I’m sure all parents get deliriously excited about their child reaching a significant developmental milestone. Up until this week, I’d kept a pretty even keel.

Then I watched Madison crawl across the floor.

She’d actually taken the first step – er, scooch – toward crawling quite awhile ago, pushing off with her little legs while inching forward on her forehead. That was almost four months ago, so we had come to expect more rapid crawling than your average baby. After that, though, her crawling progress stopped, in part because she would get extremely angry every time she was on her tummy. We did what we were supposed to do – keep putting her down like that, despite her protestations – but she would just lay there and yell at us. (I believe she gets that attitude from her mom.)

Then, a few nights ago, she resumed her forehead-first approach, with one major development: She went halfway across our living room. The rug burn faded quickly, amid her excitement about our cheering.

Then, on Wednesday night, she decided she’d stop leading with her noggin and started legitimately crawling. Her form still isn’t quite perfect – she basically does a push-up, pauses in a “plank” position, then pulls her legs up underneath her. Then she starts the process again.

Now, before this blessed event occurred, our veteran parenting friends warned us that we did not want Maddie to be mobile. And we understood why they would say that: A baby who’ll lie on the floor and calmly self-entertain by staring at the ceiling fan, or who’ll sit in her bouncy seat and do nothing more is certainly easier to deal with than one who’s on the move.

But what our friends didn’t understand – at least, not until they’d spent significant time with Maddie – was how getting her crawling would actually make our lives easier. Addicted to stimuli, she hasn’t really been the lay-around-and-do-nothing kind of baby since the day we brought her home. She always has to be engaged in some way or entertained in some way, always wants to be on the move, constantly has to be doing something. (She gets that from her dad.)

And while her motor skills gradually improved to the point where she could do certain things to self-entertainment activities (she loves her Fisher-Price Roll-A-Round balls, for example), her favorite activity had been walking – with her mom or dad hunched over, so she could hold onto an index finger on each hand as she walked (the highlight of her visit to Chicago to see her Uncle Charles – Robinson, of Yahoo! Sports – was walking up and down the long hallway of his condo).

This way, we figure that, having baby-proofed the house, if we put up our baby gates, we can trap her in rooms with us and let her roam around and play with toys – which theoretically might allow me to start getting some work done when she’s around.

Then again, as I’m sure some of you dads will tell me, she’ll just find another way to distract me and keep me from accomplishing anything whenever she’s around.

I am not, by nature, a morning person.

I’ve always tried to blame it on the job, from covering Monday Night Football to learning late-breaking news to having a schedule that made it easy to sleep in. When I was at the Wisconsin State Journal, it was the old newspaper deadlines; at ESPNMilwaukee.com and ESPNMadison.com, I have been known to pull all-nighters after games – even afternoon ones – writing my four or five stories.

But the truth is, I never have been a fan of mornings. My mom would tell you that it took four or five wake-up calls – and the threat of missing the bus – to get me up for school as a kid, and Paula would tell you that she used to accomplish half of her to-do list before I started my day.

My schedule changed significantly upon Madison’s arrival, of course. There were late nights and early mornings at the beginning; once Madison started sleeping through the night – luckily for us, that was at about 9 ½ weeks – she’d zonk out at around 9:30 and wake up at 5:30.

Not a schedule I particularly liked, either, I must admit.

I learned fairly quickly that the early-to-rise portion of the program demanded an early-to-bed approach, which I still haven’t quite adjusted to.

But here’s the thing: Every morning – and I mean every morning – she wakes up with this ear-to-ear, happiest-baby-on-the-block smile. I’m not sure I’ve woken up that happy even one morning, and she wakes up like that every morning.

It almost inspires me to be a morning person myself.

Almost.

Veteran dads with teenage girls wasted no time in warning me. Madison wasn’t even born yet, and they’d already felt the need to alert me that eventually, Maddie and her mom would not see eye-to-eye on, well, anything. I would have to serve as mediator on such hotly debated issues as the importance of makeup, the proper length of a skirts, the need for a vegetarian option on the nightly dinner menu, household chores being a form child abuse, the insufferable embarrassment of being seen together at the mall and on and on.

Something about hormones and such, I was told. I wasn’t really listening. I figured I wouldn’t have to don my striped Foot Locker pullover and whistle until Madison was at least 12.

Turns out, I’m already the Ed Hochuli of my household and Madison is only 4 ½ months.

Let me preface this by saying that Paula is a terrific mom. She is a natural. Having considerably more previous baby experience than her husband, she always seemed to know exactly what to do from the moment Madison arrived.

But these days, it appears Madison has figured out – in another example of her being ahead of the curve for her age – the best way to get her mom’s goat. She has an uncanny ability to save any major-spit ups until I hand her off to Paula, delivering a perfectly timed dousing within a minute of the switch. This morning, Paula was on her third outfit by the time she left the house just after noon.

