We Have a Schoocher!

It's official: Rutherford can scooch forward! He has been trying and trying for a few weeks now, and yesterday he started schooching a few inches towards toys - so proud! He gets really excited and Ned and I think it must be really satisfying for him to have some control over his movements, as he's always gotten frustrated when he can't get to where he wants to go!

The down side is we've definitely got to get moving on baby proofing - we haven't done a thing! Outlet covers, cabinet locks, sharp edges, etc. Our house is like a baby accident waiting to happen right now! I do have a really nice gate so at least I can confine him to a few select areas :)

This weekend our big guy turns six months - we'll be starting solid foods - woohoo! Oatmeal is on the menu for the next week or so, we'll see how he does with it. Poor guy has been teething this past week - we feel really bad for him. Sometimes he grumbles and cries and I can tell his little mouth hurts :( It's not easy growing up!

It has been one perfect day after another, mid to high 70s and clear as a bell. We're celebrating Friday by taking the family to the La Mesa farmer's market this afternoon. Hopefully we can find some good organic produce that Mr. Man can try out. It will be so fun to start cooking for him!

Here's the Schoocher in action:

Merry Christmas!

Rutherford's first Christmas was awesomeo! Ned and are were laughing about how different the holiday is now - definitely more difficult (wrangling a baby, adhering to his strict timetable, trying to get everything done while he takes a 30-minute nap, lol), but so rewarding. It was so much fun to see him nomming on wrapping paper and to see what he thought of all the sweet, fun gifts he received.

Some Osh Kosh B'Gosh engineer overalls from Grammy and Grandpa. Can't wait for him to wear these to the miniature railroad at Balboa Park this spring!

Chad and Esther and Sylvian found one of the best baby toys ever - I'm not even sure what it's called, but it jingled and jangled and R loved it!

A Mickey Mouse (!!!) baby laptop from Neddie's sister Ellen. Rutherford is obsessed with mashing on my keyboard so this is great - one he can drool on and bang on the buttons with abandon.

One of the gifts we got him was a band-in-a-box, a little set of elementary school-type instruments. R really likes music and dancing so I thought he'd like us making music for him. There's some maracas, a triangle, jingle bells and multiple wooden noisemaker thingies. He loves it already!
The Houston Grands sent him some goodies, he loves this handmade monkey, he went right for it when he opened it up!

Can't forget the BoSox hat! That one was a surprise for Neddie :) R looks adorbs in it! Merry Christmas to our little boy!

Rutherford at Play

Little man has become more mobile (not crawling yet, but lots of directional rolling!) and better at playing with toys - it's cute when he spots something he wants and then rolls toward it!

We have been hanging out a lot on his Mickey blankie, listening to Christmas songs and playing - sometimes he helps me wrap pressies! Here's some playful Rutherford video:

Christmas is So Close!

I can't believe Christmas is almost here - just a few weeks away. Last year at this time I remember feeling pretty blah - just first trimester yucky stuff - and we didn't do lights or decorate or anything. This year, we've already got our lights up, tree is decorated and there's even a small stack of gifts underneath! I had fun shopping for R, just getting him a few cool things here and there.
Also also got the whole family (even the doggies) new stockings from an adorable shop on etsy, rikrak. Here's an example of her stuff:


So adorable! Rutherford has trees on his, Neddie has a cool retro pattern and I got a hot pink stocking with white flowers. Love them!

Rutherford has been a charmer this weekend, such a sweet little boy. He has been sleeping a bit better at night and that helps SOOO much!

Tonight Neddie is going to make us a roast chicken and some veggies. And yesterday he made us teriayki stir fry AND hung up the Christmas lights. I have two sweet boys!

Five Months Old!

Our little guy is growing up so fast. I know everyone says it but it's just remarkable to watch him learn so quickly and begin forming his own little personality. He has become quite the grabby little dude the past few weeks - anything within reach becomes the most interesting thing in the world - newspapers, dishes, doggies, and especially remote controls or my phone. This will be one technologically-savvy baby, mark my words.
Gearing up for Christmas now, going to try and put up our vintage tree this weekend and maybe some lights, too. I'm almost done with our Christmas shopping, now just have to start wrapping everything up!
Here's some beauty shots I took just a few days ago. Love our man!

Halloween (Eh It's a Bit Late I Know...)

Rutherford's first of two costumes - a pea in the pod! Mariel brought it for him from SFO. Adorbs! He was also a doggie (thanks to our next-door neighbor Nico's costume from when he was a baby), I have some pics of those, just gotta grab them off the camera. I love the pea, though! He is such a good sport!

