2 Month Check-up

Yesterday was Scott's 2-month check-up and first round of vaccinations. He weighed in at 10lbs 12oz and was 22.5in long. My doctor didn't tell me percentiles, but I looked them up--between 10 and 25 for each. His head, however is between 25 and 50 at 40cm.

And along with these stats, I bring you more pictures:

With Grandma on Thanksgiving

A series of Scott smiling at Daddy:

Can you tell I was wearing a necklace? I didn't remember until I laid him down... I'm surprised he wasn't more uncomfortable.

This is my favorite of his many hand positions. He's so cute!

This was actually a sad time, though. He took his vaccinations like a champ--cried for less than a minute--but he was very fussy for the rest of the night. He went in and out of restless sleep for about 8 hours. It was very hard to watch. You could tell he was in pain. The doctor did warn us that he might be fussy and have a fever because of the vaccinations, but I didn't expect this reaction. It was all over by midnight, though, and he slept his usual 4 hours.

Almost 2 months

Whoa. My baby is almost 2 months old, and he is growing so fast! I think it's almost time to adjust the straps in his carseat already, and he's grown out of some of his clothes. Amazing.

I took some pictures recently, so I just thought I'd share a few.

Matt is teaching Scott how to program.I finally caught a smile on camera :) And yesterday Matt got him to laugh! So cute!"Check out my tube sock!" I love the tube socks! They make him look so old!This does get tiring after a while, but it feels so good!

In other news, I peeled an apple in one strip! And, not that you can tell, but I dried my hair for the first time since Scott was born. It felt good.

1 Month Old

Sorry I have taken so long to update. You'd never guess that a baby who sleeps 12-18 hours a day could take up so much time. I haven't been really good even at taking pictures, but I'll try to be better in the future.

This is Scott at 9 days, sporting a beautifully crocheted blanket made by his Aunt Jessica. Thank you!

Here he is at 12 days--he loves to sleep with his hands on his face. We like to pretend that he's smelling something stinky, but probably not.
17 days--you can see the blanket hasn't left the bouncy chair... He loves to move his arms around! If he's awake, his arms are constantly in motion. And sometimes his legs, too.
Not sure what he's doing here, but it's cute!
18 days--his first real bath! And he hasn't had one since... He just doesn't get very dirty. Is it bad that he's only had one real bath since he was born?
29 days--Today.

Happy Halloween! The shirt is too big, but that's the way it goes. The shirt is a gift from his Nana and Papa. The hat and socks are from a family friend, Tammy. The pants are preemie size--they're too short, and the waist is too big... ah well.
And there you have it! A whole month has passed. He is probably just a little taller, and he weighs a little over 8 lbs by now, I think. He was 7lbs 6oz when I took him to the doctor over a week ago, so there ya go! Things are going well. I'm learning to deal with little sleep, and even when he's crying, I still think he's very cute, so that's a good sign :) Thanks to everyone for your love and support and oohs and aahs.

1 Week

I thought I'd continue with the belly pictures... Here we are 1 week post partum.

Here's us at the hospital--day 3, I think
Do you think the carseat is big enough for him?
I realized we were all still wearing our bracelets after being home almost two full days. Had to take a picture so we could cut them off :)
This is just for a size comparison. iPhone on the left, universal remote on the right. He's such a little dude.

Scott Simon

So, I had my baby! He was 6lbs. 6oz., 19.5 inches long. I just looked at the clock and it's 6:33pm! So, little Scotty (Scottie? I haven't decided) is now officially 3 days old. We should totally have cupcakes or something...

Sorry it has taken me so long to post, but we got a computer virus on our laptop (now our only computer--see Oregon Trail post) at the hospital because our antivirus software ran out and we forgot to renew it. Plus, the hospital wireless was an unsecure network. Anyway, Matt's been spending the last few days making our computer healthy again, so again, I'm sorry for the delay.

So, I haven't downloaded pictures from my camera yet because we're still working with the virus, and some amazing people cleaned my house (thanks Mom and Tammy!) and I'm not sure where the cable I need is, but I do have a few pictures that my dad sent and one from Matt's cell phone, so I'll post those for now to satisfy the masses.

