12: my new favorite number

Levi has been a great sleeper lately and has gone about 12 hours getting up only once to eat.  A few nights ago he went down at 5:15 for a 'nap.'  But it ended up being his bed time and he slept until almost 7am the next morning.  Wowzers!  That happens, though, when you don't hardly nap during the day.

Quality time with Dad

"I'm king of the world!"

Lovin' the football

I'm so afraid that when he goes to bed at 7:00 he'll be up for the day at 5am.  But it's been longer than that, thankfully.  He's been kind of erratic in eating and of course I get worried and google 'low milk production,' etc.  I'm always fine.  He's having normal diaper changes and acting the same, but of course I still worry.
A new realization that I've had is that reading parenting books can be a very bad thing sometimes.  Right now I'm feeding/sleeping, etc. on demand.  And it's working just fine.  We have a little bit of a routine: bed time/bath, morning nap.  But other than that I just do what Levi wants to do.  Well, within reason.  But then I read a book that says I need to have him on a set schedule because that will help me figure out more easily what he needs or why he's upset.  Also because babies need to have a routine.  Well, I'm sorry, but I'm not going to wake up him at 7am if he's not already up just to start a set schedule.  I mean, what real-life mother purposefully wakes up her sleeping baby unless there's an important reason?  And what if he's not ready to eat when the schedule says he should be?  Anyways, I've decided I'm going to be very picky about what I read from now on.  Not that the book doesn't have some good points, but I didn't want to wade through the bad and guilt-inducing ones just to find them.  I love 'What to Expect: the First Year.'  Mostly because it offers 95% information and 5% opinion, which includes the disclaimer that all babies are different and the book should just be a guideline.
Now eventually I do want to have a routine for him.  But I'd rather let it develop around his needs than my own anality.  Is that a word?  Well, I do have a tendancy to be that way, but Levi is definitely mellowing me out.  I'm so thankful that I can be at home with him and have the opportunity to have this lifestyle.
Kind of along those same lines, I've decided not to push solids right now.  Yes, I've read that it's better to wait and start closer to, if not at 6 months for a variety of legit reasons and they seem logical to me.  In all honesty, though, I love nursing him and don't want to let anything interfere with that yet.  I know that even when he starts, breastmilk will still be his primary source of nutrition, but I'm afraid that my milk supply will go down too quickly.  I really want to nurse him as long as I can and hopefully until he's 12 months old.  I guess part of it is that I don't want to have to supplement with formula.  Why do I have such an aversion to that all of a sudden?  Weird.
Yesterday was our second time in the nursery at church and Sunday school went fine.  He slept for most of the time, so...  I went in to feed him before the service and there were a couple other little kids in there.  He was so distracted while nursing and started to cry when another baby was crying.  He's just not used to that extra activity.  So I stayed with him during the service.  He was very clingy.  And then, stupid mommy, I took him down to the lobby to find Tim and that was WAY too much stimulation for him.  It was a bit of a rough morning.
Well, he's been down for over two hours now, so I better post one last picture.

Mommy and her little man