Abbie is PERFECT, and Mom's on a learning curve

Since I started this blog a couple of years ago, I've been lucky to get more than 3 comments on a post...I was pretty sure that those 3 were the only ones who read my blog. So the response to my last post is something that was not expecting and am VERY grateful for (but then again, anything Abbie-related is a lot more interesting than my usual posts).
When we brought Abbie home I started keeping a log of when she ate, for how long, when she slept, and for how long, and diapers. Not long after I made my last post, I was reviewing this log and noticed a couple of patterns (I guess I just hadn't seen them before that point because they weren't the patterns I was looking for or expecting to see). I realized that Little Abbie had a routine of her own and it was one I could work with. Its a funny little routine, and as I've described it to other friends that have kids they seem a little surprised by it.

EX:
Wakes at 4am, eats at 4am & 6:30 am, awake till about 7am then goes down for a nap
Wakes at 10am, eats at 10am, 11:30am, & 12:30pm--usually dozes, or is wide awake between feedings, awake till about 1pm then goes down for a nap
Wakes at 5pm, eats at 5pm, 7pm, & 9:30pm--usually pretty awake in the evening, awake till 10, goes down till about 3am or 4am.

She doesn't really have a schedule--meaning things don't happen at the same time every day, but she does seem to have a routine going--meaning the time between events is pretty consistent. We've had days where things have been completely thrown off, but even that has been good because it gives me a chance to see how she handles her routine at that point. The most consistent aspect of her routine so far has been the 5-6hr stretch Doug and I get at night--last night she went down at 9 and woke up at 2:30 this morning. The number of times she eats per day also seems to be pretty significant for her. She always eats 8 times per day, and more often than not they last between 25 mins-35 mins.
Sometimes she does want to sleep longer, and in that case--because I have a pretty good idea of how it will effect the rest of everyone's day I can make a pretty good call about whether to wake her up or not. And if I do decide to wake her up, I've learned how to recognize the times when she is in a part of her sleep cycle that's lighter, so its much easier to wake her up. The best way to wake her up, though, is lay her down in her bassinet and go get in bed yourself ;)! But we've also started to have a lot of fun with the times that she's awake. Instead of holding her the whole time, we'll lay out a blanket on our bed and let her lay there and kick and look around and "play". As soon as we started that she started making the cutest noises--I feel like she's talking to us, and we have fun talking back.
I'm not usually one to take advice in an "all-or-nothing" sort of way. I would consider myself to be more of a "pick-and-choose" type, but somehow with Babywise I got myself so worried that if I didn't do one aspect of it another aspect wouldn't work, and that if I didn't do it all right away we'd establish a ton of "bad habits". And all of this is so new to me; I don't want to "screw up", and I don't know what causes a "screw-up". But all of the great advice I got in everyone's responses it gave me the courage (lame as that sounds) to try my own thing...and its working pretty well. I'm positive things are not set yet--she could change all of this today! And there is ABSOLUTELY a lot left for me to learn. But at least I've got my head back on about how to work it through. Thank you so much all of you!!!--for your insight, experience, and willingness to share. It helped more than you know.