There’s a lot I love about new babies. I love the way they’ll go to sleep with their head resting on your chest, I love how soft their cheeks are when you kiss them, and I love their pudgy little arms and legs, just to give a few examples. With that said, I think I know what Angelina Jolie meant when she famously described her newborn baby as being just a blob.

The blob-like nature of new babies has been far more obvious to me this time than it was with either of the girls. A big reason for this, of course, is that this time I have a chatty three-year-old running around the house to compare James to, but it’s also because I’d forgotten what new babies are like.

When James was a couple weeks old, for example, I was waving at him from a few feet away when Heather said, “Uh, you do remember that he can probably only see about a foot in front of him, right?”

Of course, it’s totally natural that new babies can’t do too much, but what I love the most with babies is getting to experience those little milestone moments when they show you they’re figuring things out.

I remember a few months after Maddie came home I was carrying her when all of a sudden she reached her little arm out and wrapped it around my neck to hold on better. She held on to me like that every time I carried her after that, but that first time was so very cool.

James is slowly but surely starting to figure things out, too. The other day, for example, he was on my lap when Annie came bouncing over flapping her cape in the air and making flying noises. James turned toward Annie just as she flapped her cape, and his eyes widened with shock. A second later he burst into tears. It was pretty incredible.

Now before you think I’m a weirdo, I say it was incredible not because I liked seeing sweet little James cry, but because seeing he could be startled by something was sort of cool. Blobs don’t startle! People do!

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“Who you calling a blob?”

The best thing he’s doing now, though, is laughing when I make faces at him. It used to be that he wouldn’t respond to even my most hilarious funny face (one that’s been tested thoroughly on the girls), but now he cracks up. It’s awesome to peer down at him in his crib and see him giggle with flashing eyes.

So I’m loving all of these cool things he’s starting to do, but I’m also trying to savor all of his blobby awesomeness. This is the last blob we’re ever going to have, after all.