Christmas 2011: Audrey's First Christmas

I feel like Christmas came (and went) really quick this year!  (Don't we always say that, though?)  I thought with me being home on maternity leave I would have a lot of time to get all my shopping and decorating done way before Christmas.  Well, Miss Audrey kept me really busy, which is what my maternity leave is all about, and I found myself rushing at the last minute.  But it all got done and we really enjoyed the holidays.  I loved being home with Audrey during the Christmas season.  Everyday, we would turn on the lights on our Christmas tree, and I would sing Christmas Carols.  Audrey loved all the colorful lights.  We got a lot of new ornaments this year to signify Audrey's First Christmas.  I love keepsake ornaments.  Growing up, my Grandmother (on my Dad's side) gave us an ornament each year.  For 15 years (give or take) until Hallmark discontinued the collection, she gave us a Hallmark rocking horse (you can see a few of them in this picture).  It's a shame they discontinued the rocking horses, but I guess all good things have to come to an end.  My parents gave me all of *my* ornaments when I moved out of the house after college, and I love looking through all of them now.  It also has helped Carl and I learn even more about each other.  He has a lot of keepsake ornaments, too.  I know Audrey doesn't understand it all now but she will one day, and I love that we will be able to show her all of these ornaments to her so she can learn about our family and where she comes from.  And I look forward to having a collection of *her* ornaments that she can take with her when she has her own Christmas tree.  Here is a picture of our tree this year:

And here is a pic of our stockings... one for Carl, me, Audrey, and Chief.  I thought I had garland, but we must have packed it away last year with the Christmas tree that we gave to Jennifer when we acquired this new one from Grandma and Grandpa Bockelmann.  Next year, I'll get some garland to decorate the banister, and it will look really nice. 

Merry Christmas from the Larson's... our 2011 Christmas Card:

Since we celebrated Thanksgiving with Carl's family, we celebrated Christmas down in Forsyth/Decatur with the Patton family.  We left after Carl got home from work on Friday,
December 23rd, and we stayed until Monday, December 26th.  What a great, long weekend to spend with the family.  Of course my Mom outdid herself and we had delicious food.  She is such a good entertainer.  We had a lot of laughs, too, playing games and just hanging out as a family.  Here is our family picture on Christmas Day:

Holidays at the Patton house are all about family... and food!  Amber and Ashley were both at my parents' over the holiday, so we all could just relax and hang out.  That doesn't happen very often.  Christmas Eve, we had Eggs Benedict Florentine for breakfast, Chicken Braid for lunch, and a Portillo's dinner.  When I say Portillo's dinner, I mean Italian Beef, Chopped Salad (just like Portillo's makes it, complete with their House Salad Dressing), and Portillo's Chocolate Cake for dessert.  Yum!  Anyone from the Chicagoland knows what I'm talking about and is probably salivating right now.  For everyone else, just know that it's good.  So good that most times my Mom is in town, we go to Portillo's for a Chopped Salad.  It's that good.  We played The Game of Things as a Family... Amber, Ashley, Mom, Dad, Grandpa, and me.  That game is so fun!

And we had some visitors on Christmas Eve... Cynda, Andy, and their new baby Colby stopped by on the way to Cynda's grandparents' house.  My parents and sisters got to meet Colby who was not yet 2 weeks old and just as precious as can be.  How did I not take any pictures of the 2 of them??  Gosh!  Well, here is 1 from the week before Christmas.  Colby was not even 1 week old and Audrey was 9 weeks old.  This pic doesn't even show off how cute they are.  They look just thrilled to be having their picture taken!

Christmas Day, we went to mass at St. Pat's Catholic Church in Decatur.  When we got there, Fr. John Burnett asked us to move closer to the front of the church because he wanted to use Audrey during his sermon.  During the sermon, he took Audrey and walked around with her.  She had the honor of representing the Lord Jesus Christ and all of our "rebirth" this Christmas season.  How cool is that?  And she was such a good little girl... she was asleep most of the time he was holding her, but she did wake up and look at him and look around a bit then fell back asleep.  What a good little baby!  And just so darn cute.  Look at her in her Christmas dress and furry white boots:

When we got back to my parents' house, my Grandpa Hahn said to me that it meant a lot to him that Fr. John used Audrey during his sermon like that.  How sweet. 

