I Thought All Babies Woke up Crying

So everyone talks about the second child as a lifelong series of short-sticking, emotionally scarring injustices. Hardly any photos of their babyhood. All the holey-kneed hand-me-downs. No overly precious baby book carefully glue-gunned just-so during six months of afternoon naps. And, applying the same basic theory to the internet, these second babies don't get their very own blog either (please see The Making of a Casserole addendum above).

I remember vowing this would never happen, but sweet, chubby Ollie turned five months old last week, and he hasn't had a single entry to himself, forget his very own blog. By this time in Cass' infant life, I'd dutifully, obsessively chronicled his first bath, first roll-over, first case of crusty cradle cap, and the first time I tried to shove some ceremonial rice cereal down his throat. But writing about Ollie feels kind of like bragging: Ollie sleeps through the night (and has since he was two months old). Ollie doesn't cry. Ollie wakes up cooing in his crib. Ollie giggles at the mere suggestion of a smiling face. Ollie drinks from a bottle. Ollie loves to nap. Ollie babbles at the chandelier while lounging peacefully in the clean-lined Oeuf bouncy chair Cass refused to sit in for more than three minutes straight. Ollie likes the baby carrier. Ollie once fell asleep in his stroller while it was--wait for it--standing still. Ollie changes his own diaper!

I'm just going to come right out and say it: Ollie is an easy baby. I am fully aware that this statement alone, according to the universal bylaws of The Official Child-Rearing Handbook of Justice and Karma, means that I have just predetermined a teenage fate rife with back-talking, curfew-blowing shenanigans, sure to rob me of my fair share of sleep. I will be the first to admit it: He's a dangerous one, all right. But that's not why.

Babies this exquisitely, inexplicably... deliriously happy are exactly the kind who trick parents into having another one. Therein lies the danger: Babies like Ollie don't happen twice.