Four Month Doctor Visit

Rutherford went for his four-month appointment today. And basically, he's a healthy, awesome baby. He now weighs 16 pounds (!!!) and is 26 inches tall. He's right about the 90th percentile right now, but Dr. G was saying that breastfed babies often grow bigger faster, then taper off to match up with their formula-fed counterparts. As long as he's healthy we're happy!

She was impressed with his developmental milestones - rolling over both ways, vocalizations (R is quite the shrieker/squeaker lately!) and social interaction. He's lightyears ahead of those other babies! Haha :)

We also got the go-ahead to start trying some solid foods if we'd like to. I'm not sure when exactly we'll start, but probably around Christmas. I think it will be fun to experiment with some pureed green beans or something to celebrate the holiday! We have to start with rice cereal, then after a week or so work into "food food." R is definitely ready. When I'm nursing and eating (often a necessity), he is starting to get really interested in what I'm nomming on. Today he looked very jealous of my Starbuck's coffee cake.

And here's our guy trying to eat his playpen. Yum!

They Call Me the Squeaker

R does this little squeaking thing lately. Soooo adorbs!

Gigglin' Rutherford

Rutherford thinks papa is SO FUNNY! Even when Neddie is just talking about his day, or a work project, R gets a big smile on his face and often giggles. I call Neddie the "Fun Guy" as R lights up like a Christmas tree when he sees him.



Speaking of Christmas trees, I can't believe that Christmas will be here soon. My mom and I picked up a few things for Ford at the outlets (engineer overalls y'all!) and I can't wait to start wrapping up pressies for him! I'm looking forward to decorating a bit this year, too. Definitely some lights at least - last year I had such bad morning sickness we didn't do anything at all, ha!

We've been having some sleepytime troubles with R so we're trying some new techniques. Literally been waking up every hour over the past several nights. We're sooo hoping it's a phase!

Pho with Rutherford

This past weekend was nice and cold and rainy - perfect pho weather :) We took R to a new place on Convoy and it was THE BOMB! Super delicious and a cute little restaurant to boot. He's a pretty good sport when we go out into the real world, he likes looking around and checking everything out.
A little kissie time with mama...
...and papa introducing him to the smell of fresh cilantro :) I love how small he looks in neddie's arms. My boys are the best!

Nom nom nom

R is getting the hang of the exersaucer more and more. His favorite thing seems to be nomming on the toys. And the snack tray. There's always a nice coating of baby drool on it!

Rutherford and the Zoo!

I have started feeling more and more comfortable getting out and about with R. It's a big job (especially by yourself) - lugging the carseat, changing him in public restrooms, keeping the sun outta his little baby eyeballs, etc. But, I have to say, he's a pretty good sport. So far we've been to the zoo twice! I think it will turn into our spot, as with our family passes we get in free and it's just a few minutes from the house.

Today we hit it up with Aimee and Ryder - who is now nine months old! He is adorable and we had a good time pushing our strollers around the park and nomming on some popcorn. (Haha I accidentally rammed into Aimee's stroller with mine as I was fishing around for popcorn and a bunch flew all over Rutherford and the ground.) We checked out the flamingos, elephants, lions and more. I'm hoping R&R become buds:


On the way out, we checked out the kiddie stuff in the gift shop. I tried some sunglasses on my guy... he really is ridiculously cute!

Bubble Boy

Little guy has started to talk more and more - and right now he's blowing bubbles when he's conversing. Too cute. I love his little Rutherford babble.

The Exersaucer!

Rutherford's new toy. This video is only a couple weeks old and he can already touch the bottom with his toes! He's growing so fast!

I love how cute and wobbly he looks in it, I prop him up with some blankies but even now he seems to be growing some muscles to help himself stand up straighter. Soon he'll be able to spin himself around at top speed :)

He's Done It :)

Rutherford can roll over - I think this kid may be walking in a few weeks! It's really interesting how hard he works to do it - making those baby muscles feel the burn. He gets all red-faced and huffin and puffin sometimes. Haha! So proud of our little guy, he's really growing up now!

Rolling Over!

Back to tummy for the first time tonight! And then tummy to back! I actually had to pick him up as I was worried he'd roll into the coffee table. Hopefully can catch it on film soon :)

Rutherford's First Date

My new friend Colleen had her baby just a few weeks after Rutherford. Little Penelope came by for a visit and we got a couple good videos of them. The slow couch fall is especially awesome. Buds for life! Oh and I love how we're trying to force the hand holding! We are super annoying mommies! :)

Three Months Old!

Our little guy is three months old today! He is growing into such a sweet, happy, cute, wonderful little man. I love hanging out with him and watching him explore his world. He's now starting to be interested in toys a bit more, so I busted out a baby shower gift - some cute keys that have buttons with little noises and phrases. He thinks they're pretty cool :)

Rutherford's First Book

A friend of Charlotte's sent us some fun soft books for R. This one is called "Peekabo Forest" and it has fun crunchy noises that he just loves. We read it a couple times a day, and now he's even begun reaching for the crinkly parts himself and playing with them, putting them in his mouth, etc. Very cute!

