Coco's Visit & Wren's Blessing

Bag Lady was already planning to come help with the baby, but when I tried to die in childbirth she became extra-anxious to assist. She decided to bump her flight up a few days so she'd get here earlier and have as much time as possible with us - 13 days. I knew she wanted to be put to work, so when she arrived I told her that her first task was to clean her own bathroom and make up her bed. I never got the bathroom or anything else cleaned after Mamo left. I would have felt a lot worse about that if Bags hadn't repeatedly and emphatically told me how much she wanted to help.

Bags was amazing. She was tireless. She needed to work on her final paper for her grad school class while she was here. I kept encouraging her to take time to work on it, but she put everything aside and did all she possibly could around here. She changed all the diapers, shopped for groceries, made all the food, cleaned, and took care of the kiddies so I could nap as much as possible. She could not have been more helpful. She's a chip off the Mamo block. I took advantage. In fact, I even had her double some of the recipes she made so that I could deliver the extra food to people in the ward who were sick or had also just had babies. They thought I was so nice. Sometimes I gave credit where credit was due.

Wren's first bath was hurriedly performed by Jim over the kitchen sink. Ever looked on:

I encouraged use of the newborn bathtub, but Jim just wanted to git 'er done. (In that first pic, he's trying to clean gunk out of her eye caused by a blocked tear duct.)

Later, Bags and I gave Wren her first real bath in the bathtub. She was amazing. Unlike Ever, who screamed the whole time during her early baths, Wren was very good and quiet. No crying.

Bags and I took lots of pictures of her sleeping (and stretching):

We introduced her to Gilmore Girls, but it was lost on her.

Best snuggler ever (note Bags's and my matching Friday Night Lights shirts):

One day Bags unswaddled Wrenzo and tried to get photos of her stretching. Wrenzo didn't really perform, but Bags got some nice pictures:

Ever has been all over Wrenzo since day 1. She adores her and is so sweet and gentle with her. She strokes her softly, calls her "sweetie," "sweetheart," and, for a time, "babe-uh" and "my baby," and gives her sweet kisses: 

Bags captioned this one "Whitney and her girls." I love that I have "girls," plural:

Once in a while, Wrenzo was awake:

Wren was born with a freakishly strong neck:

Pretty much the only time I got out of the house when Coco was here was for a trip to Target with her and the girls:

Cereal was a little on sale. We were running low, so I took the opportunity to stock up. The cart looked hilarious. Wish I had a picture of it.

Ever found things to do in our many hours at home, such as bookkeeping with her cash register and about 1,000 post-its:

Bag Lady took her on a couple of walks/bike rides:

On Saturday, April 18, Christian, Shandra, Tristan and Betsy drove down (they just moved to Ventura) to spend some time with us and to participate in Wren's blessing. Ever loved playing with the cousins. She and Betsy were very cute together.

Besides the family, we just invited the Karners and the Wilsons (Jeremy, Trish, Karen, and Carl) for the blessing. Trisha was out of town with the kids, so Jeremy came solo. Since we didn't want to have to deal with food prep, we decided to order pizza and just make a salad and dessert. We told everybody 5:00 P.M. We figured we'd start the blessing at 5:15, and we ordered pizza to be delivered at 5:30. We thought we had it figured out perfectly. Jim was about a minute into the blessing when the doorbell rang. I figured the Pizza Hut delivery guy would just keep ringing if we ignored it, so I started to go to the door. Bags stopped me and went to deal with him. I was so distracted, listening to Bags and the pizza guy, that I had a hard time listening to the rest of the blessing. It was pretty much a disaster. I was so bitter that we had calculated exactly when we wanted the pizzas delivered and ordered accordingly, and then he showed up at least 10 minutes early! Bags came back into the room, and we started discussing the disaster. She got teary talking about how sad she was that she'd missed the blessing. That made me realize that it was really sad, and I was really sad, and then I started crying. We talked to Mel and Shandra about what they remembered from the blessing, and later I talked to Jim about his experience and what he remembered, too. Here's the recap:

Jim blessed Wren that she will prepare to serve a mission and that she will be the type of person to go to the temple to be married to a righteous brother. He blessed her to study the scriptures. He blessed her that our home would be a haven and that Wren will recognize the difference between our home and the world outside. He blessed her that she will follow her sister's example and be a joy to us. Jim said that during the blessing he had the impression that she will be really spiritual, and he felt she'll be righteous. 

After we ate, we took a group photo courtesy of the timer on Bags's camera. Turns out the dress I wore was very unflattering.

