Random Musings

As many of you know Nick and I decided (well mainly I decided and then he agreed) to use cloth diapers for Annabelle and everyone asks how it's going ... so far so good! Currently she is wearing Kissaluvs Size 0 diapers with Thirsties covers. Once she gets a little more meat on her we will switch to BumGenius 4.0.  I happen to think they look quite cute with her tiny feet and in Daddy's arms.

Thanks to a sling Annabelle enjoys being in the kitchen with me. Nick said I was more careful with my knife, so he enjoyed it too. He wouldn't like to take me to the ER again for trying to chop off my finger.

I'm starting to realize that Annabelle will soon be growing out of some of her clothes, so I'm on a mission to get a picture taken in ever outfit. So the new rule is diaper change = new outfit change. I'll work on posting the photos later, but so far this is my favorite:

In very exciting news, on June 5th - 6th Annabelle slept through the night!! 6 hours and 25 minutes to be exact. She slept more than I did only because I'm a night owl and stayed up to get some things done. When she woke me up in the morning I had to triple check the time to be sure. But unless I started sleep walking and can perfectly swaddle a baby during this sleep walk I think it's fair to say she did sleep though the night!

The other exciting event for June 6th was that Annabelle smiled and it was caught on video!

And in final exciting news Aunt Steph is on her way to Iowa to spend the summer with Annabelle ... she is looking out the window every moment awaiting her arrival ...

One Month

Plain and simple ... not quite sure how it happened, but on May 28th Annabelle turned one month old. 

Here are some pictures from her photo shoot.

Trying to be artistic.

For comparison next to her bear, next month we will work more on proper posture.

And now she's tired of all the photos and decides her bear is a comforting shoulder to lean on.

Annabelle attends a wedding.

Holy moly time does fly when you have a baby! Where did the entire month of May go? As of today Annabelle is 5.5 weeks old, Nick and I agree that we can't believe she's only that old.

Annabelle has had a busy 3 weeks since the last update, so to be fair we will break up the posts by major events.

On May 21st we attended the wedding of our dear friends Dave and Andrea Scott.

Nick was the best man and Melissa was the personal attendant. Thankfully Nick's mom and grandma attended the wedding also and took care of Annabelle during the day. The one thing I've never noticed before is the parents of babies always sit in the back and on the end of the pews at weddings, which now included Annabelle and I. Thankfully she was like this the entire wedding ceremony ...

And of course we had to take a family photo - courtesy of Annabelle's new friend Madeline's mom Jamie.

And here is a picture of the two girls and their mommies:

Annabelle enjoyed the wedding and dancing at the reception. But I think most of all she just loved being held by almost everyone in attendance and of course her pink dress!

Updates, updates, Updates!!

So it's been 18 days since Annabelle joined us and to say that we have learned a lot is an understatement, but more on that later.

Last Thursday at her two week appointment Annabelle weighed 8lb 4oz and was 20 3/4 inches long. So she's growing and despite all the questions we had for the doctor, the answer was she's gaining weight and growing so you have nothing to worry about.

Annabelle sometimes sleeps 3-4 hours at a stretch during the night, but sometimes she doesn't. One nice thing is that once she is asleep she is out and no sound can wake her, dogs barking and the vacuum are no problems at all.

With her new sleep buddy - Gizmo 

 

Asleep at church - not an indication of Pastor Doug's message :)

 

One of her favorite places to sleep

 

She is like her mom - hates having things on her feet while sleeping, so here she kicked her way out of her swaddle and scooted down to block the light and fall back asleep.

 

Taking an afternoon nap with the pups.

 

But then every once in awhile - instead of sleeping, she does this.

Last weekend was Mother's Day weekend and we were privileged to have 4 Mothers (now including myself) for a brunch at our house. So of course we had to take a ton of photos with everyone here.

My Grandma Glenna Mae and Aunt Peggy came up from Kentucky to meet Annabelle. So we got the 4 generations photo. My dad Mike is still in town helping around the house and with Annabelle. He soon will be heading back to work in India.

Then Nick's mom Jami, Grandma Betty, and Grandpa Ed came from Independence to get another dose of Annabelle. (Terry came down as well, but for some reason we didn't get a photo of everyone in all one photo). Jami also stayed the whole first week with us and made sure we always had yummy food on the table. Grandma Betty also was able to stay for a few days to help with getting adjusted with Annabelle. 