Longhorns :)

Our friends in Austin, Sato and Connie, sent Rutherford some AWESOME Texas onesies - here's our little guy and his papa modeling their burnt orange:
We watched Texas kick UCLA's butt and just hung out this weekend. On Sunday, my brother and sister in law came down and finally got to meet Rutherford! He gave them some good smiles and we all caught up. Ford has been doing well, I swear he gets cuter and cuter every day. I really love being with him and I'm so grateful I don't have to return to a nine-to-five job right now. I can't imagine being away from him all day. I really feel for moms who have to do that.
We're just a few weeks away from starting our deck renovation project! We're going to completely redo the decks with trex and glass panels. I am so stoked, I think it will really make a huge freakin difference. It will be a long project, a couple weeks, but sooo worth it. Hopefully we have a pretty fall so we can enjoy it - but San Diego is pretty awesome during this time of year so I forsee some sweet nights enjoying the sunset with the fam while hanging outside. :)

The Bouncie Turtle Seat

Ford is really moving around more - he loves swinging his arms and legs now, sometimes he goes nuts on the changing table. It's super cute! Another big milestone has been his ability to hold objects - although for just a short period of time, he has held his rattles and even shaken them a bit. I learned the hard way to only give him soft rattles right now... he bonked his head with a plastic one the other day and hurt himself :( I think it mainly scared him but lesson learned!
Here's a vid of him in his bouncie seat last night, we usually put him in here when we're having dinner. He really likes looking at the little turtle and froggie toys!

Tall Baby!

We took R in for his 2-month doctor appointment today. Everything is looking good and we got an update on his growth! He weighs 12 pounds, three ounces (!) and is 24 inches long. That places him in the 43rd percentile for weight and the 70th percentile for height - so maybe he'll be tall and slim! :) A couple things we have to work on is getting more info on his vaccines (we're not yet sure what we'll be giving him at what time, we'd like to space them our more so than the traditional schedule) and more tummy time. Time to get to work!

Rutherford & the Great Blackout of 2011

It was a week of firsts for little Ford. Earlier this week we had a freak rainstorm (rain in September? Crazy!) that marked his first rainy day. And then, yesterday, we went through a blackout - apparently the largest in SoCal's history and definitely on the list of largest power outages nationwide.

It's been wayyy hot the past few days - Ned's poor parents were sleeping out the stuffy guesthouse before they left - and Ned and I were sitting in our room around 3:30pm as the a/c only works upstairs and we had the room cool-ish plus TWO fans. I was nursing the baby and we were chatting about dinner. All of the sudden, the fans went off and everything got super quiet. When the power doesn't come back on within seconds, you know something is up!

I got on Facebook and quickly saw my friends scattered throughout the county were all in the same boat. I knew if it was countywide it could be bad. With hours left until the weather was predicted to cool off, I started to worry about the baby. We gathered all our stuff and hung out for a while in the coolest spot, which happened to be my office. We put R in his playpen and fanned him with magazines until he got hungry again - luckily by then the weather had cooled off some and we could open the windows - and the breeze was back which was awesome!

While the baby ate, Neddie did some emergency preparedness stuff - got the candles and flashlights together, collected our bottled water, etc. He made sure I had the cold water and even fanned us both while I was nursing - what a good papa! The light seemed to be fading fast so we headed up after R was done to make some sandwiches and get ready for the evening. By this time, Twitter and the online newspapers (we had charges on our iPhones so we could check the news online, thank you God for that!) were saying the outage could be into Saturday - and that it stretched from AZ to the OC and down to Mexico - insane!

We set R out on the deck in his diaper and in his bouncie seat while we had turkey sandwiches and ginger ale. Here he is dining al fresco with us:

As the sun went down, the view was weird - no lights anywhere except for SDSU and the freeways. Eerie. Kind of made me think the zombie apocalypse was upon us!

Fortunately no zombies came wandering down our street and Neddie and I fed the baby, got him to sleep and tried to get some rest. A little before 2am we both woke up - and three minutes later the power came back on! The fans and the Hello kitty humidifier jumped to life and we were on the grid again :) All in all, for the extent of the outage, I was surprised it was back on so quickly, so I was grateful for that. Also my breastmilk stash in the fridge stayed frozen so I was SUPER grateful for that - 40 oz!

Neddie's parents also avoided the mess, their plane took off just an hour or so before the outage. Lucky as everything was grounded at the airport! I learned that I definitely have to set up some better emergency supplies for us, though - you never know when the real zombie apocalypse will occur!

