Fortune Cookie

Ledger and I brought Chinese take-out to Chris for lunch on Friday. I think this fortune cookie sums up exactly how we feel about parenting. :) Chris really loved seeing Ledger all dressed up in his BA/BY onesie.


I had to work on Saturday morning, but Chris and Ledger came to visit me at the office... and bring me a little bit of morning caffeine. My vet techs both love it when I bring Ledger to visit.
On Saturday, Jesse really enjoyed playing with my little boy and even got him to laugh! :) Of course we uploaded a video.

Saturday afternoon, we all went out to the lake. It has been an unseasonably cool August this year and temperatures this weekend were only in the 70s! That makes it just a little too chilly to wakeboard. So we just enjoyed our weekend and played Pegs & Jokers.


Today it's Sunday and we're back home. The lawn needs to be mowed and we need to go to Walmart... but all I really want to do is just sit on the couch and rest. This week shouldn't be quite as busy as last week. Hopefully Ledger will sleep a little more and we can all get some much-deserved rest! :)

UPDATE: Ledger and I took about an hour long nap before he woke up to eat. Then he went back to sleep and slept for another 3 hours!!! I DID get the lawn mowed (yay!) and we stopped by the grocery store to get only the necessities. Wal-Mart is just going to have to wait until another day.

A Long Week

This was not Ledger's best week. He has started fighting sleep -- which makes bed time a nightmare. And when Ledger isn't sleeping, Mommy isn't sleeping either. So this has been a very long week for everyone.

Ledger has been entertaining everyone with his amazing skills in his Baby Einstein jumper seat. There is a little green frog attached to the seat that he has been working very hard to get into his mouth -- which is not possible. But, boy, he has been focusing so hard. Here is a video of his very hard work.

In shopping news... I found the car seat that I really want on Kansas City craigslist for about 1/2 of the normal purchase price. It makes me so happy to find a bargain! :D I owe a big THANK YOU to Emily who is working with the seller to arrange to pick up the car seat!

My Boys

Here are MY boys... the reason that I smile.
And, honestly, you're probably smiling right now too.

Ledger and Daddy have this amazing bond. They play and talk. There are smiles and noises that Ledger only makes for his Daddy. If I didn't love them both so much... I'd be completely jealous. :)

Laughter: Caught on Camera!

It's true! While we were at the pool party this evening, cousin Val really got Ledger laughing. He even kept laughing when we got out the camera to film it. Here is a cute little clip of him laughing. He sure is a happy baby! :)

Pool Party

Today we went to Lindsborg for a pool party with the Peterson side of the family. My cousins, Tamrin and Jon, came in from Chicago, and we got our first chance to meet their baby: Edward Jonathan. He is only 5 weeks old, but he is so big! :)

Great Grammie Peterson with her 2 newest great-grandsons.

We have a lot of cousins on that side of the family, so Ledger got to hang out with some of the big kids! Here is Alanah holding Ledger and Kennedy holding Edward. Those girls sure are good with their baby cousins!

And this is just a cute picture of Faith and Annika playing "ring-around-the-rosie".

Tiny Bubbles

Lately, Ledger has learned to blow these little tiny bubbles of drool. Which was cute, but wet. Today, he added blowing raspberry sounds to make the bubbles. It is ADORABLE. Aunt Emily wanted video of it, so I got out the camera to capture it. Unfortunately, our baby is a little camera shy. As soon as the camera comes out, he stops whatever cute thing he's doing. We managed to et a few cute clips on camera. You can hear Chris and I cracking up in the background.

Sleepy Baby

The first thing everyone asks about Ledger is: "Is he sleeping through the night yet?" As it turns out, this is a really hard question to answer! Our bed time routine is going really well, so usually Ledger is in bed by 8 or 8:30pm. He usually sleeps really well until 12:30am or so. Then I feed him when he wakes up. He will then go right back to sleep and sleep until 5am-ish. Sooo... he's sleeping 4 or 5 hours at a time -- which is definitely better than getting up every 2 hours!!

So, I guess the short answer is NO, he's not sleeping through the night. BUT, he's doing really well. And, although I'm pretty out of it for his midnight feedings, I actually like being "mommy" during the night -- the one that soothes and comforts and puts the baby back to sleep. It makes me feel needed and, honestly, there is NOTHING sweeter than my baby's sleeping face.

Ledger's 3 Month Pictures

Earlier this month, we had a 3-month photo session for Ledger with crazy Kira. Here are some of the best photos:

To see these photos in higher resolution, go to our Web Album.

