You've come a long way, baby

As we were packing to leave on a weekend trip to Tampa on Friday, I found a tiny, yellow hat under the bassinet. It took me back to the last time Luke wore that hat, the first week we had him home from the hospital when he would sleep approximately never hours and zero minutes. The first night we tried to get him to sleep in pretty much every device made for baby sleeping and some that were not. We tried the swing with and without a swaddle. We played the music that comes with those baby swings, mechanical renditions of classical pieces that circled through my subconscious as I slept.

We tried lights on and off, the pack n play, the crib, and in a moment of sheer desperation and exhaustion, we tried laying him on our chests while we sat sleeping up. Turns out, rocking in someone's arms for the better part of the night was more his cup of tea.

Then there was the matter of his temperature and general comfort, because as you moms and dads know ,and we found out quickly, parents don't really know if the baby is too hot or cold unless they are screaming, and even then it's sort of a crap shoot. Our son was born in November, but also November in Florida, so it is hot, then cold, then hot. Rinse and repeat. SO, we dressed him layers at night: onesie, socks, blanket sleeper, and a hat. The hat was an exercise in futility; it never once stayed on for more than five minutes. And of course, with an anxious mom and worry wort dad, we checked constantly to see if it was somehow smothering him.

Three months later, we don't mess with the hats, he sleeps laying down in his bassinet without music hours at night, for which I'm eternally thankful to the big guy upstairs. He's learning to hold on to toys and his feet, and learning to roll to his side. He;s laughing and smiling and clearly thinks we're so silly. Those times are simply the best.

But I'm learning there are challenges with every age. I always naively though I could just keep on doing whatever I did before, but with a baby in tow. After two consecutive baby meltdowns in restaurants this weekend, I realize my life as I knew it is gone. Long gone. Riding into the sunset with its friends, happy hour and a clean house.

Even when he's at his crabbiest, ripping us all a new one because the sun is just way too bright for his liking, all he needs to do is smile at me and I fall more and more in love. We've come a long way in the past three months, Luke, me and hub, us as a family, and we have so much more to learn.

I can't wait to see what other changes are in store.

For you moms and dads, did you realize your life had changed sooner than I did, or am I just slow?