Exotic Locale Photo Shoot

Jim instigated another photo shoot featuring Ever in various odd locations in our partially-built kitchen and TV room.

Wall art:

On the island:


(Jim wants it to look as if we just stumbled upon Ever hanging out in these weird places, but I think it's funnier to see him hiding.)



In the cabinetry:

Atop the speakers:

I love how much he loves his girl.  I keep taking pictures of them together on the couch.



Matching.

I don't appear in very many of our pictures so far, which is probably best.  I'm usually not properly dressed or put together these days.  I am clothed in this one, though au naturel in the face: 

I held a photo shoot of my own the other day after I changed the wee one.  She just looked so cute. 

She's had terrible acne and a majorly flaking forehead for a couple weeks.  It seems to be a little better the last day or two, maybe.  We're hoping it resolves soon.  She's so ashamed. 

I realize I am posting millions of pictures of my baby.  That's what you get when you make me blog! 

The Champion

I wanted to do a big post about Ever's birth using all the photos Bags, Ann Marie, and Jim and I took while the fam was here.  But alas - because it is taking me too long to get it together, and because Toots is begging for pictures, I will post some more recent shots of the wee one.  And then I will brag about her.

Ever is the best stretcher in the whole world.  She always stretches after she wakes up and after a satisfactory feeding session.  I haven't really been able to capture her best moves.  She stretches her arms above her head, hands in fists.  She turns her fists in, then rolls her wrists around and turns her fists out.  She puckers her lips. 

And sometimes she just relaxes with her hands behind her head. 

 

  

She likes to keep her hands by her face.  It started in utero; the ultrsound techs had a hard time getting clear shots of her face.  Sometimes she covers her ears as if she's trying to block out noise.  Sometimes she puts her hands under her chin as if she's doing a really cheesy photo shoot.  Sometimes she just vogues.

Jim likes to make Ever do weird things, like drink his Coke...

... and sit on the mantel.  Ever wasn't happy about the left side of the TV but quieted down when perched on the right...

Last night Jim gave Ever a fro after her bath (which bath, by the way, she tolerated without crying at all).  Check out the perfectly circular hair.

And tonight they watched TV together.  (So much for the no-TV-until-two-years-old recommendation.)  Note that the hair is still perfectly circular.

Ever used to go super cross-eyed a lot.  She seems to be growing out of it now but still does it occasionally.  Here's a mild example:



She seems so much more alert now.  She just looks at us. 

It's hard to capture her cute expressions - especially her smiles.  Tonight she smiled at me for about a whole minute while I talked baby talk to her.  I know she's still young for social smiles, but she really does seem to be smiling in response to us the last couple days. 


(Note her giant pants, which Jim has named her "Elvis pants," gifted by Tutu.  Won't be long before she's grown into them.)

She stares with her eyes super wide, and I'm certain that if she could talk, she would say, "I see dead people."  It really freaks me out when she does it when I'm up with her in the night.  She looks possessed.

A few days ago, I actually left the house and ran a couple errands with Ever.  I thought I had turned a corner and was going to start being productive.  But alas.  I tried to go to church yesterday but had to turn around because I realized I had taken the wipes out of the diaper bag and had forgotten to put them back in.  By the time I got home to get them, Ever was crying.  I took her in to change her.  Then I had to feed her.  Then sacrament meeting was almost over, and I gave up. 

Similarly, all I have to show for today is an hour of continuing legal education (have to finish a couple more hours before the end of the month) and a load of laundry - cleaned, but not folded.  But part of the reason I got nothing done today is that Ever and I were sleeping a lot. 

This is where the bragging comes in.  Ever is a champion sleeper.  I know it may not last, but for now I am basking. 

Last night was the second in three nights when Ever went about seven hours between feedings.  She ate from about 8 to 10 P.M. last night, with breaks for diaper changes and for my trying to convince her that she wasn't hungry anymore.  Then we read to her, sang a song, prayed with her, and put her to bed.  I had to pick her up for a few minutes to bounce her, but I crawled into bed at 10:49.  She woke up at 4:30 A.M. to eat.  I let her eat a long time, changed her, and put her back to bed.  She slept until about 9:45 A.M.  I got her up, fed her, changed her.  She seemed tired, and I was still tired, myself.  So we went back to sleep from 11 A.M. to 1 P.M.  As of about 2:30 P.M., we had eaten and slept and changed some diapers and clothes (thanks to a lot of spit-up).  And that was about it.  For that, I am unspeakably grateful. 

The Growing Babe, Etc.: My First Really Lame Post

I don't have any idea what I'm doing, but I want to try to get one post out of the way - if only to silence the skeptics.  And because there has been some interest in my fatitude, I will do a random post loosely centered around my belly and related events - something I generally despise.  But maybe someday I will want to look back and remember what it was like. 

Here I am around 22 weeks, when, at the time, I really felt as if I were showing:

About two weeks later, 24 weeks-ish:

My wonderful friends in the ward threw me a shower on October 29 (when I was about 34 weeks) at Amy Thompson's homestead.  Amy is an amazing party-thrower.  I told her to make it the most ghetto shower she had ever seen, but there's no stopping her (or Mariah or Deb, who co-hosted). 

The diaper cake and some of the decor:

 

The favors:

The food (so much and so delicious, I made myself sick) and some of the friends:

Presents - including, on the mantle, products used to play The Price is Right.  I tried really hard and got one right.  The biggest loser. 

Amy also created a little true-or-false quiz game out of facts about baby/child laws, in honor of my being a lawyer.  I performed terribly on that, as well. 

It was a lovely day, despite the game fiascoes.  

Mamo arrived Sunday morn in anticipation of the babe's arrival, after getting stuck in L.A. overnight Saturday.  After church, she took my official fully-grown portrait.  Here I am, four days from the due date:

Not the loveliest picture of me, but it took about seven tries to get that one.  Mamo had a hard time not getting my bedroom slippers or taking the picture from a kneeling position (which gave me an awesome double chin).  This one, with the open closet and bedroom slippers, was the runner-up: 

The house is under construction and was grocery-free when Mamo arrived, so we've been eating out a lot.  Here's Mamo on the way to dinner.  She wore her trusty jacket and kept her gloves on in the car.  It was very cute.  The only person in the world who gets colder than I do:

We've spent the last couple days returning baby stuff and shopping for things I still need.  Turns out it's really hard to buy baby clothes - even just footed one-pieces and sleepers, etc. - when you don't know the gender.  We have made some good progress, however, and don't have too much left to buy.  Nonetheless, it's fortuitous that the baby is going to be late, as we are certainly not ready for it to arrive tomorrow (its due date).  Jim starts rounding at the hospital tomorrow for a week and has substantial work left to do on the house before the babe makes its debut. 

That's it for now.  I blogged, and I'm not sure how to feel about it.