We've come a long way baby

Charlie decided to ring in his 3-month "birthday" by sleeping through the night!

According to pediatricians and other experts, Charlie has been sleeping through the night a long time now, since they would define it as sleeping for a 5-6 hour stretch. I heartily disagree... if I have to get up after I go to bed, and before 6 AM, it's not sleeping through the night! For several weeks now Charlie has been going 8 to 9 hours between feedings, with the exception of what was probably a growth spurt that set us back for a few nights last week. And lately it seemed no matter what time I put him to bed, he'd wake up around 5 AM. Although he always went back to sleep, and slept until about 8 AM, I was concerned Charlie had inherited his maternal grandma's early-bird tendencies!

And then last night, Charlie ate at 8 pm, went to bed, and didn't make a peep until Zach got up at 6:45!!! And I only got up once, at about 5:30, to turn on the monitor to make sure he was still breathing (he was). We've come a long way since the days when he was up every 3 hours to eat!

In addition to being a wonderful sleeper, our little guy is doing great in general. He smiles all the time now, very easily, and we think we've heard a few noises that sound suspiciously like a laugh. He's much more active than he was, and stays awake for large portions of the day. He no longer likes to sleep on his belly; being swaddled (arms free, of course) is what helps him to sleep now. Charlie's hands are often near or in his mouth now, and he's even found his thumb several times. So here comes the drool...

Charlie is absolutely fascinated with Zach - his eyes follow his big brother whenever he's near. And usually Zach's appearance is all it takes for a big smile to bloom on Charlie's face. Honestly, it still makes me tear up when I see the big gummy grin light up Charlie's face when Zach sticks his own face inches from Charlie's nose. It's really going to be fun to watch these two grow up together.

I realized I never provided an update on the stomach/gas issues Charlie was having a while back. We tried the anti-gas drops for a couple weeks, and while they didn't seem to have an obvious impact, by the time they were gone we definitely saw some improvement. Today our little guy still has what seems like a lot of gas (and not the burping kind), and puts effort into actually pooping, but it no longer seems to hurt him. So I guess he did outgrow the digestion issues.

I also realized the other day that I had never blogged about a rather funny Charlie story. When he was 3 or 4 weeks old, I took Charlie with me for my monthly Mom's Night Out dinner. Charlie, my friend Wendy, and I were sitting on the patio of a lovely St. Paul restaurant on a gorgeous night, waiting for the rest of our party to arrive. As Wendy and I were talking, and Charlie was snoozing away in his carseat next to me, a waitress accidentally tipped her tray, sending a caesar salad on a collision course with Charlie. Fortunately, the bowl first hit the sunshade of the carseat, before it flipped over and landed lettuce-down right on Charlie's little chest. I have never seen the staff of a restaurant move so fast - busboys and other servers instantly surrounded us, picking individual lettuce leaves off poor little Charlie, who not only didn't wake up, he didn't even blink.

As soon as I realized he was not hurt, and in fact was still fast asleep, I laughed. Hard. The sight of the stray piece of parmesan cheese resting under his right eye was comical. Afterwards, I started thinking about the "what ifs" - what if it had been a bowl of hot soup? or what if that heavy restaurant-grade china had landed squarely on his head? Scary thoughts, but that's not what happened. And he really did look funny as he slept like a baby with that salad bowl nestled on his chest. So all I could do was laugh.