I Want, I Want, I Want

I have never been a big "shopper" and rarely bought stuff for myself. But since having a baby, I WANT EVERYTHING that is even remotely baby related. And ALL of it is adorable. Clothes, gadgets, gear... you name it, I want it. LOL. (You might have noticed the "Amazon Wish List" button that has appeared in the left-hand bar of this blog. ) I am trying to find things used on Craigslist and Ebay, but some things are more difficult than others to find.

So far, I've purchased the following items from Craigslist or other online ads:

• Arm's Reach Mini Co-Sleeper - This was one of the BEST purchases I've made.
• Bumbo Chair with Tray - It's still in great shape, and Ledger loves sitting up in it
• Car Seat extra base - BRU charges $75 for a new one, which was just WAY too much!
• Changing Table - It fits in perfectly with our crib and dresser set
• Halo Sleep Sacks - I *think* Emily is picking these up this week. Yay!
• Soft Shapes Books - Ann's son LOVED these books, so I bought quite a few of them off of ebay for Ledger.
  

Here are the items I'm currently searching for:

• Jogging Stroller - it's gotta be a really nice one to buy it used; I kinda have my heart set on the Kolcraft Contours 3 Wheel stroller that is on my wish list.
  
• Crib Tent - I need something to keep Cooper out of Ledger's crib
• Britax Marathon car seat - We already own one of these, but when Ledger is big enough to need that car seat, we will need one in each car since I will be dropping him off at child care, and Chris will be picking him up!

Happy Birthday Oma

Today is Oma's birthday! This year, all 3 of her daughters chipped in to buy her tickets to the Paul McCartney concert in Tulsa -- she is a huge McCartney fan! We hope she has a great time.

I also wanted to just take a minute to tell my mom how much I appreciate her -- especially now that I am a mom too. And Ledger loves his Oma! They have a very special bond. I'm including a video where they are playing -- Ledger is making his highest pitched screaming sound in response to his Oma. :) Warning: This video is LOUD!

Mommy's Birthday

Today is my birthday! I'm 29 -- which means it's the last birthday I'll ever admit to having, right? We had another wonderful day today. Emily woke up extra early this morning and made me a birthday version of "Blueberry Buckle" It was EXCELLENT! The Powell family played games all morning and then went out to eat for lunch. BoomMa and BoomPa had to leave and drive back to Oklahoma in the early afternoon... so Oma and Papa Hensley came in from Lindsborg! We continued playing games (Pegs and Jokers) and then had pizza delivered for supper. It was a super day -- exhausting, but fun.

Having family here this weekend has been so much fun for Ledger. He has been able to look at so many faces and loves being held by everyone in his family. Here are some pictures of Ledger today. :)

Ledger discovered his feet and works very hard to focus on grabbing his toes.

Over the last week, Ledger has really gained control over his hands. He grabs his bottle with two hands to control it and just this weekend was able to grab his teether with both hands to keep it in his mouth!

After a long weekend with the family, Ledger could barely keep his eyes open!

I really enjoyed being surrounded by family this weekend. We are truly blessed to have such a wonderful family support system and I really enjoy watching everyone's reactions to Ledger.

And I want to congratulate my nephew, Ronan Guy. He turned 1 year old yesterday AND started walking all over the place. We miss being able to see the Guy family more often... but at least we can follow them on their blog!

Powell Family Weekend

Josh and Emily came to visit from Kansas City... which means that the whole Powell family is here together! :) Here is a photo diary of our day.

BoomMa and BoomPa cuddling with Ledger at lunch.

Aunt Emily knows how to make Ledger smile and laugh.

Bella and Dakota's birthdays are both August 15th. Emily made them a dog-friendly cake, put birthday hats on them, and we all celebrated! :) Everyone enjoyed the doggie birthday party.

The Chiefs had their first pre-season game Saturday night. We decided to put Ledger in his Chiefs outfit and take a few pictures.

All-in-all it was a great family Saturday and we all enjoyed our time together. :)

BoomPa

Today BoomPa came to join BoomMa for a weekend visit. He was very excited to see Ledger, since he hadn't seen him since Father's Day in June! We went out to eat at "Scheme" -- GREAT pizza. :) You can tell that Ledger loves his BoomPa.

Chris is on the front page!

Chris is in a picture on the front page of the Salina Journal this morning. The article is all about back to school. You can reach the article from the link below. But the best part is the big picture on the front page! :)

salina.com - an online service of the Salina Journal

Make sure you keep reading the posts below -- this is my 4th post in 2 days... so make sure you read all of them. The last of them has some adorable pictures of Ledger in a winter hat. :)

Boomer Sooner Invasion

This week, BoomMa has (again) come to Kansas to fill our gap in child care. She and Ledger are getting along great. He loves to talk to his BoomMa! You can see a video here.