The Houston Grands

This week Neddie's parents are visiting from Houston! Rutherford finally gets to meet them, and vice versa. I must say they have taken to the whole grandparent thing very well :) Ford loves hanging out with them and he's been giving them lots and lots of smiles and some giggles, too.
It's been nice and lazy, we've mainly just been hanging out, going to a quick meal here and there and catching up. The first night we all went to Nicolosi's! It was Ford's first trip there and now he's truly a Hemus.
Rutherford has been more and more interactive - more responsive to talking, and he likes to carry on cooing conversations with people as well. Sometimes it makes him laugh which just melts my heart. I love that big gummy giggle.
He's also been sleeping pretty well! In the past few days we've had some seven- and eight-hour stretches. Kind of amazing, I wake up all refreshed which is a nice change :) Here's a happy sleeping baby pic:
Oops, I hear someone stirring, gotta go!

Magic Mobile

Bought new mobile - it spins around, plays music and has three little colorful stuffies that look down at him - Rutherford approved!

Naptime Wake-Up

Ford has become wayyyyy more open to naps over the past week. In fact, I think he's starting to enjoy them a bit :) When I come to wake him up to eat, he's usually pretty smiley and sweet...

Monday Morning Smiles

My baby is much too cute...

7 Weeks!!! (Plus a few beauty shots)

Time seems to be going fast - a friend of Ned's said that with kids, you have long days and short years. I can see what he means. Each day comes with its own challenges and taking care of Rutherford is a full-time job and then some - but now when I look at him I realize that his "newborn" stage is almost over and he'll never be that small again. It really is bittersweet.

On the sweet side, him growing up means he's becoming a little smiley boy! It is so much fun to watch him start to come alive, reacting to facial expressions, focusing on patterns and toys, even a couple giggles each day. He's made some big strides in the past week independence-wise, too. For several weeks we've basically been unable to put him down (he would awaken immediately and be upset), although he's always been pretty good at sleeping at night (thank God!). Over the past week, however, he's been content in his crib - napping or just kind of looking around and at his mobile - for stretches of about 30-60 minutes. It's nice, helps me get a few things done around the house :) This past week I even made a crock pot dinner, it was my first cooking experience since he was born. I made our super healthy and yummy sausage-lentil-barley stew. We call it "hippie gruel" and it's freakin tasty.

Here's some pics from an impromptu shoot I did last week, I got some excellent Ford beauty shots!


In other news, I think this week I'll be going back to blonde - hurray! This brown shit is for the birds! It's a freakin long process so hopefully Neddie won't mind watching Ford for a few hours while I'm getting my girl on :) Today I also went out to pick up some new plants for the backyard - it's starting to look halfway decent back there! The grapevines are doing well along the fence and the Valencia orange looks happy. Today I bought some cool, modern-looking, drought-tolerant plants: some flax, ornamental grass, more bells of fire (the hummingbirds love those things) and some salvia. Best bonus is Ernie (our gardener) is going to come by this week and plant them for me - woohoo.

Also, Ford's Houston grandparents are coming to visit soon! They're coming to town in a few weeks and we're excited about finally introducing them to their first grandbaby. I'm hoping we can do some fun out of the house stuff, maybe a quick trip to the zoo or Coronado. For sure we can have some local picnics, Neddie and I tried that last Thursday and it went just peachy.

More soon!

RHE and the Activity Mat

Three weeks and four days, starting to enjoy some of his toys/gear. He especially liked looking in the little mirror :)

RHE Swinging to Classical

RHE is Here - Videos :)

I have to still blog about so much - the birth, the last ten days in the NICU, etc., but I had some videos of our new baby boy to share - he is the cutest!

40 Weeks - The Waiting Game

40 weeks and one day today. Having some inconsistent contractions, but I think they're just practice ones. Some lower back pain too which I'm taking as a good sign - hopefully this baby decides to come soon!

Our acupuncturist gave us some techniques to try at home, so we're doing those today, along with a nice walk at the lake. More than anything I want the baby to come naturally so I'm praying it gets to go that way! Hopefully more info soon!

38 Weeks - Relaxation, Assembly :)

38 weeks as of yesterday! We really can't wait until the baby decides to come, we're so ready to meet him/her! I'm even looking forward to labor :)

Feeling really good. Swollen feet and legs and sleeping isn't perfect, but really everything's pretty cool. I feel lucky. We've been eating really well, too, which I think helps. We've been cooking at home and making double/triple batches of yummy food for when baby arrives! So far in the guest house freeze we have two trays of healthy enchiladas, bran muffins, some chocolate-chip yogurt cookies, hippie gruel (sausage, lentil and barley soup, really yums) and two turkey meatloaves - wewt! Tomorrow I think I'm going to try and make some gyoza - never tried dumplings before, so we'll see.

