first month, first smiles.

This whole motherhood thing continues to astound me.  I never knew I was capable of such extremes of emotion over mere minutes.  How is it possible to swing from a sense of drowning in Faelen's inconsolable crying to experiencing a wave of happiness so physical it gives me butterflies?  
This morning Faelen gave his first smile.  His first perfect smile.  And, somehow, perhaps a reward for making it through the previous night, it was caught on camera.  Apparently the shutter sound is his new favourite thing!  Those lit up eyes and the slight dimples spied on those chubby cheeks have kept me buzzing all day.



When I imagined what it would be like to have a baby, I could never have conceived of how it tests and rewards.  The airbrushed scenes from baby clothing catalogues have no hope of capturing the magic of a perfect moment following a night that, at the time, felt like it might never end.  Perhaps it is because the perfect moments in the catalogues aren't prefixed with 30+ pictures of the carnage that comes with changing five nappies in an hour (one of which leaked from the top of the babygrow) and a continual, shrill background wailing.  



Best of all though, between the extremes, come these perfect quiet moments.  The ones that to an outsider may appear insignificant, but for me have redefined contentment.  
And wow, hasn't he grown?!