Having your baby smile at you is a thrill. I still become overwhelmed with joy every time he does it. At the same time, it's terrifying, because I remember that this little creature is a person and will probably end up more intelligent than me.

He will smile in response to me making a funny noise. Usually I'll have him sitting in my lap and I'll lean over so my face is really close. Then I'll make up some very loud animal noise, such as an elephant that just saw a mouse.

He will usually respond in one of three ways. One is he'll smile immediately. It might be that he just likes how goofy I look more than the noise. Secondly, he'll get a confused and concerned look on his face, then smile. I think he's actually responding to the noise in that situation. Thirdly, he'll stick out his lower lip, clearly ready to cry. I have only had that happen a couple of times; I'm not sure if it was the noise I was making or if I scared him or what. It's hilarious when he does it, but it breaks your heart at the same time.

Our cats still behave oddly around Luke. Melissa thinks they're out to get him, but I think they just don't understand why they get so much less attention. Puma will occasionally come up and sniff Luke, but he still won't touch him. Missy caught Puma sleeping in the pack'n'play the other day. "Why would he even want to be in it?" I asked. "Because he knows he's not supposed to be," she replied. She's probably right.

Luke has discovered his hands a few time in the past few days. A couple times I've been occupied with something else, then I notice he's being quiet and I'll look over. He's got both hands up literally inches from his eyes, and he's just staring at them expressionless. It's amazing to watch him learn.

I'm scared he's going to poke his own eye one of these days. He still moves his arms and legs in twitching motions. I like to hold him standing with support, so he basically supports his weight while I keep him from falling. He doesn't really have balance, so he looks like he's making a poor attempt at a hula dance. He'll usually accompany this dance with random giggling, grunting, farting, etc.

I've tried walking him a couple times. Although the instinct to stick his feet out are there, he tends to not want to support his weight in those situations. Along with the standing, Luke likes to demonstrate his leg press ability. For example, when sitting and laying him in my lap, he'll press his legs against my stomach, and sometimes he nearly pushes himself off my lap. Missy predicts he'll be crawling by Christmas.

He's added a lot of weight. His eyes continue to look more brown, but he's clearly a light blonde and has much fairer skin than me, so he's not my clone. Sorry, ladies.

Sleep, Sleep, and More Sleep

Luke has decided to sleep throught he night for the past two nights in a row! I had almost forgotten what a full night of sleep feels like. He goes to bed before 8 and we give him a "dream feed" around 10 or 11. Then it's back to bed until 7a.m. ! I did have to sneak in last night and replace the pacifier to help him stay asleep, but it worked to keep him sleeping! I must admit that my biggest fear in posting this news is that my luck will end and I'll be back to missing that full night of sleep. Thank you to all of you who prayed for Luke's sleeping habits!

Go Colts!

Luke knows what team to cheer for! He watched his first Colts game today. He was happy about spitting up all over his Colts onesie, but not so happy that we tried to make him take a nap during the second half.

Luke Blows Mommy Away

I know that Matt normally writes our posts, but I feel I have to clarify on the farting situation. You see we were sitting in the balcony at church. It was the quiet time right before communion begins when I decided to see if Luke had a dirty diaper. He was sprawled over my lap as I carefully pulled back a portion of his diaper to peek inside. At that exact moment (my hand holding the diaper open and my face not too far away) that he lets out one of his powerful, wet sounding farts! Keri, who was sitting beside me observing the situation, and I both found this to be hillarious! We were trying desparately to stop laughing so that we wouldn't disturb the people around us. I think the guys passing around the comminion trays thought we were nuts because by that time I was wiping away tears from laughing so hard! Luckily, Matt volunteered for the diaper change.

Rolling Over

We told you Luke was freakishly strong. He has proven this theory with his latest "milestone". He rolled over multiple times last week. From what I've read, only some babies can roll over even at three months, and we're at half that.

Luke will also stand up under his own strength (with us keeping him from falling) for several minutes. He will fully support his head, although he still will wildly flail his head around sometimes when he loses control. I'm waiting for the day I come home and Melissa has a giant bruise on her chin.