This week we got a lot of baby stuff done. We ended up getting our crib and coordinating changing table and putting them together, here's Neddie working his Ikea magic:

Now I'm just waiting on a few supplies from Amazon and we'll be all set up for middle-of-the-night feedings and such :) We went ahead and set the Gulliver crib from Ikea up in the bedroom, too. Got a very nice mattress for it. Originally we were thinking we were going to use our Mickey pack n play for the baby's sleeping spot, but the bassinet attachment didn't seems as sturdy as we wanted it to be. Definitely good for a quick nap, but we wanted baby to be sleeping someplace more permanent. After checking out the Mickey pack n play, however, we do really like it for a playpen - it's super easy (like 20-second easy) to break down and move around, so we'll be able to use it all over the house, take it to grandma/grandpas, biz trips to LA, etc.

So the baby checklist is getting shorter and shorter, it's a good feeling :) Now we just need our little bundle o joy and we'll be cool!

37 Weeks - Down to the Wire

Just three weeks or so to go! Hard to believe we started this back at Disneyland (where we took the pregnancy test) with a fetus the size of a lentil. Now I have a big ass baby inside my belly! And when they come out, they'll have a mind of their own, a soul and make our family even stronger. Awesome.

This past week we made some good progress. Neddie finished painting the nursery (butter yellow, too cute!) and we've started getting some of our gear together. First up was the swing that my Aunt Benita got us:

So cute! As you can see, Lucky is interested in it. I think mainly because of the dangling stuffies :) So far the boys have been good with the baby stuff. Interested and sniffing a bit but basically leaving it alone. We unpacked our Mickey carseat, too - super adorable, I love it. We'll install it this week I think and then have the PD or FD check out to make sure it's installed properly.

My iPhone isn't taking great pics of the nursery (and there's not really much to show off yet), but here's a pic of a cute needlepoint I picked up a few months back at an estate sale and our cute squirrel hook for the diaper bag - you can kinda see how cute the color is:

I'm not too stressed about the nursery being "finished" since baby will be upstairs with us for a while, so I'm just picking up things here and there that I like. Yesterday I had a mini spree on etsy and got the following:

Ridiculously adorable vintage planter - love it! I'm planning on some small shelves on either side of the window and this will look too cute there :) And then...

Super rad vintage radio! Wheee! We plan on putting the baby down for naps and such before s/he moves down there permanently, so I wanted a music source. We really like KSDS Jazz 88 here in San Diego and have it on nearly all the time in the kitchen - I figure baby needs to learn to love it, too. Plus during baseball season they can learn how awesome baseball sounds thru an old radio. :)

Gotta get Ned to take one last belly pic. I'm kind of ginormo. Hopefully this week.

In other news, we went out for a last big date night at Donovan's in La Jolla. Shirley Temple, Caesar salad, big ol NY strip and a loaded baked potato. BOMB! It was great to go out somewhere kinda fancy and "adult," as we assume it will be a while until we can do that again :)

Also finished some additional planting - got poblanos, jalapenos, lavender, dark opal basil, chives, strawberries and even a baby watermelon in the raised beds. We'll see how they do! Just gotta get the drip irrigation installed soon so I don;t have to pay too much attention to them once baby arrives :)

36 Weeks - More Gardening and Nursery Painting!

This past week we made some good progress on the backyard! Ernie came by and installed drip irrigation throughout the whole backyard and I planted some newbie plants! We're trying two varieties of grape on the new lattice - Summer Royal Seedless and a Red Flame Seedless. I just got tiny plants (you can just see them in the pic against the fence), they'll take a while to get big and probably at least a few years to bear, but they look cute already :) Also planted some salvia and small groundcover under the Indian Hawthorne.

In baby news, I feel ginormous! Baby seems to have settled into one side, and all day I feel kicks on the right hand side - sometimes it shakes my whole belly! I will definitely miss the sensation after the birth, it feels rad to have something alive inside of you that you created.

Neddie has been A#1-double-extra-super-awesome husband these past few weeks (I mean even more than usual of course). Right now he's painting the baby's room and gorgeous pale yellow. It looks so light and bright in there, I just love it. We'll take some pics once he's done and we do a little sprucing up.

Oh - we also attended our final baby class this past week - Infant CPR! It was super cool! What a useful skill to have, it made us both feel better knowing we could do something - anything - in case of an emergency. We also learned some basics on choking and child CPR. Really glad we had a chance to take that one, just in case.

