The post we've all been waiting for...

Odegaard baby sleeps through night, mostly.
(Mommy doesn't even come close.)
Seven months after her birth, Kalina Odegaard, baby, sleeps through the night.

This phenomenon is defined here as sleeping until morning without needing any parental intervention.

"If you consider 5:09 morning, then I made it!" exclaims the baby girl.

Her mommy, giddy but groggy, couldn't be more proud. "Everyone told me this would happen someday," Mommy slurred. "I stopped believing them long ago."

The baby alternated between happily cooing and hungrily fussing until her mommy came and got her at 5:27.

When asked how she felt after a full night's rest, Mommy responded: "What do you mean? I woke up every hour and a half and I hardly slept at all after 3:45. About half of those wakings, though, the baby was quiet." Her eyes glazed over before she added, "Kalina fussed at 3:00 and 3:45 before waking again at a little after 5:00. I decided that was just about good enough."

The young girl was caught up in the celebratory spirit this morning, her Uncle Tom's birthday, smiling at everything and even eating a few bites of the solid-meal breakfast of banana and oatmeal her mommy ordered to help make up for the skipped nighttime feeding.

"Mommy said she's making me a cake to celebrate, but I know it's really for the birthday party. That's okay, I don't know what cake is anyway," mentioned Kalina.

The girl easily went down for both morning and afternoon naps, and was generally cooperative throughout the day.

"I think she does better when she sleeps," commented a chipper-yet-also-drowsy Daddy. "I think we all do better when she sleeps."

Mommy is looking forward to a future of the occasional 8-hour night of sleep. However, she may not get there soon. "I've been suffering from insomnia, plus random wake-ups during the night, not to mention the fact that I wake with every noise the baby makes. I'm lucky if I get a 3-hour stretch," she complained for everyone to hear.

"Mommy said we're going to sleep-train her now!" giggled Kalina. "I hope we use the cry-it-out method" she muttered, becoming serious all of a sudden.

The Odegaard parents used a combination of cry-it-out training as well as lots of patience to achieve the desired result of a night of sleep.

"Well, we're not there yet," Daddy warned. "But it does seem like she's finally developmentally ready to sleep long periods of time. She's been waking later and later for her feeding the past week or two, and we can finally consider it morning," he said with a slight groan. "Mommy wanted to celebrate, but all I could think of was 'great, we're up extra early this morning!'"

The family will be turning over a new leaf with the onset of sleep-filled nights. Daddy has been filling in for Mommy during the early mornings with the baby, and will soon get a well-deserved chance to sleep in for a change. Kalina will use her extra sleep to process the millions of things she's learning each day.

Mommy has big plans as well: "With all the extra energy, I plan to write a book on sleep training that reaches out to other suffering parents. I may also start a foundation to fund hotel stays for tired, broken mommies and daddies who just need a break. And after that," she added, "I'll take on a full-time job or two, run for office, build a solar-powered house, tame lions and sew Kalina's entire summer wardrobe. That should keep me busy for a week or two."

She noted crankily that she actually hasn't had a good night of sleep since last April, pregnancy having interfered until the baby took over.

"The last night of sleep before I went into labor was particularly bad," Mommy remembers. "And labor started as I put my head on the pillow that evening. I felt cheated," she admitted.

And so the Odegaards are celebrating their good fortune, glad it's a Saturday so they can spend the day together.

"Maybe I'll even sleep through again tonight!" quipped the baby.