Dear Caroline,

Happy half birthday! Today marks the halfway point between the day you were born and the completion of your first year. Six months! I say this every month, but time is just passing so quickly!

This month you celebrated your first Christmas and your first New Year’s! You also had your first (long) roadtrip – driving down to Orlando, FL to visit your grandparents and other relatives. You did great in the car, sleeping mostly and happily entertaining yourself the other time. You pay a lot of attention to your sister when you’re in the car, which is cute. Sometimes the two of you just go back and forth, making each other laugh. You really love your sister!

This month, you got to meet your namesake. Your great-grandma is named Dorothy Caroline, and we wanted to honor her when we named you because she has been a very important person in my life. She lives in Florida and isn’t able to travel, so you got to meet her the first time when we drove down. I am so glad she got to see you while her eyesight is still okay!

You have grown and changed a lot this month. You have gotten a lot more active. You aren’t crawling, but you’re very wiggly and you seem like you’re ready to go. You love to stand – putting weight on your cute little legs. You spend much of your time standing on my lap. I feel like you’re just going to one day start walking from there. You hold your core up very well – you are very close to being able to sit unassisted. You can hold yourself for a while but do eventually fall over, so I can’t leave you by yourself yet. Almost there!

You discovered toys this month, and you adore sticking them into your mouth. Actually, you love to grab anything and stick it into your mouth. I am finding it difficult to write without you grabbing my pen, or use my phone. You are so eager to learn everything about your environment. I am trying to remember to bring toys with me when we leave the house – not in the habit yet! You entertain yourself pretty readily, though.

You’ve started to give us big belly laughs, which we all love. You laugh mostly for your sister, but you also laugh for Mommy and Daddy. You also flash your big smile, complete with dimples in each cheek. Strangers in the store love to try to elicit the smile from you, but you’re not always ready to give it to them. But at home, you are SUCH a happy, smiley baby. You generally wake up from your naps pretty happy, as well as first thing in the morning. You’re also fairly easy to get to sleep. I usually just need to lay you down and you fall asleep on your own – often music helps, but you don’t always need it. I know from experience that this might be a temporary thing, but I am enjoying it right now. :-)

Your hair is filling back in, and is much lighter than it was before it all fell out. I can’t tell exactly what it will be when it’s fully grown in, but it seems you have quite a bit of red mixed in with the light brown! It’s also very soft. Your cradle cap isn’t nearly so bad, though I keep rubbing coconut oil into your scalp for moisture. I wonder if that is helping it look so soft and full and beautiful. You also still have the most gorgeous blue eyes – when you look at me and smile it just melts my heart.

It’s been a wonderful six months, and I look forward to seeing what future months bring us!
Love, Mommy