Snuggle Bug

Marie's First Bath was a bit traumatizing. But I got through it. Now her skin seems to be pealing off like a reptile. Weird, but Brett says it's normal. Apparently he was paying more attention to the nurses than me when being explained the "in's and out's" of the neonate.


She is quite the snuggle bug.





Today is Marie's Expected Birthday. I made brownies. Mostly to celebrate the fact that I am not in labor. I've decided that from now I am awarding my children $100 dollars for each day they come before their due date. So far Marie has earned $900. I will then distribute that money in the form of diapers and wipes.



Brett accused me of having her being asleep when he comes home. But considering she sleeps 20 hours a day his odds are pretty bad of catching her when she's awake. But she throws him a bone now and then.

This picture is fortuitous of our relationship throughout her teenage years.

Now I gotta do a posting on the labor details, to a lot of peoples dismay. Just kidding. Not really though because I myself didn't understand a lot of things until 8 days ago. Such things as "being 5-8 minutes apart," being "4 cm dialated," what a pitosin drip is, and the joys of the episiotomy.

Don't fret, I'll get the details soon... unless I start reading "Breaking Dawn" .. oh what a sellout I am.

Little Marie's all grown up

Happy August 1st,

Today is Marie's 5th full day. She has celebrated it by trying to learn how to whistle. Not very good. This is Rachel's 9,050th full day. I am dominating them all at 11,930 days.

I took the week off work, so I've been hanging around the house a lot. When I get bored I ask Rachel if I can wake the baby up.

Marie is really good natured, so far. I hope it lasts. I think the fact that I sleep like a rock through the night helps me to overestimate her good naturedness. So far, I would say, her main talent consists of staring at things. She seems especially fascinated with blank walls. Her eyes get really big when she seems them and she can't look away. She also likes being on her stomach, and she already is as strong as her dad.

Things I've been told Marie is too small for (all instances of The Man keeping her down):

1. Going to baseball games

2. swinging in her swing

3. jumping in her jumper

4. playing soccer

5. crawling

6. walking

7. talking

8. reading

9. swimming (including hot tub)

10. changing her own diaper

11. eating roast

12. hitting stray cats with a tennis racket

In other news, Matt, welcome back to the states. Way to quell the violence in Iraq. Pretty safe to say you left it much better than you found it. All in 12-months work. I'm sure you'll miss the good times you had on that industrial, wooden swing outside of your tent. I will have to dust off the link to your blog. Hopefully The Bubs didn't ruin your car too much.

And also, a quick shout out to Platypi, for taking first place. And the only help they needed from me was to jump start their season with a leadoff triple.

July 27th - A time for babies

Pay no attention to the baby counter at the top of the screen, it's way off. Baby Marie came a few days early. The contractions seemed to step it up a notch on Thursday night. Rachel's family was in San Francisco, and we had a little get together at old Chinatown. For a minute we thought the baby was going to have to be born on the floor of the trashy kitchen alongside the fish bones. Then Saturday came around she was having contractions fairly regularly at about every 15-20 minutes. So we made the obvious choice and decided she should go see Batman. Good thing the baby wasn't quite ready because I guarantee I couldn't have dragged her away from the movie.

Rachel's mom called that night, she was flying in to stay with us for a bit. She was going to fly into Oakland Sunday afternoon, but the flight was booked, so she got onto a Sunday morning flight. I went and picked her up at the airport, and when we came back we found a girl needing to get to the hospital. We went in around 10:30am or so. 10 super-easy hours later the purple-faced girl came out and learned how to breath, poo, pee, eat, and scratch her face. Not bad for a first hour or two. And she was able to magically get her cone head to go away lickety split. She weighs 6 lbs and 5 oz. Pretty humongous. The tiniest clothes we have drape all over her. She has dark brown hair like her mom, and if we're lucky she'll have Rachel's cheeks. Her poo definitely doesn't look like mine, so she probably gets that from Rachel too. And she cries exactly like Bubs watching a Jazz game.

