February 12, 2000

One month old. Alex is one month old, today. We keep saying this to ourselves, over and over. We both find it hard to believe. It may be a cliché, but time really does fly by. In so many ways, Alex is an entirely different person than that tiny baby we first held at the hospital just one month ago.

What a month it's been for Alex! Milestones and changes rocket past: birth, learning to breathe and digest food, meeting his parents face to face, doctor's appointments, increased muscle control, clearer vision, meeting grandparents and family friends, growing. It's amazing. Wonderful, yet truly bittersweet.

He's already beginning to fill out his newborn clothes and we suspect it won't be all that long before he outgrows them all together. Isn't this happening too fast and too soon? We talked via e-mail with a good friend this week about parenting being a continuing process of letting go. Seems true enough at this point. The passage of time is a recurring theme in these pages, I know - I hope you all don't find our musings thereupon dull or morose.

It's been quite a month for us, too. We are enjoying this time so much and love this process of learning to be a family. Alex has brought us so much joy and challenges, too, of course. It's been and is wonderful.