   

Of the lessons Annabelle has taught us here are the top 5 lessons:

1. Hair and Annabelle can not reside on the same shoulder, this is even more so once a shower has been just taken.

2. Socks must be removed during diaper changes.

3. Quite often all bodily functions that go rogue at the same time and you just have to laugh.
4. Spit up is the new black, pacifiers are the new fashion rings, and cries are classical music.
5. No matter how many places you put burp cloths, most of the time they are never close enough. Shirts are good substitutes, by default.

In other news, which is quite obvious and cliche of new parents, we love taking photos of Annabelle. To help use technology to our advantage we have set up a shutterfly account where everyone can upload photos they have taken, download photos on the site, and also order photos. Here is the link http://theshaferkids.shutterfly.com/ with all the photos.

I now have to go through the checklist to see what Annabelle would like us to do for her now.

Best wishes for 3 hours naps tonight to everyone,

Mommy Melissa

P.S. Soon Aunt Steph will be here for the summer - Annabelle can't wait.

Dear Blog,

I am sorry for neglecting you. Annabelle is to cute to neglect. Have you seen pictures of her? Oh, not since the day after she was born? Well, she has changed a lot. I promise to update you soon. She's been asleep for 3 hours already and if you can convince her to hit 6 my shift will be over and then I promise to update you this weekend.

<3,
New Mommy Melissa

Annabelle Lyn is here!

After 41 weeks of pregnancy, 28 hours of labor (apparently Melissa has a high pain tolerance, as she went 14 hours until her first round of meds) and a c-section Annabelle Lyn Shafer is finally here!

 First official family photo

Family photo after some sleep.

She sleeps, eats, crys, and repeats very well.

Melissa has learned how to do many things one handed and Nick is starting to learn how to function with no sleep.

Annabelle, or Belle if we are sleep deprived and lazy, has crazy long fingers that have put the death grip on Melissa's hair, her IV, and everything else in reach. As you can see from the pictures Annabelle has a ton of blonde hair, thanks to all the heartburn she gave Melissa during pregnancy, seriously we should have bought stock in tums.

We are planned to be out of the hospital on Sunday afternoon, 96 hours in the hospital is long enough for  Melissa, the person who hates hospitals. As you can see she loves visitors. So far she hasn't spit up on anyone with out warning and only screams a few decibels louder than normal when visitors are around.

Grandma Jami 

Grandpa Mike

Aunt Steph

 

Mommy enjoying a sleeping baby.

  

Daddy enjoying an awake baby.

In other kids news, Gizmo had surgery on her left knee again last week. We figured it was the most convenient inconvenient time to have it done. She is still quite precocious, the vet said she would have to have her cast re-wrapped once in the two weeks she is supposed to have the cast on, she has already had it re-wrapped 4 times. Thankfully our vet is really awesome and doesn't mind the two emergency calls that we have made to her late at night. Also super thankful that Mike, Melissa's dad and Stephanie, Melissa's sister are in town. They spend most of the day at the hospital spending time with Annabelle and then go home and take care of the pups.

Princess Annabelle has requested some more attention, so we must oblige!

still. no. baby.

Baby Update

Until further notice please visit http://www.haveyouhadthatbabyyet.com/ for all baby arrival updates.

Gizmo is in surgery for her knee today - will share updates as soon as we get them.

O.M.G.

The countdown to Baby Girl's arrival is now in single digits.

Oh.
My.
Goodness.

What have we gotten ourself into?

Big News!!

The big news of the day ... I'm still pregnant! Other than that nothing of any importantance to report :)

But in reality, we have a couple of big events coming up this week and after that Baby Girl will be given the green light to come anytime she pleases.

Nick is getting ready for a trip to Des Moines for work. He will be gone Monday night - Wednesday. Then on Wednesday he has his final for his MBA class. So Nick's vote is for anytime after Wednesday night.

My week consists of finishing up taxes (seriously why can't I get motivated in February to do them?), making more lists and then checking them twice. On Wednesday I will have another doctors appointment and I will make sure to pay attention to what they say to report back to Nick and everyone. Then finally on Saturday my Dad flies into town from India, so it will be nice that he's in the country and an extra helping hand.

This past week my favorite phase to Nick when he asks me how I'm feeling is "I feel 9 1/2 months pregnant". I mean seriously what am I supposed to say? I'm not on bedrest which is a plus, but other than that as the doctor says everything looks great. Boring. Typical complaints of being this far along.

