Naptime

Don't worry, he doesn't sleep on a pillow or on the couch =). The two of us do lay there together, though.

Playtime with Nana

My mom, whose been visiting for two weeks, heads back to San Diego tomorrow. Today we headed to a nearby park to take some portraits. We were thwarted by the wind, but did get a few pictures in.

I also met some other moms that get together as a group to head to local playgrounds once a week. It's weird to be in this new mom social group, but I like it.

I Gave Birth to a Pirate

and a boxer



— with long legs and giant baby feet —



who sneezes quite regularly,



is very curious about the world,





and seems to like being photographed:



p.s. Thanks for the bouncy chair Jody! He loves it.

At least he has good taste in music

He likes "Here Comes the Sun" even more than originally thought. This is fine with me. I'm well suited for this part of parenthood — I also like listening to songs on repeat. He likes other Beatles songs, too. My dad and I used to listen to the same music. It's transforming to be doing it with my son now.

I typed this whole thing with one hand. Take that typing teachers who insisted typing with one hand had no purpose! How do they think moms blog?

Portraits

We snuck in some time for Truman portraits yesterday. I've heard its hard to take portraits of your own newborn, but I didn't really believe it until now. I think I am just so busy doing other things with him that it's hard to schedule time for photos that involve any kind of staging of light or baby.

Of course, that doesn't mean we're not taking plenty of other pictures.





(by Victoria/grandma)

Poo-tastrophes

WARNING: If you don't want to read about poo, stop reading now.
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I bet that made you instantly more curious. As new parents, it's no surprise that our lives are filled with curiosities about our child's pee and poo. This is primarily because they are signs of health, but also because we have to change diapers.

Our son was born with a very tight sphincter. As our friend Erin put it, he was literally anal-retentive. He did not poo between Saturday and Thursday. At his one week appointment, the doctor remedied this by sticking her pinky where the sun doesn't shine. After some very intense facial expressions, poo immediately oozed out, and we waited with bated breath for his next poo.

Friday morning, it came and made up for lost time, exploding out of his diaper. It was the kind of poo I never thought I would live to observe:





More explosive poos have followed. We're slightly longing for the days when we had a poo-less child.

Things He's Good At:

eating, sleeping, pooping, peeing, being cute.

As for the last in the list, observe:

More Truman

I promise he does more than sleep. We had some great pictures of him with his eyes open from yesterday, but we had a memory card malfunction.

Things we have learned about him in the last five days: he doesn't like to be left alone. He can raise one eyebrow. We think he has three dimples (including a slight chin dimple). He loves his hands and wants them at his face most of the time.

My mom turned 50 today and met her grandson for the first time:

--Truman Ambrose--

Press play:


Introducing Truman Ambrose, born at dawn on Friday, April 11, 2008. He weighed a whopping 8 lbs., 9 oz. and was 22 inches long (although now that his head is less cone-shaped, he is more like 21 inches long). He was born after 8 hours of labor with no pain medication. The birth was an amazing experience.

Before we left the hospital, Joe's sister Kellie gave us a "mommy and me" frog musical toy that plays "Here Comes the Sun." We found it remarkably appropriate; in fact, you might even call it his song or "Here Comes the Son."

Here are some long-awaited pictures. He's a little shy in some of them.

You'll have to forgive him. He's new here.

Sleep, I Think I Love You

Let's revamp the way we're thinking about this whole baby thing. Don't get me wrong, I really want to meet this baby (as everyone does). But I've been enjoying the sleep I've been getting for the last few days and it's reminding me of some important facts.

The baby's doing fine. It's easier for me to care for him or her now than it will be after birth and I bet I'm going to look back on all this sleep fondly in a couple of weeks once I'm on the baby's sleep schedule.

Also, we didn't make a dummy. I think this baby knows about the snow and is waiting for it to be over. I think the storm shall pass and the baby shall arrive.

In the meantime, Joe and I are going on a date to the movies tomorrow if we're not having the baby. I'm looking forward to either activity.

Bless the Ticker

It probably would have driven me insane if it stopped.

I did not mentally prepare myself to make it to 41 weeks so this is kind of surreal. I've been reading a lot of people's blogs that made it to 41 weeks and pretty much all of them had there babies within a few more days.

Why doesn't that cheer me up as much as it should?

_________________________________________

I'm really looking forward to being outside with the baby this summer — taking walks, sitting outside at the farm. Spring fever is really intensified when you have a spring baby. But the newscaster called it last night he said the words "last storm." The next storm is supposed to be the "last storm" of winter.

Of course, that might be followed by the first thunderstorm of spring, right?

Ticker Watch (again)

I wonder if the ticker will stop tomorrow ...

40 weeks 6 days

I'm starting to feel like a great explorer traveling farther into pregnancy than most have before. It's a whole new adventure being this pregnant.

What used to be my pregnancy email arrived in my email box just now entitled "your one-week-old."

I'm in a really good frame of mind, though. I'm just sitting and waiting and trying to enjoy things I won't have as much time for once the baby comes. Things are definitely gearing up, it will just be a question of when the baby decides to finally make his or her debut.

I will keep you all updated here and try to find something to write every day from now until the baby is born, even if it's a random musing.

I appreciate all your thoughts and prayers. Thanks to those who have refrained from calling. If you do call, I might not answer. I'm simply sitting here gestating in peace.

Everyone Thought You Were A ______

Check out the poll results. It looks like we'll never have to tell the baby that everyone thought they were the opposite sex.

36 votes total:
18 for boy.
18 for girl.

It's a good thing we have so much green!

It makes me wonder what made people vote the way they did. Was it just a feeling you had? Did you have some sort of formula (about how I was carrying, etc.)? Did you vote for what you wanted?

I'm curious. Leave me a comment and let me know.

Sell-by Date

What do you know, the ticker didn't explode. It didn't even stop counting!

I was thinking that maybe my due date was more like a sell by date. There are ton of things you eat well past their sell-by date, even though the date looks like a warning not to.

This metaphor is pretty absurd, so I am going to stop there =).

40 weeks

Today's my due date. Tomorrow I fully expect the bottom ticker to stop counting or maybe explode ... we'll see.

I am doing fine just waiting. I promise to share news when I have it and appreciate everyone's thoughts and prayers.

One thing is for certain, one of these days we will have a baby =).