I've been trying to take it easy, too, but it's hard - I still feel like we have so much to do. But I guess that feeling will never really go away. I did get our carseat which was a big priority on the to-do list, so that felt good. I went with the Graco SnugRide - as well as the stroller attachment thingie so you just pop the carseat into the stroller frame which seems super logical and easier. We got the Mickey design, trying not to "commercialize" baby too much... but I don't mind it with Mickey!
Over these last few weeks I think I'll be concentrating on prepping some food to freeze for after we bring baby home, plus some light house stuff. But really, I think we're in pretty good shape. Just hoping baby doesn't decide to arrive early - I'm enjoying these last few days with Neddie, soaking up the "just me and him" vibe. :)

35 Weeks - Gardening

Just five weeks to go! Baby is doing great, moving around constantly and we're making a lot of our final prepartions. This week I'll get our bags packed, finish up all the baby laundry and Ned has volunteered to paint the nursery. (Buttery yellow, super cute). Also, we're getting some last house things done, too. We've finally started attacking our sad sack backyard - for the past oh... two years or so, it's looked like renters live here. Maybe even crackhead renters. Not anymore!

We're starting slow, I wanted to keep it affordable and manageable - didn't want to spend beaucoup cash with all the upcoming baby stuff and I also plan on maintaining a lot of the yard ourselves, meaning I need to be able to learn thru trial and error and not just pay someone to install expensive stuff that I kill :)

So... we had our awesome gardener Ernie and his crew come and rip out the last of the saddest plants (some old yucky lantana, gazanias and a bunch of weeds), then add a bunch of fresh new soil, roto-tilled it in so the beds were prepped, install edging AND this week they'll be back to install drip irrigation to all the beds - woohoo!

I have some raised bed planters that will go in, and yesterday Ned and I started the first phase of replanting the beds. In the guest house bed we added a dwarf Valencia orange, some Spanish lavender and a border or drought-tolerant herbs like thyme and oregano. Butterflies and bees seem to love those when they start to flower.

More pics soon - it's a bit cloudy today - but here's what the cleaned-up yard now looks like (oh, on the lattice we'll be doing a grape and maybe some trumpet vines or star jasmine)


Fresh and clean! Now just some nursery trips to start filling it in and making it look presentable :) In the winter, we're getting new sod, too - we have a bad mix of crab grass and yucky stuff that gives me a rash. We need babbeh-friendly soft grass!

34 Weeks - Grandparents Visit and Shower!

Bam! This is my "hells yeah I'm pregnant!" dress :) Six weeks to go, and this past weekend we enjoyed a visit from Neddie's parents from Houston and I had my shower!

The visit with his fam was great, got to catch up, talk a lot about the baby, we got some interesting lineage and names from both sides of their genealogy, and we even took them for 99-cent fish tacos at the roach coach in the Pep Boys parking lot! His parents hadn't been out since we first moved into the house, so it was great to show off our house projects and take them to some of the sites around town.

On Saturday I had my baby shower at the Tea House. It was rad - good food, good tea, lots of amazing pressies for us and the baby and just treating my friends and fam to fun little afternoon. It was funny, at one point while I was opening up gifts, it suddenly struck me how close we are to having a new little human to take care of. I think we're ready, but still - it's just strange and wonderful that it's really happening.

My friend Trishy took some pics at the shower, so hopefully I'll be able to post some next week :)

33 Weeks - Talk to the Hand

The last sonogram netted us this gem of a pic - my little sassy baby looking all cute. I still think the baby has Ned's nose and lips (thank you!) but perhaps my cute cheeks (yay!). Now if we can just get away with blue eyes... :)

This coming weekend is my shower - wheee! Ned's parents are coming into town, which is super exciting as they haven't been out to Cali since we moved in about four years ago. We're hoping for some zoo time, some chill time and of course, getting dressed up and going to the tea house for the shower (with his mom, of course. Maybe Neddie can take his dad to shoot guns while we're eating scones and lemon curd, that sounds about right.)

We've been getting a few presents in, which has been great! Neddie's grandma bought our pop-up stroller, how cool is it:

Also received the activity mat/play gym from my friend Katrina which I think is double extra super cute and adorable:

So sweet! It makes it seem more real now that we're assembling baby's "gear." Ned and I keep talking about how strange/cool/insane it is that in just a few weeks we'll have a new member of the family. I can't wait.

