Sleep

I think I can officially say that Henry is sleeping through the night now*. He will be 6 months old on the 28th of this month. He has a bottle around 8 or 9 PM and doesn't eat again until the next morning around 7 or 8 AM. The past two nights he hasn't woken up at all, but for about a week now, if he does wake up one of us just gives him his pacifier and he goes back to sleep. Needless to say this is nice and we are enjoying the full-night's rest.

*I of course realize that this all could change with teething, storms, illness, etc. but for the most part, we are past that certain stage of the baby's life where their need to eat wakes them (and us) up.

No more stumbling into the kitchen at 3 AM to make a bottle...

This makes me think back to the earliest days after we brought Henry home from the hospital when he was 1 day old, when he was in his bassinet in our room, waking up every couple hours (if we were lucky to have a couple consecutive hours!)... those nights are such a hazy memory. I did not breastfeed, but I'd sit up in bed and hold him, and have the most painful contractions that I sometimes actually had to set him down or give him to Ron because they were excruciating (almost as bad as when I was in labor!). That was definitely unexpected, but I learned that the production of oxytocin can be triggered by things besides breastfeeding. I can't believe how little sleep I got (Ron was spared from most of the newborn work), and yet during the day I just kept on truckin'. Now getting up once in the middle of the night is like, "UGH! Come ON! Sleep through the night already!"... Really, how can we complain?!

Henry has been such a cuddly baby right from the start, it was hard not to let him fall asleep in our arms, because he was just so peaceful and adorable. I hope we're not already spoiling our little baby boy! Or maybe because this is probably our last child we're trying to take advantage of the this time when he is still a little baby, because we know how quickly it is over. He's already well past the tiny phase. Anyway, now we can lay him down in his crib wide awake and he takes care of the rest, so usually that is what we do. But not always ;-)

He takes a couple decent naps during the day, and one long one that coincides with Lucy's nap time, should she take one. That sometimes gives me a nice break. Generally speaking, we don't have Henry on any kind of schedule other than the one that he is falling into on his own. It's much easier that way, and less stressful for me if I'm not worrying about what time it is and whether or not he's "supposed" to be sleeping. I just read recently in an article online: three things you can't force a child to do "eat, sleep, or go potty". SO true!