the party animal lifestyle of new parents

December 1

Front Yard

Enjoying an unseasonably warm day with a nap outside while Mom and Andy work on the porch.

December 2

Kitchen

No baby is going to slow down my baking! Fish shapes for Bob, axes for Andy, and stars for everyone else.

December 3

Living Room

Father-daughter couch time.

December 4

Living Room

I think our wish of "If we have a girl, she'll have Andy's legs" was heard.

December 5

Living Room

Post-bath baby bird hair.

December 6

VMFA

Our first solo outing. (That's not true. We've gone to the grocery store together.) 

But here we are spending a rainy afternoon with art.

December 7

Leena's Room

The day Leena really started to show her smile. Obviously I ran to get the camera and took about 1 billion photos.

December 8

Living Room

And thus began the quest for the cutest baby photos because once you have a newborn that's really all it's about, right?

December 9

Living Room

Struggles with breastfeeding. Leena's first formula bottle was a little hard on me. But Kiki was very reassuring.

December 10

Sunroom

Another example of the nonstop photo quest. Naked baby in a bread bowl. Obviously.

December 11

Kitchen

A midnight backsplash party. One of the finishing touches for the kitchen!

December 12

Sunroom

One month old, holy cow! (Kiki's latest craft obsession: Numbers for all the newborns in her life.)

December 13

Cyborg Room

Roller gift exchange Christmas crafting. These are air plant vases after phase one (cutting wood blocks) and phase two (sanding them down).

December 14

Kitchen

This requires three photos because it's important to see where we came from sometimes.

Before!

During!

After!

December 15

Kitchen

The finished air plant vases! Ready to be mailed to Beefers in Tucson where they will fit right in with the good energy and desert air.

December 16

Sunroom

Look at that little arm sticking out grabbing Pop's collar.

December 17

Leena's Room

We finally got shelves, pictures, and mobile hung. Leena loves it so much that she sleeps in our bed every night.

December 18

Doctor Office

One month check up. Leena is putting on the pound(and a half)! She's bumped up to 7.8 lbs. and 20 inches!

Decmber 19

Living Room

A Kiki and granddaughters moment. Adah is clearly in love with her Baby Cousin Leena.

December 20

Sunroom

I thought we needed a photo for scale and some day it's going to be crazy to me that her head could fit in my hand.

December 21

Sunroom

Now it just looks like we torment little Leena.

December 22

Kitchen

More Christmas crafting: the scarf I made for Adah.

December 23

Leena's Room

Kiki and Leena. Enough said. Well, maybe not enough. This is Leena's first pair of pants, a very noteworthy occasion. 

December 24

Peterson House

Which stocking is Leena's? Too cute! And the story is that it was Andy's on his very first Christmas.

December 25

Schemmel House

More cousin love. One enjoys it more than the other.

December 26

Sunroom

Our attempt at the perfect family photo. (We will try again, but this is all we have managed so far. This is also my excuse for not sending birth announcements/holiday cards yet...)

December 27

Lewis Ginter

For Christmas we got Mom a photo shoot with her grandkiddos. Here she is putting Leena on top of a fake black bear in front of a giant Christmas tree.

December 28

Terrace Ave.

Andy is hogging the new wood splitter and making Leena and I use the ax.

December 29

Bedroom

Close-up headshot pictures like this are taken every single day, just FYI.

December 30

Italian Restaurant

Dinner out with the whole fam. Grandpa Bud and Leena just hanging.

December 31

Kitchen

Getting Leena all clean and ready for the big New Year celebration where we had the Cronks over for leftovers and Catan. That's the party animal lifestyle of new parents for you. We might have all been in bed by 10:00.

pig's in the blanket

November 1

Living Room

Andy was working on Halloween so I had to show him my costume the next day. It's hard to tell that there's a baby bun in the oven too.

November 2

Sunroom

Here are a few pictures of things we accomplished today. The Cronks came over and helped put the house back together. I'm so grateful for the willingness and kindness of our friends. 

Reclaimed space, finished countertop, framed out shadow boxes.

November 3

Nursery

Slowly coming together, but definitely ready enough to receive a baby! Maybe next month we'll have everything in place...

November 4

OBGYN Assoc.

