Nine. And. A. Half.

HUGE NEWS: HR slept through the night last night, clocking an unprecedented 9 1/2 hours, not even waking to nurse. I have no idea what prompted it, and I have no realistic expectation that it will happen again anytime soon, but glory glory that was the longest chunk of sleep I've gotten since I was probably 7 months pregnant. And of course I was like, what's wrong with him? Isn't that the first thing you think when things go suspiciously well? He's just fine though, growing up-- probably coming off a growth spurt, actually, as he's 15 weeks today and couldn't seem to get enough chowing down at the boob ranch over the weekend. Oh yeah, and because I was so, er, full by the time he woke up this morning, he had his first "reversal of fortune" due to the unfamiliar abundance of milk. Barf fountain aside, I got a little taste of how other women must feel, women whose babies sleep and who produce milk like goddamn milk-producing-prodigies and it tasted ambrosia-like. So there we have it - a milestone. I expect setbacks, but I'm enjoying it for what it is. Eventually I guess I'll have to sleep train him instead of nursing and rocking him to sleep, but first things first. I'm not into messing with success right now. He sleeps, we sleep, life is good.

About vacation: this is the same summer vacation we take every year, that I've taken every year of my life and my father before me (his mother, at 88, still goes, though she's rented a cabin for the past couple decades instead of tenting). We go to the same campground and go to the beach every day and play games and have campfires and eat lobsters and slap mosquitoes and don't shower much and catch up with the far-flung family and this is our idea of fun. It's amazingly fun, and luckily my husband has come to agree. I remember last year very well, it was probably our best time ever. I was still getting over the miscarriage I'd had a few months earlier (though it turned out that I had my LMP while at the campground and ended up getting pregnant immediately after we returned home), and being in that place with those people was really key to my healing. Suspecting that it would be my last child-free vacation, I really whooped it up the two weeks, eating and drinking and tanning and staying up late and reading book after book. Did I mention drinking? This year was ever so different, but wonderful in its own way. We went to the beach, but I had to stay out of the sun with the baby. I had an occasional cocktail, but I didn't get tipsy on 4 o'clock gin and tonics (that is the best summer drink period). I sat around the campfire, but I had one ear to the camper where the baby was sleeping at all times. But every single member of my father's side of the family got to meet and hold our little one. And we took a couple of days in the middle to go visit my mother and maternal grandmother (my parents have been married for 36 years strong, but, as I tell people, she divorced camping 20 years ago). Unlike other years we took one week instead of two, and I didn't go into psycho packing mode for the trip - I was pretty laissez faire about the whole enterprise but it worked out fine. Next year I'm pretty sure I'll resume my ultra-organized ways and the vacation will be even better, since HR will be old enough to run around and enjoy the beach and the woods. But this year, for all its weird and chaotic vibe, was pretty rad and I'm so glad we got to go. And now I've got to go.