A spoon full of sugar

Once the weather cooled off we could open up some windows. The kitchen window does not have a screen and is right by the table and chairs so it is the perfect set up for playing Mary Poppins. Here is Gracie with a bird on her finger. She would sing the song from that part that starts, "A robin feathering his nest..." and then at the part where it says, "he knows a song will move the job along." She goes out the window and sings with the bird.

William even joins in the fun when he is home.

They watch Marry Poppins a lot and I am 100% okay with that.

Mom of the year

This is my mama holding my new baby. She came out at 3:00 am when I told her I was in labor. She came and cleaned and made food for the whole household while I labored. She watched Gracie and took her out to the car at the end so Gracie could not hear me, and then she cleaned my car out! She slept on a small foam futon on my living room floor for days. I never even had to ask her. She just new I would need help and boy did I need her help. She cooked food cleaned and held the baby when I wasn't nursing him (which seemed like all the time). My mom has always been a good mom and helped me when I needed it, but this year I have needed her a lot and it has made me more grateful than ever for her kindness, love, patience, and hard work. She let us movie in when I was sick with this pregnancy and she took care of mine and the kids every need. She helped us move out of our house into our new one. She helped me clean and organize the new house when I was so big and pregnant and not motivated to do it. She has loaned us money and watched our kids and just helped in any way she could. On top of all she did for me she never stopped helping my other siblings and there were a lot issues going on there this year. She has a lot to worry about, but never let that stress her out too much to help. There is no way to thank someone enough for help like this, but I will say it anyway. Thanks Mom, I love you.

Relax

Don't you just love when babies do this? Sleep with their arms or hands sticking out. It makes me want to tell them to relax.
This something I have had to tell myself a lot. For some reason (maybe it is because I never went to the hospital) i keep feeling like I should be recovered and back to my good old self. But I am not. i still have some recovering and sleeping to do. I have to force myself to lay down and take a nap sometimes because there is so much around me that needs to be done. I try to tell myself to relax, cause it will get done...someday.

I have also had to make myself chill out over nursing. Nursing was something I was determined to do but because extremely painful because he was not latching right and frustrating because no matter how many times I tried I could not get him to latch right. I found myself getting very emotional over the whole thing (like crying for days at a time). I was also getting to be very snappy with my other children and just felt awful about myself. I decided in the long run, nursing just wasn't going to work for me and this baby. And while it is a decision that still makes me sad, it has given me peace. So for now I am pumping and he gets formula every once in awhile. It is very hard for me to buy something that my body can make for free, but I just try not to think about that.

Adored

Isn't he sweet. We all love him.

But I think that there is very little that this boy will do that will go unnoticed by this little girl.

Are their hands the same size?

She just loves and adores him and can not leave him alone.

I sure hope he doesn't mind having two Mama's. Here she is literally offering to feed him. And she was dead serious

Sweetness

Our little boy is so sweet. Here you can see his orange hair. Williams was a more brownish red so I expect that this little guy will have lighter hair than him.

The coolest thing about our little Candy Corn (this is a onsie I made him for Halloween) is that at a few days old he would smile. And not just the sleep smile that babies do. Here he was fully awake and content and I would talk to him and these are the pictures I got of it.

I know this is not a big smile, but you can see it, right? He is a happy boy. I love looking at these pictures. His face is already less fat.

These pictures also remind me that I need to take pictures of him with William and Gracie in their candy corn cloths.

Fly on your wall photography

The day after I had my baby my friend Kayleen asked if she could come take some pictures. I love the pictures she takes so of coarse I said yes. When she came over she said she doesn't really do portraits she just kinda acts like a fly on the wall. I think she should start a business. The pictures are lovely and none are posed and I didn't even know she was taking half of them.

These are pictures of my life and I love my life.

debut

I know you all just want to see pictures of our newest family member.

Sometimes he has a hard time opening his left eye.

Nothing is better than sleeping with a new babe.

Doing his foot prints.

not fitting into the smallest sleeper we had for William. I know William fit in this for at least his first week. Not even for Joseph's first day.

Just a sweet baby.

My husband the talented multi-tasker. joseph stops crying intantly when Russ bounces on the ball.