I am TWO!!

Months, that is. But still. TWO! Months! We've kept a child alive for TWO MONTHS! Who'd have thought?

Some random notes from the Norman camp:

Dexter was 12 lbs, 1 oz at his last weigh-in at lactation class. He goes tomorrow for his two month check-up at the doctor, so he'll get weighed and measured then. Can't wait to see how long the child is. He's already getting close to hanging out of his swing and his bouncy seat. Actually, the feet already hang off the bouncy seat.

Have any wood close by? You're going to need it for this one. Dexter has been pretty reliably sleeping from 9 or 9:30 pm until at least 3am, every night. NOW is when you knock on wood. NOW! HURRY! Most nights he will actually sleep until 4 or 4:30. So we're working toward a good solid 8 hours of uninterrupted sleep from him. He goes to bed at 7:30pm, gets up at 9 or so to eat (not his choice - I make him get up), and sleeps a good solid chunk of time before waking up to eat again. Our next step? When he's ready, we'll drop that 4am feeding. And Mom can SLEEP ALL NIGHT! :-)
The exception to the sleeping through the night rule happened the other night, when Dex woke up crying at 1am. But not his "dude, I am hungry" cry. More like a "HELLO? What's going on here?" kind of cry. Why? Because Mr. Muscles had busted BOTH ARMS free from his Miracle Blanket. Which I just didn't think was possible. Ah, but who swaddled him that night? His DAD! Who is FAR too nice. He said "I didn't want to make stuff too tight around his arms." OK - next time you want to make stuff not so tight, YOU can get up at 1am to re-swaddle the boy and get him back to sleep...

Naps are not, unfortunately, going quite as well. Dex seems to have become a perpetual 45 minute napper. Which means that Mom can get a lot less done during nap time. Ah, who am I kidding? I didn't get anything done, anyway. So what it REALLY means is that I am (kicking and screaming) slowly coming to terms with the fact that MY naps are going to be significantly shorter now...

Dexter is still kicking butt with his bottle feeding. John feeds him a bottle a day. Which allows me to: go to girlie movie night without worrying at all about how the baby is doing, go to Target and Wal-Mart to do some shopping without a kid strapped to my belly, and maybe, sometime, start going to the gym at night. Woo-hoo!
Dexter is smiling all the time now (except, of course, when I have a camera in my hand), sitting up in his Bumbo chair, kicking the snot out of his play gym that makes noise when he kicks it, and grabbing stuff. Also following hands and other objects as they move across the sky in front of him. Cool stuff!

Also, right now. Dexter is hungry. We shall continue this post at a later time...

One bath and one feeding later, and we're back! Also, check it out - Dexter can have normal hair when his mom remembers to comb it after a bath! No worries - give it one nap and it'll be back to being the crazy hair that we all know and love.
Dex is, I am pretty sure, going to win any beer chugging contests in college. Right now he nurses for 10 minutes max, and in that time period eats four to five ounces of milk. Which, apparently, is HUGE. We feel like slackers at lactation group, as we're in and out of there before most moms are even done nursing. No dilly-dallying for this boy! Which is cool - less pain for my nipples, and it leaves us more time to play.

Speaking of nipples, I can't WAIT for them to not be in pain. One of these days (and I am guessing it will be after Dexter is done nursing forever) I will be able to actually hug my husband again. Right now I can't because OWWW. Nipples smooshed against another person = hurt.

And according to some of you savvy moms (and all this baby stuff I keep reading) this is about the time that Dexter should start to poop less. WHEN? WHEN does that happen?? This whole six poopy diapers a day thing is getting old...
So what's on tap for us this week? Doctor tomorrow, and shots and weighing and stuff. Recovery Wednesday. Lactation group Thursday. Maybe some photos on Friday, or a visit to the Easter Bunny (gotta take advantage now, when he doesn't care that he's being held by an enormous scary thing with big ears and googly eyes...). Saturday Dexter gets to hang out all day with Dad while I go help a friend at a competitive trail ride in Fair Hill. And that's about it! We'll be busy this week!

Also, happy birthday today to Grandma Cowan!!

Happy Birthday, Grandma!