My otherwise wonderful offspring also seems to be hell-bent on saving her Mad Maddie moments for when her dad is on the radio and unable to help quell her. While she’s gotten better with her Tuesday-Thursday behavior during my visits with Homer while her mom is coaching, she’s still game for a good meltdown during my 11:30 appearance with the boys from The D-List, like the one she had today.

Even with Madison’s bedroom door closed, I could hear her wailing throughout my chat with Dan and Drew. “Take care, be good” had barely passed my lips when I made a mad dash for her room, where Paula was fumbling with Maddie’s pink iPod and docking station.

(We learned early on that the phrase music soothes the savage beast was particularly applicable to our daughter, who has gotten considerable use out of her iPod and her 100-song playlist. Train’s “Hey, Soul Sister” has an incredible calming effect that neither Paula nor I can explain.)

On the cusp of a meltdown herself, Paula passed Mad Maddie off and we went into our usual shush-dance combo, which worked, as usual. Slightly exasperated, the look on Paula’s face was one part relief, one part annoyance.

I, of course, just smiled, thinking about how this figures to continue for, oh, about the next 18 years or so.

When Madison was born, I must admit, the first thing I did – besides start crying -- was count her fingers and toes. Finding 10 of each, I breathed a sigh of relief.

Then I really started worrying. It wasn’t a surprise – I knew that my paternal instincts would trend toward the worrying more than I should. Around other people’s kids, the phrase you’ll hear most out of my mouth is “Be careful.” With our new playset in the backyard, that phrase figures to be worn out by summer’s end.

So predictably, following Madison’s arrival, I worried about everything. She didn’t pass her initial hearing test. Oh my god, she’s going to be deaf, I thought. She started spitting up everything she ate. Oh my god, she’s got some rare intestinal disorder. That’s how my mind worked. I was like George Costanza. Lupus? Is it Lupus?

As it turned out, we were blessed with a happy, healthy little girl. With one minor exception.

Madison’s doctor told us the day after her arrival that her hips were loose. Immediately, of course I thought about the worst-case scenario: That her future as an elite gymnast (like her mom) or as a below-average baseball player and golfer (like her dad) might be in serious jeopardy. That she’d have to wear a body cast for six months to correct her condition.

The reality was that it’s a common condition – think about how squished babies are in the womb and how flexible they have to be – and it almost always resolves itself.

Nevertheless, when we went a few weeks later to have an MRI done on her hips, and the scan showed that her left hip was still loose, my worrying only got worse.

When we took her for her second MRI a month later, her hips had tightened up, just as predicted. We now have a little Maddie intent on walking before she crawls, one who is able to climb up on her bouncy seat or up her mom or dad in an attempt to dive over their shoulder to freedom.

But it served as a reminder of what so many parents face when their little bundles of joy arrive, and how impressed I constantly am by the way they handle those challenges. We’re thankful we haven’t faced those with Madison, but we realize we might down the road with our (hopefully) future kids.

Here’s to all you moms and dads out there who face down these difficult moments and overcome them.

When her maternity leave ended, Paula decided not to return to her position at Community Bank & Trust in Appleton – a decision that was a no-brainer for us, given the fact that the commute to and from Appleton (40-45 minutes) and a 40-hour work week would’ve meant Paula spending limited time with Madison and us forking out some significant money for daily child care during the NFL season.

Instead, Paula is working 20 or so hours a week – primarily evenings – returning to her first love: Coaching gymnastics. A former elite gymnast – Madison’s athleticism comes solely from her mom, while her appetite and cankles are thanks to her dad – Paula has reunited with one of her mentors and is part of the coaching staff for the Sheboygan/Manitowoc YMCA team. The schedule is conducive to me being able to watch Madison when Paula is gone, with the only real drawback being a potential Madison meltdown during my daily visit with Homer and Thunder, and figuring out what to do with her if there’s a big breaking news story.

So it was on Tuesday night, with the NFL set to release its 2010 schedule at 6 p.m., right in the middle of my shift with Madison. It left me with two options: Potentially typing one-handed with a crying baby in my arm, or giving her up for a few hours to one of the many babysitting volunteers we’ve been lucky to get since her arrival. I decided the smart play was to enlist Paula’s aunt and uncle, Bob and Nicole, and their three kids for Maddie Duty.

Everything worked out great – Madison was a dream for the Hoffmanns to deal with, and I got all my work done – but I have to admit my mind wandered during that three-hour window, wondering how she was doing and making me feel like I was shirking my responsibilities in some way.

I’d been away from her before, having attended the NFL Scouting Combine in Indianapolis about five weeks after her arrival, but that was different – I had to be away from her. This time, I’d chosen to be away from her so I could get something done.

I’m told that this is natural for parents – and it’s probably the reason why moms and dads don’t go out as often once their little one arrives. We’ve made a deal to keep our weekly “Date Night” alive, but so far, it’s been “Date Night +1” whenever we’ve gone – despite more generous offers to take Madison for the evening.