He's still growing rapidly. His food consumption has increased slightly, but Melissa is keeping up fine. He's eating a lot faster now, so nursing him doesn't take hours at a time; a welcome relief.

He's finally started clumping his diapers together, so we have fewer per day. We've read a lot of material claiming that a nursing baby's poop doesn't smell that much. We disagree. I personally have a sense of smell so poor that I usually step on the skunk before recoiling. However, there is definitely a smell when Luke lightens himself. My thought is that once the baby begins eating solids, the smell will be so relatively bad that I'll think the nursing smell was heavenly.

Luke continues to smile more often. He focuses quite well on things that attract his attention. Flashing lights with music are his favorite.

Missy and I also have a theory that Luke is aware that I have a difficult time putting him to sleep. He will NOT go to sleep for me. Melissa thinks I'm just not patient enough, which is partially true, but I really do wait until he appears to be out like a light before I leave the room. The problem is ten minutes later he wakes himself up.

By the way, there is a built-in sedative in breast milk. The thing is that it really only lasts about ten minutes for us. You'd think that when heavily drugged like that, Luke would just stay asleep. Not the case. After a meal, he's usually completely unconscious, but ten minutes in the crib and the howling begins.

I can't complain, though, he IS sleeping during the night, which is excellent at this stage. He's still waking up about twice during the night, but it's regular and predictable.

During the day, when he naps, Luke grunts. When I say that, I mean he grunts CONSTANTLY. Half the time, you'll hear associated farting. But half the time, it seems like he's doing it for fun. Weird.

We finally took Luke to church on Sunday. He seemed to enjoy the singing, then he fell asleep during the sermon (ha!). We had one instance where he smelled, and promptly farted on Melissa when she checked his diaper. I haven't seen her turn that red with laughter in a long time!

First Road Trip

As our first lengthy road trip with Luke, we went up to the lake for labor day weekend. It was chaotic, exhausting, and fun.

I had poor expectations going into the trip. My sister's baby did not have a good night when she was away from home for the first time. I figured Luke would be equivalent, but he was very good at night. He wakes up about twice a night now, and there's usually a five hour stretch of sleep sometime during the day.

Luke can sleep through noisy conditions. I've discovered that our house has inadvertently been designed to amplify sounds from every room to the nursery. For example, when Melissa gets ice from the fridge ice machine, it sounds like Mt. Saint Helens is erupting. She was preparing a meal the other day, and I actually went down and asked her if she was being intentionally loud. She looked at me funny.

Anyway, the lake cottage is a lot different than home. The fan in the bathroom sounds like a turbine, and our redneck neighbors sometimes think Labor Day is actually the 4th of July, so "bangs" are pretty common. He slept perfectly fine through all of it, though.

Luke apparently thinks I'm funny, or funny looking. He's smiling at me a lot now. I continue to make the stupidest noises and faces I can think of, and he seems to like them. The smiles are very brief, though. He can instantaneously go from smiling to concerned to crying.

It's a different case with mommy. He tends to be more relaxed and sleepy around her. The girls have come up with a "boob pillow" theory, and they're probably right.

He has started clumping his diapers. By clumping I mean he burns through about three or four within an hour. He also gets very fussy when he has a wet or full diaper. Hopefully the clumping will eventually combine to larger, fewer bowel movements, but he's not quite there yet.

Luke took his first boat ride. It was similar to his first car ride. Meaning, he just slept the entire time. He seemed to enjoy the strange new surroundings, though. He listens and watches very intently to his environment, especially when it's unfamiliar.

He's making a larger variety of noises. He also seems to have slighly more control of his arms and hands; you could almost believe he's trying to touch things. He stands up while supported for a pretty long time now.

He met a lot of people on this trip. He's still young enough that he doesn't really know what's going on, so he wasn't shy or anything. He never cries if a stranger holds him, but we'll see if that changes in a couple months.

Packing was horrible. Our car was completely full. He easily had more volume of gear than Melissa and myself combined. "Pack and Plays" are convenient, but they are a pain to transport. I thought Melissa was crazy to pack fifty outfits for Luke to wear in three days, but it was barely enough.

Guess it's time to start pricing minivans.