Thanks for all the congrats and well wishes. We couldn't be more thrilled with our little boy. He gets cuter by the second.

A different kind of labor...

Well, since I have no baby pictures to post, I thought I could at least brag about all the cool stuff that I have made, and that my mom has made for the baby.

The first thing I made, with some help sewing from a gal in my ward, was a book for our baby to look at during Sacrament Meeting, so he'll learn at a young age that the whole reason we take the sacrament is because of Jesus.

Soon after that, my friend asked if I wanted to learn how to knit. I said sure. So we made a little cocoon and matching hat for the little guy.

When I finished that, we thought we should start a crocheting project. This one is still unfinished. My friend who was teaching me is pretty busy, and she recently had shoulder surgery, so I haven't had the help that I need. so, I'm still working on the hood, and then I have to do the button band and then sew it all together. It's for a 6-month old, so I have some time.

Then, Walgreens was having a sale on their Everyday Photo Books, which are just 5x7 paperbacks. So, I put a little one together. I'll have to do another one because all the cousins will get older, but I thought it would be a fun project while the sale was going on. I just have the cover and first pages shown here.

My mom arrived a little over a week ago and brought some flannel with her, so she made me some cute receiving blankets. Note the fun edges. She was not happy until she added a little flair. I like the edging on the sheep the best, but it's the hardest to see, since it's white.

This is the crowning achievement. Mom and I went shopping on Monday so we could make a quilt for the baby. I wanted to make a red, tan, brown, cream quilt because we live in New Mexico, and that's the color palette most often used. And I knew it could be done tastefully, more tastefully, perhaps, than the city of Santa Fe... (Mom did all the machine sewing, but I helped by cutting out each piece while we watched an 8-hour miniseries.) So here's the front:

And close up:

And the back. Matt noticed that since we did 8x8 blocks, we could actually use his blanket as a massive checker or chess board someday. Always thinking...

The quilt did turn out rather massive, but I'm glad because now he'll be able to use it until he's almost 5 feet tall. And, there will be room for me or Matt to cuddle with him under it.

So at least now you know we haven't been just sitting around waiting for the baby to come. We're keeping busy!

40 weeks

Here I am at 40 weeks. I was due to have a baby today, but it's already 9:42pm and as far as I can tell I'm not in labor. So much for due dates. I put up a picture of me sitting, because everyone keeps telling me I look small, but maybe I look bigger sitting down? I dunno. Hopefully the baby will come soon. I'll keep you posted.

Pictures from Maurine's Visit (cont'd)

Okay, I spent all day yesterday quilting with my mom, but I felt like I had to finish these pictures. Maybe it's the task I have to finish before my baby makes his appearance... Probably not, but I wanted to finish anyway.

Here's one of each kid on the train to Albuquerque. We only made in on the train with seconds, literally, to spare, but we made it and had a good time on the train for about an hour.



Our first stop was the Zoo... Here are some of the many pictures we took. It's hard to get good shots of animals when there's a fence between you, but Matt did his best.



Next we took a little train from the Zoo to the Aquarium. Max and Reed both slept through the trip, and Dean was pretty spacey. Maybe it was too much for one day...



And our last stop was a walk through the Botanical Gardens. We definitely didn't see everything. We chose to walk to the Japanese Garden and then head back to the train station and go home.



(And please, take the time to go to click on the slideshows because I put a little caption with each picture.)

Pictures from Maurine's Visit to Santa Fe

My amazing husband was able to get our pictures off of our corrupted hard drive from our desktop to the laptop, so now I can share some pictures with you. I hope it works... This will be one of four slideshows, if I can figure it out. This is just day one at the Children's Museum



It worked! If you click on it, you should be able to view my comments about each picture through the picasa web album. Enjoy!

Oregon Trail--Metaphor for Life

Sorry it's been so long since I blogged. My sister came to visit not long after my last post, and then I had another friend visit shortly after that. So, as always, when you have stuff to blog about, you don't have time to blog! Ah well.

