He wakes up running.

I wish that I could wake up as joyful and energetic as Luke does. I am a morning person (unlike a certain person who shares my bed.....) but I still don't hold a candle to the kid. We have a morning routine that consists of Nate going to get Luke after he has been babbling in his crib for a while. Nate changes his diaper, and brings Luke into our bed for some family cuddle time before Luke and I actually get up for the day. This morning Luke awoke at 7, and Nate went to get him as usual. Its a dark and very rainy day in PA, so it was still dark in our room at 7 AM. Luke came into bed and we stuck him in between us as usual, but today, as it was so dark and 7 am is on the early side of Luke's waking up continuum, we tried to keep our eyes closed, instead of playing with him as we usually do. Luke thought this was HILARIOUS! He cackled with delight, while sticking his sticky little baby fingers directly into our eyeballs and nostrils gleefully. He grabbed onto Nate's nose as though it was a handle, and gave us wet slobbery suck-face "kisses" until he had us both cracking up. Then he commenced with his favorite "non grabbing or kissing Mom or Dad" bed activity ~ Scaling Mt. Pillow in his quest for the holy headboard. Luke LOVES our wrought iron headboard. He climbs up the mounds of pillows and can now reach up to the very top of the headboard. Once he has reached his goal he literally screeches with the thrill of the conquest. Luke is being a parrot for Halloween ~ and I swear, standing up way above our heads, cackling and screeching, he sounded exactly like one. I raised one eyelid and looked up at him ~ my little man, arching his back with laughter, wearing his striped pajamas and his polka dot socks, looked EXACTLY like a bald escapee from a mental asylum. The cutest little escaped lunatic you could ever hope to see, let me tell you.

In other news, Luke seems to be phasing out his middle of the night (3 or 4 am) feeding. Last night he went to bed at 7 as usual, and slept till 6, had a bottle, and slept till 7. This is wonderful, and has been the trend this week, with him even sleeping as late as 8. Heaven. The only issue is that he has me very effectively sleep trained......I wake up around 3.30 every morning waiting to hear him. One beautiful side effect ~ this morning as I was laying there I felt Deuce start to move.....and when I put my hand on my belly I felt two distinct kicks from the outside. That was the first time this has happened this pregnancy. I have been worried that this pregnancy would not be as thrilling or special to me now that I have already "been there done that" if you will. But in the still dark of the night, feeling those two distinct little "hello's" from my tiny unborn babe with my hand....tears came to my eyes instantly. I honestly think that it was the first moment that I truly became aware that there is a baby in there. Our baby. And I love that baby already.

Excuse the bad pic, I need to take some new ones.....this Luke and I having a wrestle during dinner the other night....he in his PJ's and me in my gross gym clothes. I won the wrestle with a convincing pin/tickle combo maneuver. Someday Luke will likely tower over me, so I'm taking my wrestling victories while I can still get them. :)