After Mass on Christmas Day, we had brunch (egg casserole, hashbrown casserole, and my favorite coffee cake). My Dad took this opportunity to read to Audrey:

I think he was reading her something about the Cardinals, which is surprising that she's so content in that picture. Ya know, being that she's a Cubs fan. I think she just really likes her Gramps and the sound of his voice.

Then we opened gifts after brunch. We were spoiled again this year! This was the first year our family drew names to purchase 1 gift for 1 other person. That worked out really great and a tradition that I think will stick around. And of course Santa and my parents were way too generous. I think everyone got everything that was on their wish list. We have a video of Audrey opening her gifts... scratch that, me opening Audrey's gifts. I'll post when it gets uploaded. She got some really cute clothes and neat toys.That afternoon, Carl, Audrey, and I went up to Crystal and Matt's house to visit them and drop off a gift for Maci who is 16 months old.  So cute!

Christmas Night, we had a fancy dinner with prime rib and scalloped potatoes.  Yummo.  Aunt Faye and Uncle Jim came over for Christmas Dinner.  It's always great to see them!  And they had some exciting news to relay to us from Keely and Matt who were in South Carolina with Matt's family...they are expecting another baby!  Yay!  Baby McClure will be due around the middle of September.  So this will be 3 years in a row of "first Christmases".  And now we're thinking about how we can "sync up" so that we are on the same Christmas "schedule" as them with the family and we can all celebrate together.

And then we had a special visit from Santa himself!

Audrey really enjoyed her first Christmas.  Can you tell?  What a happy little girl!

Then Monday, we came home and Santa had been at our house!  So we opened gifts and played with Chief and Audrey.

That night, we celebrated Christmas with Grandma & Grandpa Larson.  Santa came to their house too!  And we were spoiled again by all the gifts.  We have another video that I'll upload of all of Audrey's gifts.

And then Christmas was over before we knew it.  What a special time!

Audrey is 2 months old!

Today, Audrey is 2 months old.  Can you believe it?!  Even our doctor (Dr. Tess) at Audrey's 2-month checkup on Tuesday said he couldn't believe how quickly 2 months has gone by.  Tell me about it!

We had our monthly photo shoot today and I took a lot of pictures... I mean, like 30 pictures... yeah, a lot.  I couldn't get enough of her.  She was so alert and cooperative.  Here are some of my favorites:

 If Audrey could talk, she would probably be saying:  "Mom, what are you doing?  Why do you have my dressed like this?  And why are you talking so funny?"

 See, Audrey was having fun!

I took this one without the tutu so we can see her whole body, long legs and feet and all.

At 2 months...

Audrey weighs 10 pounds, 13 ounces and measures 23 inches long!

In the last month, she has grown an inch and a half and a pound and a half.  This puts her in the 75th percentile for length, and 50th percentile for weight (Source: CDC.gov WHO growth standards).  Perfect!  We think she's going to be a tall girl.  

Audrey is wearing size 0-3 months clothes

Although, some of the 0-3 months onesies are snug on her.  Especially the ones that we wash over and over again.  Also, there's a pink Puma outfit that I love dressing her in to run errands and that's snug on her now.  Maybe I'm just shrinking it in the wash?  Nah, I don't think so.  :)  I hate to see her grow out of these cute clothes!  Most of her Christmas outfits are 0-3 months, so she just needs to stay that size until after Christmas.  Then she can move up to 3-6 months.  I will be prepared.

Audrey wears a size 1 diaper

She has worn this size since birth and it's still serving us well.  I think we have another 3 pounds or so to go before she's size 2.  We do have a big box of transitional size 1-2 diapers that we will use after we run out of 1's.  

Audrey is eating about every 3 hours during the day and frequently sleeping through the night.  There are still some nights that she'll wake up every 3-4 hours, but more and more frequently she is sleeping all through the night from about 10pm or 11pm to 4am or 5am.  I'm reading On Becoming Babywise: Giving Your Infant the Gift of Nighttime Sleep so we can start getting into a routine.  Up until this point, Audrey has done pretty well with a routine; she regulates her eating to about every 3 hours (and has ever since she was just a couple weeks old), she naps when she needs to during the day, and she sleeps well in her crib.  It's just that sometimes her wake-up time varies for that first feeding so then our days are not as predictable.  I still have a few weeks to get us into our daycare/work routine, but I'm getting started now.  They say it takes a few days for a baby to get into a new routine, so hopefully she'll consistently be sleeping through the night every night very soon!  

