This morning begins as it regularly does.

Madeleine wakes up at around 6:30. I lazily get out of bed and take her out of her crib. I head downstairs where her daddy is getting ready for work. I send him off with a fresh cup of coffee in hand and wait for the water to boil for Madeleine's formula. Once prepared, she drinks it up with minimal fuss. I set her down in the exersaucer for her morning play while I enjoy an innocent cup of coffee.

And then it happens.

Madeleine makes a horrific mess. In her diaper.

Okay. I forgot to change her diaper immediately after she woke up but these diapers are supposed to be ultra absorbent. Well, not today as I so regretfully discover. Carefully, I remove all of her dirty clothes only to discover that the "mess" is all the way up her back. How is that possible? She was standing at the time and with Newton's universal law of gravitation, you would think the "mess" would be pulled down to the bottom of the diaper.

Now, of all the frustrations of being a first-time mom, I would say cleaning up after my baby has dirtied her diaper weighs heavily over losing sleep. It doesn't help that, after I've opened up her diaper, she quickly reaches down to give her bum a good scratch. She can't wait a few minutes before I can clean it, can she? No! I have to figure out a way to keep her hands away while suspending her bum in mid-air and cleaning up the mess all at the same time. But somehow, I manage.

The phone rings. "Daddy's coming home early," I later reveal to Madeleine. In my head, I'm thinking, I'll finally get a little break. Right? Hardly. She decides to make a fuss and over what? We don't know. She's been fed, changed, held, entertained... Wait a minute, she hasn't had her early morning nap and it's past her mid-morning nap. She must be tired. Aha!

So I take her back from daddy and nurse her, as I usually do before each nap. Madeleine, however, won't settle down. Daddy comes to the rescue and takes her into the shower with him. Afterwards, I resort to taking her into our bed to nurse her to sleep. Cowabunga! It works!

Thankfully, she naps for almost two solid hours, just enough time for me to recover and complete some minor chores. When she awakes, I give her another bottle as I quickly look over some email. What's that I smell? It's Madeleine. Again. She's made a huge mess all the way up her back and we go through the same aforementioned ordeal. I can't take it anymore. I've had enough of her pooh, goshdarnit. It's rancid, nasty-looking and it stains all of her clothes. I think back to the early weeks when I would change her after a bowel movement and she would relieve herself again right then and there. The stuff would be airborne, if you can believe it. So you'd think if I could handle those days where I, the change pad and the floor would be covered with it, cleaning it up now would be a piece of cake, right?

After a morning dealing with her whining and not knowing what it is that's bothering her (though I'm quite sure she's teething), I cannot deal with a second blow-out. My mood has now changed for the worse. My husband notices. I just can't help feeling like I've been sentenced to cleaning up nasty mess after nasty mess. So I decide to take a break and lie next to Madeleine as she plays with her toys. She babbles to herself. And then, she says it. Mama! She says, "Mama." I look up, but daddy has just stepped out. He's been lucky enough to hear Madeleine say, "Dada," "Daddy," and "Dad" on several occasions, but the rare time she calls out for me, there's not even a video camera within reach.

You could say I was frustrated by that. But, no. Madeleine's babbles were everything that mattered at that precise moment. It was just her and I, exchanging two mere syllables. Priceless.