Band of Bross: Slow down! Too fast!

Lynlee will be 4 months old this Sunday. How did this happen?! It seems like overnight (and it practically was) that our tiny baby girl went from being in the 1st percentile for weight (she got off to a rough weight gain start what with the acid reflux and all) to chunking up a bit and maturing so fast! I picked her up one morning and she looked almost twice as big as when I had put her down for bed the night before.
I absolutely love being able to be a stay at home Mommy and spend my days hanging out with her! She smiles and laughs so often now (mostly at silly things I do but also at normal things, like sneezing), holds her head up very well considering our constant struggle with tummy time and her extreme dislike of it, sleeps through the night (she just decided to fall asleep at 8pm one night and has done it every night ever since), is always looking out at her surroundings, and brings everything up to her mouth for a slobber-based inspection (although she hasn't completely mastered keeping a consistent grip on things she wants to hold so she gets frustrated when she drops them all the time). Sunday I discovered her sucking on her thumb instead of her entire fist and since then I catch her all the time like that. She looks so cute when she does that!
She's also in the process of discovering her voice. She's a chatterbox already, just like her mommy and daddy were (and still are) hehe. She'll start out cooing quietly to herself (or whatever giraffe is in her lap at the moment) and within a few minutes she is yelling at the top of her lungs, just happy to be heard. I wish I could figure out the stories she tells me, but she seems extremely content with the fact that I just sit and listen and talk back when she's finished. It was soo cute: on Sunday there was a lady in our ward sitting behind me with her 7 month old little girl, Ellie, on her lap. Ellie started screaming (happy, play-with-me! screams) at Lynlee and was so excited. Lynlee just sat and stared at this other baby, brow slightly furrowed, trying to understand. After a few minutes she started to coo very quietly at Ellie and would look surprised when the baby would scream back. I was giggling the whole time!
It's amazing to watch Lynlee discover new things - her feet for example. She first really discovered her hands about a month or so ago and spent so much time studying them until she looked past them and found her little feet one day. While giving her a bath she was munching on her hands, as usual, when she all of a sudden pulled them out of her mouth and started to reach for her toes, staring very intently at them. She grasped her soapy foot with wet hands and brought it to her mouth for inspection. When it was almost at her mouth it slipped out of her hands and she threw her arms out like she was falling and had a look on her face that suggested disgust and utter terror (this is her oh-my-gosh-I'm-falling-through-the-air-while-still-firmly-on-the-ground-I-just-don't-know-it stance). She did this repeatedly for about 10 minutes until finally getting frustrated enough to decide that bath time was over for the day.
I know that all babies go through these different "milestones" in development and so my stories are really nothing too new, but all the same it is so much fun for us to watch her discover and learn rather than just reading about it all online.
When we first brought Lynlee home from the hospital (it seems like eons ago!) I thought I'd never want her to get older because I loved how small she was and the way I could just cuddle up with her. However now that she's starting to play (she almost accepts the game of peek-a-boo) and interact more with people I vote for this stage to stay. She's growing so fast! As a new mommy I've heard it several times from other mommies: "Enjoy it now because they grow so quickly." This is very true and I'm having a love/hate relationship with this concept at the moment. I truly adore my child and wouldn't trade motherhood for anything in the world!