Audrey is so alert during her awake time.  She is so much fun with her smiles and laughs and sounds.  She wakes up smiling and laughing.  She loves when we sing to her (even when I sing to her, poor girl).  So much fun!  And it's pretty funny what Carl and I will do to get her to laugh.  If only there were a hidden camera in our house.  You guys would think we were nuts.  Anything to get her to smile and laugh!  She is such a beautiful, happy baby.  We visited the Applied Systems office last week to visit my coworkers and they all commented on how happy and alert, but quiet she is.  She is such a good baby!  And at our 2-month checkup, all the nurses and Dr. Tess were so pleased with how easy-going and happy and alert she is. Dr. Tess said she was his easiest patient!  And the cutest too.  (Wait, that's what I said.)  Although, she did have to get 2 shots at this appointment, so let's see if she's as cooperative in the future.  She took the shots like a champ, but she sure wasn't happy about it.  She let us hear her screams!  But then after a few minutes of crying, she calmed down.  She was sucking on her paci really hard.  She has been a little irritable since getting them, but no fever or big change in behavior.  Next checkup is at 4 months where she'll get a couple more shots.  They say it's harder on the parents to see their babies getting shots.  I agree that it is so hard!  I keep telling her that we still love her and it's going to be better in the long run.  Of course I'm trying to reason with her.  Do you think she understands?  ;)

Audrey can nap/sleep anywhere.  She almost always falls asleep when we run errands or go out to eat.  That makes it so easy to take her places.  People tell us to take advantage of it and go do things now, because once she's a toddler and up moving around, we won't be able to go out as easily!  Grandma Larson plays piano in a Dixieland Jazz band called The Dixie Bandits.  This past weekend, they played at a coffee shop in downtown Joliet.  We surprised Grandma Larson and came to see her play!  It was pretty loud in there.  They have I think 7 different musicians and instruments, and it got loud.  

Would you believe it that Audrey fell asleep and slept right through all the noise?  What a good baby!  Here she is listening to the band with her Daddy: 

Sidenote:  The coffeeshop, Jitters in downtown Joliet, is the cutest place.  They had great food (we had the Muffaletta sandwiches and pumpkin pie) and the people are so nice.  You must stop by there if you're in Joliet.  

It has been a really great month.  This past month really flew by, even faster than the first month.  And I know with Christmas and New Year's, this next month will go by even faster.  I'm really enjoying my time at home with Audrey.  I don't want it to end!  

We love you, Audrey!  

Audrey's Newborn Pictures

We had these pictures taken when Audrey was just 1 week old.  A lady I work with, Cynthia Kristufek, came to our house to take these pictures.  Aren't they fantastic?  She was so patient and so creative and really great to work with!  Here is a link to Cynthia's website - http://www.cynthiakphotography.com/.  This is the 2nd time that we've had her take pictures for us.  Last year, she took pics of Carl and me and Chief for our Christmas cards.  The cards and prints last year turned out really good, so I was very confident about how the pics of Audrey would turn out.  And Audrey's just so darn cute, so how could they not look good!  :)

Here are the pictures:

Cynthia is working on our Christmas card/birth announcement design, and she should be getting me a proof tonight.  I need to put in our order for the cards and the prints we want, but I'm having such a hard time deciding what to order!  Really, I'm trying to decide what NOT to order.  :)  How could I not order all of them?  Oh Lord...  Some of our favorites are the one with the crocheted hat in black and white, the ones with the flower headband, the other ones with the fluffy white background, and the guitar one.

The guitar one.  Seriously, how precious?  Carl owns (and plays for Audrey) a few different guitars.  This one in the pictures happens to be the 6-string guitar that I gave Carl for our wedding present 4 years ago.  How special that Cindy was creative enough to capture this.  And look how small Audrey is on the end of that guitar.  It's just so special.  I feel like this is a picture that Audrey and Carl will treasure forever.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Audrey's first Thanksgiving...

