Mackaroni

Yes, his eyes match his Bears shirt. He looks like he has a little man haircut. His cheeks are nice and chubby. And I am absolutely head over heels in love with him. God couldn't have sent me a sweeter little thing in this world.

And he couldn't have sent me a wilder little angel than Mimi.

I keep my camera handy just in case I can catch a sweet shot of the two together, and I grabbed it as soon as I saw the two of them snuggled up in the chair. But of course Mimi decided to jump on the side and be a monkey.

But she does love Baby Mack, as she calls him. She doesn't like for him to be upset, which he isn't too often. And he loves her, too. Last night Clint was making Mimi laugh like a hyena, and every time Mimi laughed, so did little Mack. Whenever he hears Mimi squeal, he squeals. If she smiles at him, he smiles back.

Mack has been sleeping through the night for the past week, and he is only 12-weeks-old. This isn't wimpy sleep either. I'm talking about 8:30PM to 6:30AM -- that's 10 hours, folks. Mimi's bedtime is also 8:30, so this has been working out perfectly for Clint and me to actually have a little bit of time to ourselves . . . but I'm sooo exhausted from chasing Mimi all day and Clint is zapped after spending long hours at the office that we rarely make it past 9:30.

Also, Mack has been eating about every 4 hours during the day. Is this normal? This also started about a week ago when a mom at a playgroup told me her daughter eats every 4 hours. I didn't think that was possible -- I just assumed they all ate every 2 1/2 - 3 hours. The next day I noticed Mack slept longer during his morning nap, so he ate an hour later. Then the same thing happened for the next feeding. And then the next. Normally I would have woken him up to feed him every 3 hours, but now I know he won't starve to death and his stomach must be big enough to hold more food.

He is so go-with-the-flow it's crazy. He is totally my son. Mimi wants to go the park in the freezing cold weather, and Mack's cool with that. Just zip him up in his bunting, and he'll sleep soundly for a few hours. I think I could also sleep for a few hours in this thing. When I unzip it, I swear steam comes out it's so snuggly warm. (Thanks, Shea.)

Mack and I were in a serious game of "try to catch the hangy-down giraffe" a couple of days ago, and he was cackling and cooing and having a fantastic time with it. I walked to the kitchen to get some water and came back to find this. He falls asleep so easily on his own.

And I pulled out the new, green Bumbo chair for the little man. I looked back to find photos of Mimi when we first tried her out in it. Oh my gosh, she is such a little shrimp compared to this giant. And now I'm in tears from going back and looking at the photos of her when she was this tiny. This time flies.

And she still likes the Bumbo chair.

And now for a photo of him with Blue. And you can look here for a first week comparison. Crazy.
Mack is still in love with his swing, which is a nice, safe place for him to steer clear of my wild children, Mimi and Ruthie.

But Mimi still likes to check on him from time to time.

We let Mack sleep in his crib for a couple of nights last week, and it was wonderful. Those were the first two nights that he actually slept through the night. But there was a little problem and he had to be returned to the bassinet in our room. And here was our little problem:

Mimi and I had been talking up sleeping in her big girl bed in her room for quite a while, and she was so excited about it. I bought a rail for the side and moved her noisemaker and snuggly baby and blanket to her room, and at naptime that day, she went right to her bed and told me to close the door. Easy enough, right?

Wrong. Very, very wrong. For two-and-a-half hours I marched her back to bed. I tried the

Supernanny technique that so many of my friends swear by: the first time she got out of bed, I was to take her back and let her know it's bedtime, and she needed to stay in bed. The other 9,543,788 times I just led her back to bed and wasn't allowed to say anything. I did this for 2 1/2 hours. And then it was snack time, and so there was no nap that day. I was mad, and she was delirious. Don't get me wrong, I wasn't mad the whole time. At first it was really quite funny -- actually, it was hysterical. Each time she came out of the room she said something silly or brought a toy like her shopping cart with her. The doors to her room are French doors covered with curtains, and I had to turn my head to laugh when I saw her smiling face smashed up against the windows. When we tried it at night, she did the same thing, and I warned Clint it would be funny -- but she couldn't see him laughing, and he couldn't talk to her. After about an hour of this, he said that it hurt him that every time he put her in bed she said, "Night-night, Daddy," and he couldn't say anything back to her.

After two days of spending hours trying to get her to stay in that bed, I lost. I gave up. At least for now. Mack is fine in the bassinet, and she can stay in that crib until she's 10 for all I care. We may even put another crib in Mack's room, but I don't have the energy to fight for sleep right now. And I was pretty sad about Mimi being old enough to sleep in a big bed . . . so I'll keep her a baby for a little while longer.