32 Weeks! Just under two months to go...

Well, we are getting down to the wire for sure. In under two months, our new little Engelke will make his/her appearance. We're ready for them to be here!
This weekend we had a garage sale, had a lot of stuff clotting up the baby's room and now I have space to start organizing everything in the nursery, yay! This week I'll start washing the diapers (I guess you have to wash cloth diapers like five times before they're ready to go, who knew?), the baby clothes we have on hand and some other prep stuff like that. We also need to get with our doula to work on the birth plan AND we definitely need a car seat very soon! After all, it's possible the baby could come early. I hope s/he doesn't to be on the safe side, but you just never know.
We made a few bucks on the sale and Ned and I split it up as fun money. I'm sure he'll use his for records, and I plan on buying some of the new plants for the backyard with mine. After nearly a year of basically nothing happening back there, we're moving forward with a more simplified landscape plan. Just replanting the existing beds with some better-looking stuff, planting a few fruit trees and adding some raised beds. I think growing our own food is dope yo!
Speaking of growing our own stuff, here's a look at our tomato plants. I'm totally sold on the Tomato Success Kit from Gardeners Catalog:

The two plants in there have grown at a pretty intense rate, even for tomatoes. They're about four times as large as another tomato I planted in a regular container. Impressive. There's even some small green fruit already!
We have our final sonogram tomorrow, I am sooo excited. I can't wait to see the progress as this baby kicks me constantly! It's been several weeks since we last got a peek at them so we're really looking forward to it.
It's warm here and feels like summer. Had lunch and dinner on the deck today, pretty hard to beat. Looking forward to some summer nights outside with the baby, just the three - well, five - of us.

31 Weeks - Happy Easter

OK... I am looking big - haha! Today was Easter and Ned and I headed up to the Ranch for some family time. My dad planned a pretty elaborate Easter egg hunt with treasure-hunt style clues, it was so fun! I hadn't moved that fast in a while :)
Baby E is doing well, s/he moves around A LOT, definitely active which is awesome. In about a week we have our final sonogram, I can't wait to get another peek at our little one. Last checkup was excellent, so happy that everything is going well.
Our childbirth class is winding down and we feel like we've really gotten a lot out of it. In fact, we've hired our instructor as our doula. We like her very much, very practical and reassuring. My hope is that I can deliver naturally and it seems like having someone there with a ton of delivery experience who is focused on helping us reach that goal makes a lot of sense. We'll see how everything goes!
And, there's just 18 days until my leave starts - woohoo! A lot of work to finish up before that, but I'm so excited. There's so much stuff to get done and I can't wait to just start concentrating on baby and family projects.

29 Weeks - 30th Birthday :)

Check out my big belly! Haha! It's so funny now, I knock it into things, like the screen door, boxes and it even makes brushing my teeth kinda hard, I have to lean really far over to compensate for it hitting the edge of the counter. Definitely noticing the weight on my lungs, too - have to take big, deep breaths a lot. But I'm not complaining, there's not too much longer to go now and it's just interesting to experience all of the little effects of growing a baby.

This past weekend I turned 30! We were planning on hitting the zoo and an SDSU baseball game, but the weather wasn't cooperating. So Neddie took me to dim sum and then we picked up a cupcake at Babycakes in Hillcrest (yeah, I broke Lent for my bday, just needed some cake!) and watched UFC while it rained. It was actually quite nice. Low key, but fun.

We did some fun gardening today. Neddie helped me put together our new tomato planter. I invested in a nice self-water planter with the cage ready to go and everything - we love it! Last year I had some sad sack tiny pots with ghetto-looking stakes and they still produced - so I'm excited to see what we can get this year with a bit more planning. Here's what it'll look like (hopefully):

We also planted some geraniums for the deck and a few other small things to add some color.

Finally, on the baby front, we've started our childbirth classes which I just love! Learning about the process is actually really helping me to not be scared of it. I mean, I know it will be hard, but it's becoming less of a mystery as we go. In a way I'm actually looking forward to it, I can't wait to meet our little guy or gal :)

I got a small nursery item this week, too. A sweet little crocheted birdie from a fabulous etsy shop, Homemade Zen. Thought it would be cute on a shelf, then s a little toy when baby is old enough for cute lil stuffies:


Adorable, right? Yup! Oh, finally - only one month until my leave starts! Wheee!

27 weeks - Starting to feel a bit more organized

So I have to admit, for a while I've felt totally overwhelmed. Between figuring out what I'm going to do workwise, working on the house, prepping for the birth, learning about everything baby-related, planning the shower and working on the registry, plus taking care of my regular work, chores, cooking, etc., I've felt like when this baby gets here I'm going to be woefully unprepared.
I'm positive we won't know everything and I know I can't ever be fully prepared, but I am starting to feel like I have a handle on some stuff and it feels REALLY good.
My friend Misha walked me through cloth diapering, I've got an outline for my maternity leave (taking the summer of, then returning part-time until the new year when we'll re-evaluate), got the shower plans pretty intact and the invites designed, found an amazing vintage dresser for the baby's room, childbirth classes start next week, Ned held Aimee's baby Ryder (7 weeks) and did great, registry's in good shape, getting a plan in place to deal with outstanding house renovations... See? I feel better already :)

26 Weeks + Nursery

Nursery planning is getting semi-serious. I didn't realize how fun it would be! Today I picked up the above vintage cards on etsy for a few bucks, I think I may frame them for the baby room. How cute are they? Also we've decided on our chair, getting the Monte recliner/glider in charcoal, I am so excited:
The one unifying theme we've heard from friends/acquaintances with babies is to get a comfy glider if you plan on breast feeding, because you'll be spending an inordinate about of time in it! The bonus recliner is awesome, too, I can just picture Neddie taking a nap with the baby in it :) Plus, I really like the modern, clean look, I think we'll definitely be able to use it as furniture after babies. It will be my TV chair! Haha. We'll probably order it this week, hooray!

