to get something out of the kitchen and returned to the sight of him on his back up against a piece of furniture. Whoops! It just slipped my mind that he can roll over. I've only seen him do it about five times. I can never get him to repeat it. And it's only from his tummy to his back one way. With Ada, that would have been a big deal and I would have called everyone to exclaim my excitement. With Iain, eh. So what? I've been there and done that once already. Next. I should have included it in the manual since he technically could have rolled off a bed or something. But then again, Ada rolled off the bed and the couch a couple of times and was just fine. So what? It's not that big of a deal.

Iain is also really good at sitting up on his own now. That might qualify as a milestone. I've also already trimmed his hair once or twice. And I didn't save a lock of his hair like I did for Ada. He'll probably hate me when he's older for that. (I'm really not all that worried.) And I'll admit that I don't check his mouth every morning to see if he has a tooth yet. I figure one day he'll bite me and I'll notice it. I'm just so much more laid back with him since I've been through all of it with Ada and I've never really been a sappy, sentimental, helicopter mom.

Lately, I've been comparing the two kids a lot more. Primarily since I left Iain with Kelly and Krissie, our neighbors, while I went to pick Ada up from daycare since it has been really cold out. Both times I returned to find Iain screaming his head off.  Nothing they did could please him until he saw me walk back into the room, and then he was fine. Ada had some separation anxiety but only for about two minutes while she still thought I was on the other side of the door and then she was over it. Ada loved strangers. Iain, not so much.

Ada also wasn't bothered by loud noises. Iain hates it when you sneeze, laugh loudly, clap your hands, or pretty much when Ada makes any noise that isn't a whisper. And then we have noticed that he giggles and laughs already. I'm not sure that Ada ever giggled or laughed at his age, or even older. She's always had a bit of a forced laugh that sometimes seems fake. She slept through the night really early on whereas he took his time to get to that point--but he is technically sleeping through the night now so that's another milestone I failed to report.

Part of my laissez-faire attitude might be enhanced by him being a boy and me thinking he won't be soon sentimental when he is older. But I think it has a lot more to do with the novelty wearing off a bit and the fact that I have less time to focus and celebrate his every move. It's probably a good thing that we are done having kids since each subsequent child would receive even less attention and eventually I wouldn't even know how many I had or what their names were. I'm sticking with two and I'll try to be better about tracking his real milestones. Crawling and walking will at least make the cut.

Moral of the story: Try to accept that each of your children will be very different and learn to appreciate those differences. And try to acknowledge each milestone for all of your children, even if only briefly.