From Ledger- 2 to 4 months

BoomMa has also spent her afternoons playing dress-up with Ledger and sending text messages to BoomPa in Tulsa. Although Ledger is destined to be a wildcat... he sure looks good in "crimson and cream".

First Day of School

In family news, today was Chris' first day back at school. For the last few years, Mr. Michel's room has been decorated in a tiki island theme. This year, the theme was modified a little. Pirates have taken over the tiki island! :) He has worked really hard hand-making all of his decorations. Here are some pictures of his classroom decorations.

Cutest Baby EVER

OK, I know I'm biased. But here are some pictures we took this week using a hat we found at Old Navy. Isn't he CUTE?!

Mommy Mania

Today I had my first (but probably not last) episode of "Mommy Mania". I was at work this morning when I found out we were under a severe thunderstorm watch for the day. Being from the midwest, this basically means nothing. If it's not a tornado warning, we all pretty much disregard the watches and warnings. I was a little nervous about Darlene being at home with Jayce during a thunderstorm because Jayce has mild thunder phobia, but figured it wouldn't be a big deal. But as the storm got closer and started rolling in, the news and radar was showing a pretty nasty storm. I only had a few appointments for the morning, so I figured I would just head home when they were finished. But, things kept coming up, of course. So by the time I actually walked out the back door at work, the storm was in full force.

It was pitch black outside and the rain was blowing in sheets. I was soaked through (literally) just from running from the door of work to my car in the parking lot. At this point, my logical side suggested that maybe it was too severe to drive in. HAH! My Mommy Mania side could think of nothing else but getting home to my son! The Mommy Mania won out. It took me 20 minutes to drive the 4 miles to my house. The rain was so thick that my visibility was about 25 feet in front of my car. The wind was blowing between 65 and 75 miles per hour. It hailed. A tree fell into the street about 100 yards in front of me. I couldn't see anything. Roads were flooded and cars were wrecked or pulled over to the side of the road. But I just kept barreling on -- nothing could stop me! Trees were down all over my neighborhood, so I had to navigate a minor maze just to find an open roadway to get home. But I finally made it home and rode out the rest of the storm with Darlene and Ledger.

Our house sustained some very minor damage to the back fence and some small tree branches were knocked down. Some of my neighbors had much more damage. I took a few pictures, so that you could all see what I was willing to drive through to get to my little boy!

In the picture above, you can actually see our street sign with trees down blocking the road so bad that it's impassable.

This is in the front yard directly across the street from us. Their tree completely broke in half and landed on the front porch and on top of their car. (Guess that will teach them to park in the garage!)

So, I have learned an important lesson: Don't get in between a mommy and her baby!

Always Learning

From Ledger- 2 to 4 months

I've always wanted to know how to do those black and white pictures with focal color and today I finally learned! So I'm posting this photo that I experimented on and left his eyes blue. I love his beautiful blue eyes! :)

I'm OK

Surgery went fine today. The scarring was worse than the doc expected, but he was able to get it out. Thank you for your thoughts today. :)

That's really all you need to know. I'm going to write a few more details about my surgery... but if you have an queasy stomach or no interest in hearing about my nether-regions... you should just STOP HERE.

So the doctor came out and talked to Mom and Chris in the waiting room. Apparently the amount of scarring in my vaginal walls was the worst he's ever seen. He actually told my family that my scar tissue was like "barbed wire and steel". So, yeah. He resected 2 cones of scar tissue out of my main problem area and stitched it back up to heal horizontally. He also removed another section of scar tissue that was closer to the actual opening. My 20 minute surgery took almost an hour. Of course. I don't take traditional pain meds without getting extremely nauseous, but my anesthesiologist was great and covered me with fentanyl and anti-emetics. Dr. Hodges gave me a prescription of tramadol to take home too. But it still hurts. Not quite as bad as it did when I originally had Ledger... but close.

Probably the worst part for me is that the doctor does not think it would be advisable to try another vaginal delivery -- so if we decide to have kids in the future, it will have to be by c-section. I am very upset about this. Very. Since I was a teenager, I was always scared of the pain associated with childbirth. And after all of that worrying, I had a really great childbirth experience with a relatively easy delivery. So I was actually looking forward to having another baby in a few years... but now it won't be the same. They will have to cut the baby out of me! It is definitely going to weigh-in on my decision to have another child. The whole thing makes me very sad.

3 Months Old!

Yup, he's 3 months! He is still wearing 0-3 month sized clothes and size 1-2 diapers... but he is rapidly growing out of both. Here are some of his achievements this month:

• He is getting great at his bedtime routine and sleeps 4-5 hours at a time in his crib!
  
• He has really improved control over his hands and can grab at the toys that interest him.
  
