Overt verb meaning "to look at affectionately"

What is a verb meaning "to look at affectionately" in a way that is distinctly visible in the subject's facial expression? For example in

Alice beams at Bob.

the action is visually and emotionally evocative. (However I think "beams at" mostly connotes approval.) Also, this should be appropriate for a parent-child relationship.

Gaze means "to look steadily, intently, and with fixed attention."1

In one sense, it is a term popularized by psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan for the anxious state that comes with the awareness that one can be viewed. The psychological effect, Lacan argues, is that the subject loses a degree of autonomy upon realizing that he or she is a visible object.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaze

I would go for the word DOTE usually followed by the preposition on/upon to mean " shower some one with love and excessive affection."

It is the German origin and excessive fondness which go to mean " act in a foolish manner" as King Lear's 'senile dotage'— the other meaning of 'dote'. However the word is often used without the foolish overtone.