I also pushed my limits with 2 back to back late nights this week. On Friday my dear friends Kimberly and Stella hosted a baby party for us. My favorite part (besides the super yummy food) was everyone decorated a onesie for the baby and people were darn creative! I will be sure to post pictures of them soon, we decided to let them dry a little bit more before moving them. Then on Saturday we attended a surprise birthday party for a wonderful friend from church. While both events were wonderful, they went on way past my bedtime and I was a little to stubborn to sit down the whole time. Nick did at least win one argument, I didn't wear heels. It kind of ruined the outfit, but I guess it was more comfortable, but still.

In other news Nick's cousin Monica just announced that they are expecting their second baby in October. Which is wonderful news. The crazy thing about it will be Christmas. One year there was 1 baby, then the next there was 2, then the next there was 4, then last year there were 4 kids and 3 kids growing in bellies, and this year there will be 8 kids under 5. I can't even imagine!

It's supposed to be my bedtime, but my mind is racing. So I think I will start working on some of my lists. I love lists - they make life easy (or annoying if you talk to Nick).

So until next time when there is real big news or I can't sleep or whatever. Thanks for listening to the ramblings of this pregnant lady!

M

2.5 weeks and I might be getting annoyed

So everyone always asks me if I'm ready for the baby to come, to which I always respond "As much as we can be". I'm pretty sure that even with all the checklists and books we've missed something and I've finally come to terms with that fact.

The next thing they always ask is how I'm feeling, to which I normally respond with "I'm feeling good for being 9 months pregnant". True statement. I've had a fairly easy pregnancy and I'm very thankful for that no question about it.

But then when I talk to the doctors I'm convinced that I have an alien inside of me. They say they baby should calm down towards the end, with less movement since there is less room. Not this baby girl. They say that during her active times I should be able to get 10 movements in an hour. I wish that were true. Seriously she's throwing herself a party in my tummy, singing and dancing to her own tunes. My ribs are sore from her booty shaking and my stomach muscles are sore from her constant flailing. Nick tries hard not to laugh when he sees and feels my stomach contort into odd shapes, but most of the time he just can't help it.

So I might officially be getting to the point of wanting this baby girl out. Might be ... I will have to review the checklists one more time.

3 weeks

So now there are 3 weeks until the scheduled on-time arrival of Baby Girl Shafer. The docs say everything is looking just fine, even commented on how calm I was. But I think it's the fact that I haven't wrapped my mind around everything that is going to change - so maybe instead of calm I'm blissfully ignorant?

One thing I have enjoyed is shopping online for the essentials and I've enjoyed even more them arriving on our front porch. It is just like Christmas. Although now out basement is a cardboard box graveyard.

We mostly accomplished the task of packing our bags for the hospital. But one thing I've found is at least half the items they say to pack are items that we are going to be using until then. It says to pack comfy clothes - but of course I want to wear those in the upcoming weeks. So I feel that we have about just as much packed as we have on the list of items to go around the house and collect. But at least we have a list correct? We just need to stay on top of laundry and everything will be good.

Now the waiting game begins. All my little baby updates reminded me that the baby was technically "full term" today. But I maintain that the party is supposed to start on April 21st. Coming 3 weeks early would be like showing up to a party 30 minutes beforehand - it's awkward for everyone. Nick has a final for his MBA class on the 13th - so he votes for anytime after that. I on the other hand can't decide when a good time would be - so I just vote before I become completely miserable.

Everyone asks how the dogs are doing, they are also blissfully ignorant. I think they know something is going on because they get scolded for jumping on me. They also notice there isn't as much room on the couch for snuggling as there used to be. We predict that Gadget will do well with the baby, Gizmo is going to be the wild card.

Off to try and get some sleep! I hear it's a valued commodity!
M

We have entered the blog world!

With Baby Girl Shafer due in less than a month why not add another thing to our to-do list and create a blog? Of course that sounds like a sane thing to do!

This will be a way for our friends and family around the world to follow the latest events going on with the Shafer's!

Upcoming events shall include:
Checking things off the baby preparation to-do list
Birth of Baby Girl Shafer
Naming of Baby Girl Shafer
Freaking out of the Original Baby/Kid #2 (Gizmo) of Baby Girl Shafer
Protecting of Baby Girl Shafer by Kid #1 (Gadget)
Figuring out Baby Girl Shafer
Trying to sleep!

Off to check things off the to-do list!
Melissa