Auntie Sonya

I usually don't go a day without talking to my sister. Since Lily was born, my phone has been racking up a lot of rollover minutes because Skype has taken over. Skyping with my sister is part of the daily routine. Lily knows her face and her voice. It helps that she and I sound eerily alike. Lily was in for a real treat last weekend because Sonya came back out to Portland for her 2nd visit in 4 months. Along with some dear and I guess I can now say long time friends (10 years already), we spent the long weekend in Sunriver, Oregon, which is near Mt. Bachelor in central Oregon to take part in the GIST Cancer Walk for the Cure. We want to help the cause however we can and we're really glad we could do this together. It was a darn good weekend of simply enjoying time with each other in a nifty little home whether it was playing tennis in the driveway with adorable Sam and Zach Larson, soaking in the hot tub while being amazed by just how clear and bright a starry sky can be outside of the city, or watching the deer outside the living room window.
Sonya, thanks for visiting us. We knew if anyone could make Lily giggle, it would be you.

I also just posted a new Picassa album, linked in the upper right of the page as usual.

Return To Work Eve

It is the night before I return to work after staying at home with Lily for the last 4 months. For so long during my leave, all I kept saying was "I don't have to think about work, it's so far off." Sure, it crossed my mind quite a bit but never to the point of it dangerously dwelling in my mind. This past week with Nate home was just one great moment after another. Lily has been extra busy learning so much in the past few days. I posted a video a couple days ago of Lily almost rolling over and now she rolls over with ease. She tries to giggle more and more (still sounds like a coughing laugh right now) grabs at toys more than ever and has discovered her feet.

I didn't think I'd cry about my role as a stay at home mom coming to an end but as I looked at all the pictures from the past week and reflected a bit more, I can't fight back the tears. I'm so proud of how far Nate and I have come, how far Lily has come in discovering the world, and it's only been 4 months. I didn't think it would be this fun to be Lily's mom when my leave ends. I thought it would still be too new and stressful to think of any time at home with Lily in the first 4 months to feel like a vacation but it has.

So, I'll dust off my pumping bag, find my Intel badge, pack a picture of Lily, and drive to work tomorrow. The change is here and now we just need to do it.

Here are a couple videos of Lily that made us both smile: Lily giving her first signs of a giggle and Lily surprising us with her rolling over easily.

Stay At Home Mom and Dad

This past week has been good, really good. Nate and I have been stay at home parents to our 4 month old Lily and wow has it been fun. It makes me daydream about winning the lottery and letting us both stay home to raise our big Lil'. Lily is a lot easier these days and I'm starting to understand how your own kid is by the far the funniest person in the world, even funnier than Stephen Colbert. And he's funny.

I am going back to work next week and in between picnics in the park and adventures to places like the bookstore (I'm not being sarcastic, it's really fun), we've been working on finalizing childcare and introducing the bottle. Lily likes the bottle as much as I like Serena Williams - not at all. I am choosing not to think about getting back to work because it's nowhere near as fun as our upcoming weekend. We're going to visit a friend's farm, Kookoolan, visit a friend's new hotel in wine country, The Allison, and hopefully enjoy a Michigan win.

I love that Nate will be a stay at home Dad for the next month. I'm not worried at all. I think Nate will be better at it than I have been. He has so much energy and he likes to be busy giving Lily lots of practice time when it comes to tummy time, sitting up and crawling. I'm much more in the "it'll happen when it happens" mode which really means I really love her at this age and don't want her to grow up. Nate also worries and stresses less than I do. I had this irrational fear the other day while I crossed a bridge with Lily in her stroller. I literally picked up speed while crossing the bridge because I was scared she'd somehow fall off the bridge. I know. It makes no sense but it's what went through my mind. Good times.

Lily had her 4 month check up today and all is good. She's in the 81% for weight (15lb 3oz) and 76% for height (25''). The only thing that keeps her off the charts is the amount of hair on her head.

Here's a video of Lily kinda rolling over.

Change Coming

It definitely feels like a change is upon us. There's a fall chill in the morning air, college football is here, and Lily is coming up on the four month mark. That didn't feel so significant until I realized it's a third of a year. Then I thought wow, already a third of the way towards her first birthday and suddenly it felt like time was flying right before my eyes.

Lots of other changes on the way too. I'm two work days away from five weeks of bonding leave. We'll have one week of overlap where both Nicole and I are off, then Nicole heads back to work. I'm definitely looking forward to being the one Lily spends most of her time with for the next month or so, getting to know her quirks and see her change in front of my eyes. But it will definitely be a role reversal of what's been going on the past four months, with me working from home as much as possible to help out. Nicole will probably work from home a fair amount and I'm sure it will be difficult and weird for her to work while I take care of Lily.

Another, more unexpected, change has happened as Nicole has started making dinner way more often. Our consumption of take out from the great restaurants around us has definitely dropped off and we've had some great pasta salads that have gone perfectly with the warm weather. So I'll see if I can keep up the dinner-making momentum, hopefully I will. Once we're both back at work I'm sure we'll be digging out the take out menus again, but hopefully in the meantime the weather will be nice enough for me to fire up the grill.

On the topic of change I'm tempted to toss in Michigan's return to the win column and the change to a quarterback who looks like he belongs on the field, but that probably belongs in a different blog, oh well.

On a more relavent note, we've posted a couple of new photo albums, you know where to click.