So, this morning I actually woke up to the sound of Matt getting ready for work--which normally does not rouse me. Apparently the power was out, so our fan was off, and I had a clearer earshot to the sound of the shower turning on and off or something. Anyway, since Matt couldn't play his game before work for a few minutes, he had to use his iPhone to entertain himself--we're so put upon in this world, aren't we?

Anyway, he has an app for Oregon Trail. So, since I was awake, I had breakfast and watched him play. I noticed he was down to 3/5 of his original party (which is actually still good--as long as you have over half your party, it's still hilighted in green instead of red). I asked him where they were. He said two of his children, at separate times, had been carried away by eagles! What the heck? How does that happen? Did that really happen on the Oregon Trail? And TWO of your children!? Oi. It's a funny game. They always let you know, once you get to a trading post or campsite how you're doing--if you're on time, how many people you still have, and how your group's health is. Sometimes along the trail random things happen and you have to decide what to do. For example--"You're wife has been mauled by a bear. What would you like to do? (1) Continue on your journey or (2) Rest." Well, if you don't want to lose another member of your party, you should probably rest. Or for another example, "Your son has dysentary" "You have come to a stream, would you like to ford it, or ferry across?" All of these things usually require you to rest, and start to put you behind schedule. What happens if you can't catch up? You might get stuck in a snowstorm and die later in the game! Scary stuff, right? Matt's always trying to get back up to speed by pressing the rabbit button and making his family run to Oregon, but then that lowers their health, and he has to rest for a couple of days to get their health back up again. But, it's either that or go at a turtle's pace and you still might lose health from random eagles, bears, snakes, and sicknesses. So many decisions. I'm not even gonna get started on the mini-games for getting food and fixing your wagon, but you get the idea...

So, when I was a kid, I thought this game was ridiculous. I thought, that's not real life--that much bad stuff never happens that close together. Well, this morning I started thinking about how my life would have looked on Oregon Trail over the last few weeks...

"Your computer's motherboard stops working--you can't use your USB ports." Matt bought a new motherboard and got it all hooked up, but it took about a week.

"Your birthday (assuming Matt is the main character) is coming up and there has been a reduction in price on a gaming system you've been wanting to purchase for 2 years." We bought it. We're crazy, but Matt is happy.

"Your birthday present breaks after one week. The company who made it can't fix it because the new model is too new." You wait, and you cry. (2 weeks later, you call Amazon.com, they accept fault and send you a new one. We love them.)

"Your sister and her three boys are coming to visit." You go at a rabbit's pace for 6 days, but you're already very pregnant, so your health is low. (We had a grand time, but Matt and I both got sick at the end of the trip. Keep reading and you'll understand why I'm not posting more on this trip at this time.)

"Your motherboard stops working--your video card and hard drives are corrupted--you can't see the pictures you loaded from your sister's trip." I'm not kidding! This is like your kid being carried off by an eagle... TWICE! Well, this time, we don't have enough funds to replace both the motherboard and the video card, so we have to wait for a while. And I won't be able to see the pictures of my sister's trip until we fix the computer. Oi.

"It's your birthday. Your wife thinks she might have broken her water just slightly, so she steals 3 hours of sleep and lowers your health. She still plans to make brownies for sundaes, and also wants to make your dinner. Too bad! She burns her hand making the brownies and you have to make your own birthday dinner! Because she has to (a) REST her hand in a bowl of cold water for 5 hours!" I felt so bad. Maybe a better birthday for Matt next year :(

Then there are the smaller things in life...

"Your fridge is empty. (or almost everything in it has gone bad because you've been neglecting it for 2 months). What would you like to do? (1) Scrounge for 3 more days, or (2) go grocery shopping." Usually we choose (1), and then (2).

I guess the only way to end this post is with the reason I started it. We ended up playing Oregon Trail until 8:15am. Matt usually likes to get to work around 8am. So our final message from our Oregon Trail life is:

"You decided to play Oregon Trail for way longer than you should have." Your health has gone up, but you are even further behind schedule. I hope you don't get caught in a snowstorm and die later...