26 weeks as of yesterday and the baby is now about 14 inches! That is almost impossible to believe, especially since the first time we saw baby, s/he was only the size of a lentil or so. We are consistently amazed by this miracle and feel so blessed we get to experience this together.

Today was a gray, windy, overcast today and we may get some rain tonight. Neddie is making us some congee for dinner, listening to some jazz. I can't believe that in just three months we'll have a little guy or gal to share our happy Sunday nights with. So much to do, so much to experience, so much to love.

25 Weeks!

The weeks seem to be zooming by and my belly is getting big! Above pic was taken a week ago, at 24 weeks. It's hard to believe that I have three months of growing left - I'm going to be huge! Haha!
Baby is a kicking machine and Neddie can now regularly feel the kicks and movement, which I just love. Sometimes when I'm working at the computer, my belly seems to take on a life of its own, and I can see little punches through my clothes. Totally bizarre and cool.
We start our childbirth class at the end of this month, it's time for us to start thinking about the birth plan and all that good stuff. I've also been working on our registry and baby shower plans! I decided I wanted a shower where I didn't have to do too much, so I'm having it at a tea house in La Mesa called the Aubrey Rose Tea Room. My mom and I checked it out last week and it was phenomenal. Delicious tea, cute, over-the-top girlie decor and lots of delicious food and sweets. I'll make the invites and my mom and Trishy will be helping with the details. Can't wait, it'll be in May!
This past week Lent began and I decided to give up sweets - although I will be allowing myself dark chocolate. It's definitely helped me so far control some bad-for-me cravings, and I love having a goal. Of course, I have to look for some phenomenal dark chocolate and make sure it's on hand :)
Finally we're making a huge pot of marinara today! I got a Costco card and picked up a ridiculously-sized tin of whole tomatoes (like 6 pounds for $2.50, could not pass it up) and started the sauce a few hours ago. I like to freeze 3 cup portions and have them ready to go for easy weeknight meals. Tonight we're having it with some pasta and leftover chicken sausage. And... now I'm hungry.

The Baby Looks Like Neddie

Last week our friend Cyndy got us in for an after-hours sonogram to check out the baby! Now that baby is fairly far along, we were able to see a huge amount of detail with the 4D sonogram. I can't believe we can get a look at the facial features like this, truly incredible. Our baby is so cute and I definitely think s/he looks like Ned. Love it.

Baby Kicks and Nurseryland

Well, the kicking is really in full swing! I'm 23 weeks and for the first time, Ned experienced a kick, too! We were hanging out in our room at the Beach House (up in Hermosa for Neddie's work), and all of the sudden on the sofa, baby started going crazy. I looked down and could literally see baby moving my belly with the kicking, and Ned saw it too! I was so happy. Later, he felt a very small kick when we were getting into bed. It seems like baby's kicking all the time now, which is awesome - lets me know everything is going good.
We made some progress on the nursery this weekend which makes me feel accomplished. Baby will be sleeping in our room for a while for sure - the only free bedrooms are downstairs - but I'd still like the room to be set up for baby and be able to accommodate the majority of the baby stuff, most of the clothes, toys, etc, so all that stuff has a home.
Of course, I want it to be super cute so I've been started to think about decorating. I'd really love to have an old refinished dresser - something vintage but repainted in a lime green or bright yellow. A hip throwback kinda vibe. Additionally, I've been picking up some stuff at estate sales when I find them: some old early readers from the 40s and some cute homemade animal needlepoint. I'd like it to feel established, homey and vintage, and not just buy all new stuff.
I'll definitely be getting some new stuff - otherwise it would take me like three years to bring everything together. This week for some reason I've been fixated on rugs. Here's two I like:

The "Letterpress" rug from CB2 is very cool - definitely not too baby-ish, but still appropriate for a cool kid's room. $300 plus shipping, which isn't awful, but there's a lot of stuff to buy and if I could save $150 and get the rug below, maybe that's a better idea:

This one is very well-reviewed at overstock, and is just $158 - plus overstock only charges $3 shipping! I like the simple shapes, bright colors and the reviews all say it's very soft, just right for baby. Anyways, just keeping them bookmarked until I get some more ideas together :)