We're really excited, obviously. We've been home from the hospital for two diaper changes now, that is how I will now be keeping track of time. Upon arriving home I immediately tried to put her in her swing, but was shot down b/c she's not ready yet, I guess. So I didn't even try for the jumper. That's all for now.

We Heart Our Guests

Its been a good three months here. If you look to the left column you can see our "CA Approved Awesome" which is a list of the guests we've had so far.
WE LOVE VISITORS! And we have had a great time with everyone!
In fact all visits deserve their own blog entry, but seeing as I have dropped the ball with the blogging I may have to settle for a mass blog entry. (Sorry beloved guests- this doesn't mean I love any of you any less!)



My old friend Jennifer flew out from Boise just to see me! As far as friends go she is a keeper. Monteray Bay, Alcatraz, Old Town Sac, Outlet Shopping!, & classic Fishermans Wharf were all on our list. Check 'em out here if you want to go when you visit us ;)



http://www.mbayaq.org/

http://www.alcatrazcruises.com/

http://www.oldsacramento.com/

http://www.premiumoutlets.com/

http://www.pier39.com/

Millburn boys hate weddings. It's a fact. But I sure like them when they are on the way to my house. Cathy's niece was married near the bay which allowed us to catch up with them for a morning at Fisherman's warf. Note the bat in Max's clenched hand. Uncle "Don" (John) has had an influence on him for the better. Good Job!

Shannon and Eric aren't pictured but they were there also. Colton is getting big! But his mom Brittany isn't even though she's due Oct 22 (My birthday!!! Holla!).
These guys were awesome and stopped on there way to AND from the wedding- so special props to them!

2 years of marriage has taught me awesome "Couple-friends" are hard to come by. That's why we love Faren and Avery (and their cute kids). We've missed them since we all moved from Moscow. They came up to celebrate Faren's big birthday with us and brought their 6 month old Simon. He's got a chubby cheeks and a big smile for anyone who wants to talk to him. He also travels very well which was great for seeing the sights at Haight & Ashbury, Golden Gate Park, seeing a Giants game, driving to Santa Cruz to see the Mystery Spot (http://www.mysteryspot.com/) and gracing the Santa Cruz board walk.

They also were cool enough to come see Brett take the oath of Captain last Friday. It's official.



ok... i have more pictures of our last guests, my brother Jesse, his wife Maresa, baby beth, and my Dad and Malcolm... but my internet is way slow and now burning out so just in case I never get back to this page...

I love my family and I am so happy Jesse flew out here and my dad and Mal biked out through the 101 to see us. My mom is coming next - I'm so happy !!!

OH NO

Um, Rachel's gone. "Visiting teaching" is the excuse she used this time. Now I have to sit here and wonder what to do while she's gone. I'll go see what's in the fridge. Okay, I put a frozen pizza in the toaster oven. I stopped on the way to the fridge for an oreo. Then I grabbed another one on the way back. Next to the oreo's are Fig Newtons, I gave them a dirty look. When I was little I heard they had fly guts in them, so stay away. Plus, they are gross.

Be advised, the smoke is back in the sky.

Ah, I know what I can do, I can put a picture of Rachel on her. Hold on.

This took me forever to do because of a couple of things. For one, I guess I'll just have one hand from now on, hence my one handed typing right now. If you think real hard I bet you can guess what happened. I'll give you a hint, it has to do with the before-mentioned toaster oven. And it has to do with grabbing the burning rack as hard as I could, for some reason.

Well, time to figure out how to one-hand this pizza.

Been Here a While..

Been here a while but have been bad about posting. Time goes by fast when your making mosaics of George Clooney out of Jelly Beans. Alright, maybe I didnt do this fine piece of art, but somebody at the Jelly Belly Factory did. Which- bytheway is right down the street. So come visit us and we'll take you to see how the beans are made.

And if your looking for religion you can get it here also. I found this flyer outside the pool. I hope this guy is Mormon. We need to be more aggressive about missionary work.

This is a personal favorite. On every street corner there is somebody with a sign for a cell phone or a pizza shop... but when do you see them REALLY trying to amuse you. We had to tip this guy.
Oh, and that weird moaning in the background was me laughing so hard I was crying. We watched this guy for way too long...