Waiting for the doctor on our 39 week appointment. The wrong doctor walked in on our shadow puppet show. We're adults about to have a baby.

November 5

Kitchen

Way too excited to be having a home-cooked meal in our kitchen that is still a work in progress.

November 6

Kitchen

Day two of disposal/dish washer installation fun.

November 7

Kitchen

I decided to take the day off thinking this could potentially be the last few days without work before the bobby arrives. I'm glad I did because a) we finished installing the dishwasher and I've never been so happy to do dishes before in my life and b) turns out I was right about the last few days without work before the bobby arrives.

One more thing, last month I mentioned three requirements before the baby can come. The third was a working kitchen sink. Shazam!

November 8

Kitchen

I had to send this to our doula and it happens to be the only picture I took. Happy to say our flexible birth plan was followed pretty closely!

November 9

Kitchen

She's a beaut, Clark. She's a beaut.

November 10

Kitchen

Using it! With chef and mini chef making dinner.

November 11

Kitchen

I'm due tomorrow. That's a big thought to go to bed with. 

Andy's working so Mom (she arrived on Monday) and I run some errands, eat Burger Bach, and organize some drawers with the things we bought, and go to bed. 

November 12

Henrico Doctor's Hospital

Well, looky there!

Did you know that only 4% of babies come on their due date? Here's the quick: I started contractions at 1:30 am, waited until I had 5 and knew they were real, then texted Andy the code. "Pig's in the blanket." He came home and we labored until about 5:30 before we went to the hospital. Fast forward through about 5 more hours of laboring (it's called labor for good reason) and at 10:16 am our little babe came through. The nurse said, "It's a boy!" And Andy said, "We have an Eddie!" He looked at the gender parts and was skeptical and approximately one minute later, the nurse declared, "No, it's a girl!" Andy thought, well, that seems more like it and I think I said something like, "Who's telling the truth?"

So turns out we've got a Leena Bea. 6 lb. 2 oz. 19.5 inches. Cutest forehead wrinkles I ever saw. Not to mention the rest of her. And Andy is already the sweetest dad on the face of the planet. She might get spoiled.

November 13

Henrico Doctor's Hospital

Really what can you say when you've carried a baby inside you for 9 months and all of a sudden you have not just a baby, but a healthy baby daughter, and she's on the outside now. You get to see what she looks like and she gets to see you. And it's incredible because we've made a human. And we all got through this together.

November 14

Car

The big trip home! Let the real parenting begin!

November 15

Living Room

Giving Dad the scowl. Because, let's be honest, we are all figuring this out one step at a time.

November 16

Living Room

Grandpa Bud bonds with his second granddaughter before heading back to Little Rock.

November 17

Nursery

It's a rare moment when Leena sleeps not in someone's arms. She stuck her tiny foot out for us.

November 18

Living Room

This is pretty much what we do. Lay on the couch and stare at each other.

November 19

Sunroom

Mom and Andy are back at the house projects. Here they are tiling behind the wood stove so we can get some heat back up in this place. (Okay, we have central heat, but wood heat is so much cozier.)

November 20

Bedroom

Snoozeville.

November 21

Living Room

Our little monster is so cute I want to die.

November 22

Sunroom

Tiling done, wood stove installed again, men climbing up the wall. Bring it, winter.

November 23

Sunroom

Morning snuggles with Kiki. So happy to have the extra set of hands around. She makes pretty good company too.

November 24

Buttermilk Bake Shop

Field trip to Petersburg for the grand opening! It's so cool to see my friends in their own beautiful bakery happily making delicious things.

November 25

Kitchen

Sitting at the bar.

November 26

Kitchen

I think me and this Ergo are going to be real good friends. A pumpkin pie and a fruit tart later, Leena is still snoozing.

November 27

Living Room

The little turkey celebrates her first Thanksgiving. It goes without saying, there's a lot to be thankful for.

November 28

Schemmel House

Adah loves her Baby Cousin Leena. Here she ceremoniously gives her pacifier to the baby because she is a big girl now.

November 29

Kilmarnock

Oma meets her great granddaughter. It's a pretty special moment.

November 30

Front Porch

Not only is Mom great at baby help, but she paints too! The front of our house gets more welcoming as we speak!