All night long

Sweet lord. Jack slept eight. hours. in. a. row. last. night.

As in, we put him to sleep at 8:30 p.m. and he did not wake up until 5 a.m.

I think he might have gone longer, but I freaked out at 4 a.m. and made Josh go in and make sure he was alive. He was. Still swaddled up like a baby burrito. But then he started stirring and by 5, he was crying to eat.

This was his longest stretch of uninterrupted sleep in his almost-11 weeks of life. We're not sure what caused it but there are a few suspects.

1. A growth spurt. We are in the midst of one, evidenced by his wanting to eat every hour for the last two afternoons. That's 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7 o'clock. I should just leave my shirt open for the all-you-can-drink milk buffet.

2. A full tummy. Because he was eating all the damn time, he certainly must have been full up when we put him to sleep.

3. A re-jiggered swaddle. We use the Miracle Blanket, but he had been Houdini-ing himself out of it lately and wakes himself up because he works his skinny little chicken legs out of it and they get cold. So I tried wrapping the bottom half of it tighter around his legs and he stayed swaddled.

4. Dumb luck. He could just be screwing with us. Because today was the day of few naps. As in, his longest stretch was 35 minutes. That's always good times. Good thing Grandma was here or it would have been mommy hiding in the closet with her laptop time.

The best part about him sleeping through the night was that Josh had to get up for the 5 a.m. feeding. His first time getting up in the middle of the night for a feeding.

The deal was that since he can't lactate, and he likes to stay up until 1 a.m., he would take the late feeding with a bottle. He gets to feed Jack and I still get up to pump. But I can pump enough for a bottle in 10 minutes, versus the 20 it usually takes for me to feed Jack.

Well, since we're planning a trip to Vegas in July, I need to save up enough breast milk so Jack can eat while we are gone. I figure 24 5-ounce bags should cover it for three days at five months old. So I try to pump an extra feeding each day now.

With Jack sleeping longer, it works well because I can get an extra session in at night.

So while I could have just gotten up and fed him at 5 a.m., it was more advantageous for me to pump and Josh to feed him. Josh? Not feeling the love on that thought process at 5 a.m. Me? Feeling the love on him knowing what it's been like to get up these last 11 weeks.

Now he will tell you, I didn't stay up until 3 a.m., waiting for the baby to wake up and eat. I will tell you that he should have gone to sleep like usual and gotten up when Jack started fussing.

All I know is, Jack slept through the night and we were both exhausted today.