Some Emily milestones (and other stuff)

Miss Emily is pretty awesome. She's 11, almost 12 weeks old now. She started smiling and sleeping through the night (6ish hours) at 6 weeks. Around 7-8 weeks, she started talking a lot. Lots and lots of babbling that we don't really remember with Noah. Lots of Goooo, gaaaa, and a gaaaa with a gurgle in it. She sticks her tongue out lizard baby style and in a way that makes it poke out really pointy. So cute. She's thrown off by the camera and phone, so I've yet to get really good smiles on camera, but we can get her smiling and talking so easily. Still not really laughing. I've gotten a little huh-huh here and there, but not much more than that. The sleeping at night has gotten back to normal after our trip out west (more on that...) She was sleeping well before vacation, but then on vacation and for a couple weeks after, she was waking in the middle of the night (4am-ish) to nurse. Fortunately in the last few days, she's back to sleeping all night. The last several nights she was up at 7:00 or 7:30. This morning I woke her up at 8:30!! She slept a solid 10 hours last night! Woot! Usually, she'll nurse for a short time (10 min) and then go back to sleep for about 3 hrs. **** I go back to work on Thursday, five days from now. Everyone has commented on how fast it went, and it sure did. I think it was because of the holidays and because I kept myself pretty busy. She was born just before Christmas, so there was that and New Years, planning Julie's baby shower, getting the house ready for the shower, and getting all of us ready for vacation. Since we've been back from vacation, I've been trying to slow down, but also working really hard to keep the house in good shape. I want to try to keep it cleaner and less cluttered now, so that we can hopefully get in a good habit when I'm back to work. I've been staying on top of dishes and laundry, but recently told Ben he is going to have to start doing his own laundry. May have to reiterate that one... not that I mind terribly doing it, but with mine, Noah's, Emily's, sheets and towels, the least he can do is wash, fold, and put away his laundry. I'm so sick of doing laundry. I'm ready to go back to work insomuch as I really do like so many of the people I work with and in reality, there are a lot of good things about my job. I have such flexibility and I am good at what I do. But my heart is aching about leaving my sweet Emily. It feels different this time and I think there's two reasons why. One is that I was actually off a little over 14 weeks with Noah, and this will be about 12.5 weeks. Two, and the main difference, is that I'm exclusively nursing Emily and have not left her for longer than an hour or two with Ben. She's only gotten bottles once really (I had the flu at the beginning of the month, and could barely walk, let alone feed the baby.) I'm nervous about how she will do without me, and how I will do without her. I realize we WILL both be fine, but I hate the thought of having to be away from her. I think it was easier with Noah because I was in an established pumping routine and I had left him a few times with sitters... I don't know if being a stay at home mom would work for me, but I genuinely adore my kids and I wish I could have the ability to at least be home with them part-time, and not just evenings and weekends. So much more to write about - vacation, the flu (Noah AND Ben were sick last weekend...) and still the 2nd half of the damn birth story... I'll make it a goal to get that damn birth story down before going back to work.