Tristan leapt unto the coffee table in full-on silly mode for the second attempt, and Ever followed suit:

Bags took a few photos of the lady of the hour:

She wasn't a fan of the couch backdrop, so the photo session ended quickly:

We opened presents from Trisha and Dee and Shan. Everybody was so nice, and they gave us cute clothes for Wrenzo. Trisha also sent a "big sister" tool belt for Ever, complete with wipes, diapers, hand sanitizer, and goggles for those really big blow-outs. Pretty funny:

The Deetrixes stayed till Sunday midday. We gave Betsy her birthday presents early:

Tristan asked to hold Wren before they hit the road:

It was great to spend some time with the Deetrixes. We've spent so little time with them in recent years and are looking forward to seeing them more now that they are back in California. 

Bags left the following Wednesday, April 22. She was sick for the last portion of her trip and went a few days without holding Wrenzo.* She was excited to be back in business the Tuesday before she left. I was so grateful for all of Bag Lady's help. Jim decided that when she has a baby, he has to take a week off of work so he can care for our kids while I go to return the favor. I'm afraid I'm too lazy ever to be of as much service as Bags was, but I'll have to try. 

*For the record, "Wrenzo" is is the nickname we use most for the wee babe. Bags expanded it to "Lorenzo," which I had somehow not thought of. Jim also came up with "Rennifer." Sometimes it's "Wrenzo Lama" or "Lorenzo Lama" (after Lorenzo Lamas; I'm just not familiar enough with him to get it right), "Wrenny Pooh Bear," etc. So the nicknames are coming along. 

Wren at Home - The First Couple Weeks

Tuesday, March 24, we went home from the hospital. Wren's first car ride:

Jim took Ever to her last tumbling class on Wednesday. I was worried he would be really uncomfortable hanging out with the mom friends during class, but he did OK.

Mamo snuggled a lot with Wren. She would just lay the babe on her chest, and Wren would sleep and sleep. Since Mamo doesn't like pictures of herself, this is a close-up of Wren sleeping on Mamo:

Wren is a cute sleeper.

Like Mamo, Ever loves snuggling with Wren. Wren looks possessed here, but it was a nice sister moment:

We had Mamo with us for almost a week after we got home from the hospital. We just hung out at home pretty much the whole time, although we did manage to get out for a walk or two:

We had told Renei (Relief Society President) that we didn't want dinners, but she lined up a whole bunch of meals anyway. We had dinners every night for a week, including two dinners the night after we got back. Karen Bunnell up the street sent lunch down one day. Friends came by with treats. We had so much food that I began freezing whatever could be frozen and gorging myself on the rest trying to keep up. All those meals meant we didn't have to worry about cooking at all initially. Mamo got to spend her time focusing on the girls and helping with other stuff, which was great. 

Then there were the gifts. By the time Jim and I got back from the hospital, Mariah Koehle had dropped off gifts for Wren and a big-sister present for Ever. Many people brought gifts along with the food. It was out of control. We were blown away by people's kindness and generosity. It made me realize how awful I am that I almost never take dinner to people, would never think of taking a gift too, and certainly would never think of taking gifts for older siblings. Ever made out with almost as much stuff as Wren. One of the gifts she got was this giant coloring roll from Pam and Mark McEwan (less than half the roll is pictured):

I was grateful when the presents ceased so I could stop worrying about thank-you notes! 

Several friends also took Ever for play dates, to the park, to the beach, etc., so I had time with just Wren. They sent pictures so I could see how much fun Ever was having. She sure loves playing with other kids.

Mamo left on March 30. She was such an amazing help while she was here. She's a cleaning phenom and is so proactive about seeing what needs to be done and doing it. There's no better mom or Tutu in the world. I'm so grateful for all she is and does.

The first weekend in April was General Conference and Easter. That Friday night, the Rondos hosted their annual Easter party/egg hunt. I left Wren home with Jim and took Ever to the party. I felt a little like a celeb; it was my first outing since Wren's birth, so I got more attention than usual. Ever had a good time.

We got ambitious and had friends, Alan and Haleigh Bruns, over for belgian waffles and the Sunday morning session of Conference. The girls did pretty well while we watched - particularly Wren, who sleeps. I forgot how much newborns sleep. As you'll see in upcoming photos, Wren spent much of the beginning of her life sleeping and otherwise hanging out on this wonderful pillow Susan Oddou lent me:

She's been a really good baby. She generally doesn't cry unless she's hungry or overtired. She made it pretty easy to leave her on that pillow.

We had Easter dinner at the Karners' with the Karner/Oddou clan. I love doing holidays at other people's houses. Not cooking is my favorite!

Jim went back to work the Monday after Easter (April 6). That first day I was alone with the two girls, we barely left the couch. Ever was so good. She just hung out, kept herself busy or just sat with us. She is a good helper, and she adores her baby sister.

I only had three days alone before Bags came to help...