• Since he has better hand control, he LOVES putting those hands in his mouth to chew and suck his fists!
• Ledger continues to impress us with his amazing head control and he can support his full body weight on his feet in a standing position.
  
• He has started in-home child care with Darlene and is doing great with her, even though he misses his Daddy during the day.

Our photo session this morning was so much fun. We took quite a few good pictures and I had trouble deciding which one to use. The one at the top is my favorite, but I'm including a collage at the bottom of this post with some of the other top contenders. To see all of the pictures, go to our picasaweb album here.

Surprise, It's Surgery!

Today is Ledger's 3-month birthday. We had planned to take a photo of him with his 3-month sign (like last month) but he was too wiped out from a busy evening to photograph. We will take the picture in the morning and post it as soon as possible. Ledger continues to get bigger and develop his motor control. We think that he is very strong for his age -- but don't all parents think that their kid is "advanced"? LOL. :) Today we put him in our Baby Einstein jumper and activity seat. He really liked being supported in a standing position with his feet on the ground and was really interested in all of the toys! He's not quite ready to "jump" in it yet... but he's big enough to keep himself upright really easily -- as you can see from the photos.

In other family news, I had a post-partum doctor's visit today and my OB is concerned with the amount of scarring that has occurred since my episiotomy during delivery. In order to keep everything in working order, he decided to schedule me for an outpatient perineal repair surgery. Luckily for me, they had an opening right away and I will be undergoing a very minor outpatient procedure tomorrow. This is only the 3rd time I've ever been under anesthesia, so it's a little nerve-wracking... but I know it'll come out OK. The doctor made it sound like I wouldn't be in too much pain afterwards, so I am still planning on working Friday morning. Keep your fingers crossed for me! :)

A Busy Morning

Can you believe this boy is almost 3 months old!!?? This is one of the adorable outfits that I put Ledger in for pictures today.

Today was a very busy day, as predicted. We had pictures taken this morning and the photo session went pretty well. Ledger was a little tired and refused to give Kira his biggest happy smiles -- but hopefully she got some great pictures anyway.

After that, we met with pastor Kent to discuss baptism and we officially scheduled Ledger's baptism for September 13th. We've asked Emily & Josh Perkins and Jaime & Chris Vanderbeck to be Ledger's "sponsors" and they have agreed! We are really excited that our sisters are willing to support us and Ledger in this very important way!

We All Survived

So today was our first day with our nanny, Darlene. She came over early to get herself acquainted with the house and to talk about how we wanted things done. When it came time for me to leave for work, I was definitely more upset than Ledger was. He took everything like a pro! :) Ledger and Darlene got along great. Chris was able to come home pretty early, so it was a short day -- like a practice day. Wednesday will be a full day, but I am feeling pretty confident that it will go just as well as today did.

Tomorrow is a very busy morning for the Michel family. We are having Ledger's 3-month photos done by Kira Gilbert -- the same photographer that took our family pics. Below are a few samples of the pictures she took for us last month. I don't know why I didn't post these earlier. :) After our photo session, we're meeting Pastor Kent to discuss getting Ledger baptized. We considered trying to squeeze it into our already busy August schedule, but it just wasn't going to happen. So we're going to get something scheduled for September... hopefully.



In other news, Chris and I have been busy scheduling some adult "events" for later this fall. We are going to see Chris' favorite band, AC/DC, in K.C in October. Chris has already seen them once this year, and everyone raved about how great their show was.... so this time I am going to see it for myself! We are also going to see "Star Wars Live" in Tulsa -- which should be pretty cool. Chris and I are both kinda Star Wars nerds, so we were excited that this show is coming to the Midwest! We are also making plans for Halloween and the OU/KSU football game in Norman. It looks like October is going to be a very busy month for us! :)

Back to School

This week, Chris starts back-to-school... which means that Ledger won't be able to spend his days with his Daddy. For the next couple of weeks, we are still "transitioning" into our daycare schedule -- so it will be a little sporadic with different arrangements for different days. Darlene will be taking care of Ledger in our home starting tomorrow morning while Chris is at a meeting. We are excited about having Darlene here, but it is very nerve-wracking for me to leave Ledger with anyone who is not a family member. I'm sure she will be great. I'm sure Ledger will love her. But I'm going to HATE going to work tomorrow.

We spent today in Wichita doing a little back-to-school shopping. Ledger, again, was a wonderful shopping companion. Unfortunately, Mommy found the sale racks in the baby department at JCPenny (70% OFF!!). And THEN we went to Burlington Coat Factory and I found some of the most adorable sets of clothes!! Seriously... I went on a baby clothes shopping spree. But everything is so cute! I know you other moms know what I'm talking about.