Crawler

March 9, 2025 — 8:12pm

Dear Reese,

You are a crawler. Your first completed hands-and-knees steps happened this morning while playing on your bedroom floor.

By early afternoon, you could go further. You’re still scooting around too, you’re faster that way for now, but this is huge.

You also figured that you can, in fact, fit through the cat door to the utility room. You cried for a while after I pulled you out and took you away from it. I should have stopped you before this happened, but I was too curious to see if you could make it. I had a misplaced hope that you wouldn’t be able to get through and then would leave it alone.

We have a mommy-daughter Sunday with just the two of us together. Early afternoon, we drive the 3 minutes to Troup Park, and we are the only ones there while I walk you around snowmelt and the beach. I talk to you while we explore. I tell you about your great-grandparents’ cottage that used to be in the open grassy field. I tell you about running from the top of the hill down to the lake at the start of every vacation. I tell you about the time capsule your Uncle Wes, our friends, and I hid somewhere in this park that we never found.

At the small playground, I hold you on my lap as we go down the slides. The short one first, and then the tall one. I take you to the children’s boat and pretend we are going up and down over the waves at the bow while bouncing you in my lap. Then I put you in the driver’s seat to take the wheel.

Later, we go for a walk around the point and you sleep while I re-listen to a D&D podcast and pay more attention to the houses than I have before. Since I’ve started thinking about building a home for us, I notice different things. The style of shutters. Windows that are double hung or casement. The color of the trim. I slow every five minutes to poke my head around the front of the stroller to see you still sleeping, blocked from the March wind by a rain guard.

Our daylight savings adjustment worked and you have no trouble going to bed on time. With five minutes to official bedtime, I try to read one more book and you start whining and bury your face into my chest. I relent and turn off the light.

It makes sense you’re exhausted. My little crawler.

Love,

Mama