...was spent in Oak Forest, IL, at Carl's Aunt Janet and Uncle Tudy's house.  It was really a great day.  We got to spend it with Audrey's Grandma & Grandpa Larson:

Aunt Jennifer Larson:

Grandma and Grandpa Bockelmann:

and Aunt Janet, Uncle Tudy, and Jay Swanson (no picture - shame on me!).  They were busy hosting us so they didn't get much of a chance to hold Audrey.  

Uncle Tudy cooked our Thanksgiving meal, and it was delicious.  We had a traditional Thanksgiving dinner complete with turkey, green bean casserole, corn pudding, stuffing, carrots, mashed potatoes, pumpkin pie, fruit medley pie... I'm probably forgetting something, but you get the idea. A lot of food that was delicious!  And like most Americans, I overindulged.  I made sure to wear my maternity pants.  :)  

Note about overeating on Thanksgiving... can you believe that I talked to a nurse at my doctor's office that actually counted her calories and only ate 1200 calories on Thanksgiving!  I couldn't believe it.  Good for her!  They said on Biggest Loser that most Americans eat 4,500 calories on Thanksgiving... 3,500 calories is 1 pound, you do the math.  I think I gained weight (despite breastfeeding) on Thanksgiving and that following weekend!  So much good food!

On the Friday after Thanksgiving, a lot of people were up early doing Black Friday shopping.  CUH-RAZY.  I wasn't shopping (you could never catch me shopping the morning of Black Friday), but I was up at 3:30am unable to fall back asleep.  I was anxious about traveling down to my parents' house in Forsyth for Audrey's first overnight trip.  I was in Audrey's room putting away clean clothes and packing her... I figured I might as well take advantage of the time since I couldn't sleep.  I even got in the shower at 6:30am - that hasn't happened in A LONG TIME.  We were shooting to leave the house by 9:30am, so I thought for sure we'd be able to get on the road a lot sooner since I was up and ready and Audrey was basically ready.  Yeah.. right.. we got out the door at about 9:00am.  Here is Audrey on the way down.  She looks excited, doesn't she?  

She's really good in the car.  Slept the whole ride down.  We had a great weekend in Forsyth.  Audrey got to meet her Great Grandpa Hahn, Great Aunt Faye and Great Uncle Jim, and Keely and Matt and Chloe McClure (cousins) on Friday.  My mom had everyone over for a yummy Mexican dinner.  She even had (un)fried ice cream for dessert.  Yum!  Here are some pics from Friday:

Keely, Chloe (age 17.5 months), me, Audrey (age 6 weeks)

 

 Matt and Audrey

Grandma Patton and Great Grandpa Hahn with Audrey

(look how long Audrey looks in this pic!)

 

Great Grandpa Hahn with Audrey - how precious is this picture??

Keely and Matt's daughter, Chloe, is on the move!  She was keeping us entertained.  She loved climbing in Bixby's cage.  

 And she was playing with dried pasta in tupperware containers.  After a short while, there was no more pasta left.  I wonder why!  Turns out Bixby and Chief like dried pasta.  Looks like Chief has a new treat...much more inexpensive than the other chicken-free treats we buy for him!  ;)

And of course Grandma and Grandpa Patton and Auntie Am and Auntie Ash loved on Audrey a lot the whole weekend.  Amber and Ashley were having fun with Audrey's "I <3 My Aunt" onesie that Ashley got for her.

 I love this pic of Audrey laying on Amber's Team USA jersey.  This is the jersey she played in when she played in the Japan Cup for Team USA.  Pretty cool, huh?

Then on Saturday, we had even more visitors... Jim and Karen Czuprynski (my parents' neighbors across the street), Bob and Nicky Bachtold (next door neighbors), Cynda and Andy Marr, Crystal Whetstone, and my Aunt Mary (Audrey's Great-Aunt).

Aunt Mary and Audrey

Cynda and Andy Marr are getting ready to have their baby boy, Colby.  Cynda looked FANTASTIC at 37 weeks.  They're a lot of fun and we had fun visiting with them.  I can't wait for Colby to arrive! Oh, and I just have to document that an egg CAN be broken with one hand while gripping it like a tennis ball.  There was a misconception that it couldn't be broken, but Andy sure proved that wrong.  I haven't laughed that hard in a LONG time!  

What an eventful weekend.  It really was so much fun, and Audrey did GREAT on her 2 night overnight stay. We'll be back down for Christmas, if not sooner.