My next challenge will be to take Paula out for a night on the town – bustling metropolis that Green Bay is – without Madison in tow. For now, though, I’m just focused on three nights without her for the elongated NFL Draft, which kicks off tomorrow night. Of course, I could just include her in my draft coverage – after all, her guess on the Packers’ pick at No. 23 has just as much chance of being right as mine.

Some called us courageous; others, just crazy. Some asked, “Why?” while others said, “Why not?”

I’d known I was going to the NFL Meetings in Orlando for months. My ticket on Midwest Airlines (which truly is “The best care in the air,” in my opinion) had been booked, my hotel room reserved, my rental car ordered. I’d even packed four days ahead of my Saturday departure – a rarity for me.

And then, I lost my mind.

Two days before I was supposed to leave, I received an email from a PR staffer at ESPN’s Wide World of Sports complex, one of the Disney theme parks. In conjunction with the NFL Meetings, the Worldwide Leader in Sports was offering up complimentary admission tickets – called “park-hopper” passes – to all of the parks: the Magic Kingdom, Epcot, the Animal Kingdom, etc. The next thing I knew, I was suggesting what was previously unthinkable: Bringing Paula and Madison, not even 10 weeks old, along and taking them to Disney World after the NFL Meetings concluded.

Temporary insanity? Perhaps. I think what emboldened us was that Madison had started sleeping through the night a few days earlier (something she continues to do, I’m happy to report), and her colicky behavior, which had been a challenge early on, had more or less subsided (although it still rears its ugly head occasionally … like today).

Still, we had our concerns, so we chose to let fate decide. If we were able to get Paula and Madison onto my same outbound flight, and change my ticket so the three of us could fly home on Friday together, all for a reasonable price, we’d give it a shot. And when we managed to make the flight schedule work, we were all-in.

And then, panic set in.

I’m generally not a nervous person. I stayed calm on my wedding day, held it together pretty well when Madison was born, have never been afraid of public speaking. But the thought of a 2 ½ hour flight from Milwaukee to Orlando spent with Madison in complete meltdown mode terrified me. For almost 15 years on the Packers beat, I’d been that single guy on airplanes, frustrated with the idiot jamming a Jet Ski into the overhead bin and thinking “Shut that kid up already!” whenever a child’s wailing would penetrate my noise-canceling headphones.

Payback, I figured, would not be a bitch, but a pint-sized screaming female Wilde.

Instead, remarkably, Maddie was an absolute pleasure to travel with. She drank her bottle, slept for most of the flight, and was cheery when she woke up for the last 25 minutes before landing. She never fussed, much less melted down. I’ve had much worse travel companions during my sportswriting career, that’s for sure.

Once in Orlando, aside from the challenge of Paula and Madison finding things to do during the day while I was working at the Ritz-Carlton Grande Lakes resort, things could not have gone better. Madison was on sensory overload at the NFL reception event on Monday night before falling asleep in the arms of Nancy McCaskey, the wife of Bears president Mike McCaskey (they happened to be sitting at our table) who I’m sure subconsciously made Maddie a Bears fan for life. Madison even met Mike McCarthy, who immediately questioned my work as a dad – turnabout being fair play, given how often I question his coaching.

The big joke about our trip to Disney World, of course, was that instead of it being a trip Madison would never forget, it instead would be a trip she’d never remember. Thankfully, she’ll always have the video. (Which you can watch here.)

Nonetheless, despite the occasional crooked look from a passerby – who I’m sure was asking, “Who brings a 10-week-old to Disney World?” (Answer: "New parents with free tickets.") – Madison seemed to enjoy herself. She met Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Pluto and Goofy, and also met three of the famed princesses – Sleeping Beauty (her favorite, based on her reaction), Cinderella (take her or leave her) and Belle, whom she nearly spit up upon. (A story that I’m sure she told when she got home to her husband, or the Beast if she’s a method actress.)

The nerves about the flight home set in shortly after we passed the “See You Real Soon” sign as we exited the Magic Kingdom, but it turned out to be wasted energy again. She was fast asleep as we went through the cluster-you-know-what of security at the Orlando airport (Have you ever been through there? It’s about as organized as drunk college kids storming the court after an upset of a sometimes barely ranked opponent) and didn’t fuss when her dad was delayed by a random screening.

While she had a 5-minute episode midway through the flight where she got restless and cried a bit, it was nothing a few roundtrips up and down the aisle – and a visit to the Green Bay Press-Gazette’s Rob Demovsky a few rows behind us – couldn’t cure.

So as it turned out, our crazy last-minute decision to boldly go where few parents had been foolish enough to go before wasn’t so bad after all. It certainly wasn’t as bad as the flight home was for the overmatched mom across the aisle, whose trip with her 4-year-old was punctuated shortly before touchdown with the exclamation, “Ouch! You will not BITE ME!”

Of course, I’m not getting cocky just yet. That could be me with teeth marks in my palm someday. But not this time.