So, sorry about the lack of pictures, but hopefully we'll come up with a good solution soon. As far as adding a member to our party, I have another doctor's appointment today and we'll see if I'm making any progress.

Happy Anniversary, 34 weeks, and Matt's facial hair

It is August 17, and Matt and I have been married now for 3 years. Wow! Where does the time go? We have a lot of fun, and I feel truly blessed to have such an awesome guy taking care of me. Here are some nostalgic shots:

Also, I was 34 weeks on Friday, so I had Matt take another picture of my growing belly yesterday. Thanks again to Maurine for my maternity wardrobe. I also was reading a lot of stuff on labor and delivery, and I almost started crying, but I'm sure everything will be okay. I thought it was a little funny how they talk about the arduous journey the baby takes through the birth canal, and I'm like--he'll mostly feel and look better in 24 hours. I, however, might take up to 6 weeks to recover! Who's journey is more arduous, I ask you?!
And last, but not least, Matt grew out a goatee for a few weeks, just because he can, so we had to take a picture. His facial hair pattern is actually quite similar to that of Christian Bale--I've attached a photo so you can see what I mean. They both have trouble connecting the mustache to the beard. I don't think it looked bad, but I prefer to kiss a clean-shaven face, so it's gone now. Yay!

Addendum

We also went to Palace of the Governors, which was built in 1610 and is the longest continuously used building in the U.S., but looks like every other building in Santa Fe, so you'd never guess it. Now it's not used as the government seat or anything like it was for 200 years or something--it's just a museum. It's worth visiting--they have a good photography exhibit. We weren't allowed to take pictures, so I forgot we even went until I was thinking about how much walking I did that day and realized we had another stop! I'm pretty sure it was between lunch and the Loretto Chapel.

Tour of Santa Fe

My cousin lives about 3.5 hours away, and she's been meeting to see the State Capitol, so she came to visit me a week or so ago. Here are some pictures of what we did and saw:

My cousin and her sons infront of the State Capitol Building. I'm not going to lie--the outside is a total disappointment.

The coolest part of the outside, in my opinion--the trash cans. Sweet, huh?

You don't expect a golden elevator when the outside is adobe. Pretty cool.

This is the ceiling. Not the coolest rotunda I've ever seen, but it's...New Mexican.

State House of Reps, State Senate, and some sweet calligraphy I saw on one of the Senate Rosters. We just don't appreciate hand-done stuff like this as much as we should. So cool.
There is a lot of art in the State Capitol building. These are three of my favorite. There were a lot of tapestries and some interesting modern art, too, but these are the ones I liked best.

Next Stop: Lunch and one of the oldest restaurants in Santa Fe!

They tiled it on the inside with broken dishes. I thought that was really cool.

The next place we went was the Loretto Chapel. I really liked the windmill-type sculptures out front. There's some cool stained glass, and then there is, of course, the miraculous stairway.
The choir loft did not originally have a stairway leading up to it, because all the people who sang were men, so they just used a ladder. Then, nuns starting singing in the choir, so they needed to build a staircase. So, this was built. It didn't originally have handrails, and was unsupported by anything--that's what made it miraculous. They added the handrail for safety, and there's a small support tying it to the column nearby because the surrounding traffic made it shake too much. Anyway, still pretty cool.

Last stop: Children's Museum.
These are the fish. I like watching fish swim around. If I ever get a pet, it will be fish.
Kalos on the pulleys.
Atticus on the pulleys. The scientific part of this is that there were three different sets of pulleys, and you noticed that it's easier to pull yourself up, the more pulleys there are. Pretty cool. And Kalos and Atticus had just learned about simple machines, so that was great.

I thought this part was really cool--you could make a huge bubble around yourself. Unfortunately, that tire gets in the way. Atticus could do it way better than I could.

So that was our trip to Santa Fe. It was fun. There are some other cool things to see, but that will have to wait for another day. Maybe when YOU come visit :)