Nursing the Nugget

Tonight I am thankful that I'm able to nurse my Nugget.  I mentioned a while back that I love nursing WAY more than I ever thought I could, and that's still true, but our nursing relationship has changed quite a bit since she was born.  Since I know many, many, many soon-to-be mamas out there, I thought I'd take some time tonight to try and describe the world's greatest feeling.

In the beginning (i.e. the first four months when I was at home), nursing was a no-brainer.  Sylvia latched well, and I loved rocking with her in her room and feeding her whenever she needed it.  Every once in a while I'd venture out into the living room to nurse, when I was feeling feisty, but I've always been content sitting in her room and enjoying that precious space with her...especially when there were other people in our house or other things to do.  Sometimes it felt downright sinful to sneak in there with a hungry baby and close the door.  "Ha ha, world!  You can't get me!  I'm feeding my baby and you can SHOVE IT!"  That was always fun.

Eventually I got up the nerve to nurse her in public.  I love my trusty nursing apron and it really came in handy for the first five months or so.  My Mom was skeptical when I wanted to register for one, but when she and I were shopping at the mall and I sat down on a bench to nurse the nugget, she was convinced - they're another one of those "why didn't I think of it" ideas.  Once I got the hang of it, I was nursing that baby everywhere!  At the mall...at restaurants...pretty much everywhere except for church.  I never got up the nerve to nurse my baby in church.

All of the lovey-dovey nursing hoopla took a serious hit when I went back to work.  A working, nursing Mama means PUMPING.  I hate pumping.  It's pretty much the world's most awful thing and I hate it.  Sylvain says I look like a milk-making robot and Mom says I look like a dairy cow.  My coworkers can't figure out why I would lock my classroom door in the middle of the day (gasp!) and one of them actually UNLOCKED it so they could barge in and deliver something.  I had to get very comfortable with "going topless" for twenty minutes a day.  For the first three months of the school year, I was pumping THREE TIMES a day!  Sylvia was sucking down bottles at daycare like it was her job and I felt like I had to keep up with her.  I pumped at planning, I pumped as soon as school let out, and depending on how much she ate that day, there were times where I pumped before I went to bed at night.  Luckily, I had a pretty good stash of frozen milk, so on nights where I was too exhausted to pump, I could grab one of those.  Then, she hit six and a half months old, and everything changed again.

A couple weeks ago, Sylvia decided that she's just too busy to lay in my lap and nurse.  She's been taking bottles so frequently at day care that she wasn't interested in feeding from the boring old breast anymore!  I started supplementing with formula and OH MY GOSH IT WAS THE GREATEST THING EVER!  Suddenly I was freed of the shackles of pumping.  Once Sylvia started taking formula, I could go back to nursing her when we both actually enjoyed it.  I still pump during planning, which isn't too bad at all because I have plenty of time and I can eat or work on the computer while I do it.  When she's really tired or groggy, she has no problem nursing, so currently our schedule looks something like this: I nurse her first thing in the morning when she wakes up.  She eats a bowl of oatmeal for breakfast at day care.  She drinks a bottle of breast milk.  She eats a bowl of rice cereal and veggies.  She drinks two bottles of formula in the afternoons.  She eats rice cereal and veggies at home for dinner, sometimes she has another small bottle of formula if she needs it.  She nurses before bed.  The milk I pump during planning is her first and only bottle of breast milk during the day.

I was really nervous about this new routine, but now that we've done it for two weeks I absolutely love it.  I have the best of both worlds!  She'll eat a bottle of ANYTHING and she'll eat any vegetable as long as it's mixed with a little bit of cereal.  I'm sitting in the middle of one of those rare time-frames where everything seems to be working well.  All of my spinning plates are in the air and they haven't shattered on the floor yet.  I'm sure that soon we'll have to change our nursing relationship again, but I'm so thankful that she's still nursing twice a day without any resistance.  I cherish each and every ride in the rocker that we have because I know our days are numbered.  However, now that she's taking formula, Sylvain gets to feed her a lot more often than he used to and he loves it.  So does she.  At the moment, all is right with our nursing world!

My School

Tonight I am thankful for my sweet little elementary school.  During my first year there, I almost threw in the towel, but I'm glad that I picked up the phone and called a friend.  Actually, she was just an acquaintance at the time, but now she's a dear friend; and one of the many reasons I chose to stay at my school and dig in to the hard, yet fulfilling work that it offered.  Now that I'm deep into my third year there, I can truly say that this school feels like home, that I love the kids I work with, that I love the adults I work with even more, and that I'm in the absolute best and right place for me.  I've learned so much at this "new" school, which isn't really new to me anymore, and working there has made me a MUCH better teacher.

In a couple of weeks we'll be having our Thanksgiving Fun Feast and I can't wait to toss the lesson plans aside and laugh and play with the kids who fill my heart every day.  I'll be sure to let them know how much they mean to me and how much hope they give me for the future.  If you only knew the challenges they face, you'd be amazed and impressed at the work they're able to do every day.  Our kids are awesome.  Our staff is awesome.  I'm honored to be a part of it all!

Ms. Spradlin

Tonight I am thankful for my student teacher, Ms. Spradlin!  (She won't be Ms. Spradlin for long, though.  Come June she'll be Mrs....Somebody Else)  I've been taking student teachers for a few years now, and after last year I almost threw in the towel and said, "To heck with it!"  They were really starting to be more trouble than they're worth, but then Ms. Spradlin showed up and renewed my faith in young, eager educators!  Once the kids and I figured out how to say her name correctly (she is NOT Ms. Bradley), we all fell madly in love with her.

She's a natural, and a good student teacher makes my job so much easier.  I know that on her solo days, my kids are going to get high quality instruction and I won't have to go back and re-teach the content.  Which means that the month of November is an easy, breezy month for me!  Since I teach reading to my homeroom and science to all three classes, she's already taken over most of my day.  The biggest challenge for a student teacher in fourth grade is delivering the content, and she has done her homework and planned the world's greatest Motion and Design Unit for our kids.  Hooray for good teachers!

She just finished up a two-day solo and next week she starts her week-long five-day solo, so between now and Thanksgiving, I have lots of down time during which I can pull small groups of kids, do some one-on-one assessments, and *gasp* catch up on grading, planning and report cards!  All of this means that I get to leave at a decent time in the afternoon and I don't have to take work home on the weekends, so I get optimal Mama and Nugget time!  God bless GOOD student teachers!

Now I just have to figure out how I'm going to survive without her after December 3rd.....

Let me elaborate...

Last night I rushed into the office to say I was thankful for my husband and my nugget, so tonight I'm cheating by explaining why.  I won't take long.  I just want to take you back to a moment of my day that was not captured by a camera.  It was one of those moments where your brain jumps outside of your body and screams, "Remember this!  Whatever you do, don't ever EVER forget this!!!"  So I better write it down.

We've had such a great weekend just hanging out at home and being together.  It's nice to enjoy some time as a family of three with no other obligations or responsibilities.  Sylvain worked on a lot of grading this weekend, which meant I got to spend some much needed time taking care of the nugget.  She's started sleeping more regularly and today she even took an honest-to-goodness, real, day-time nap!  An hour and 15 minutes!  It was glorious.

This evening, we went down to the basement to watch some Thursday night TV that we had DVR'd.  Sylvia hasn't spent much time down there, so we layed a blanket over the tile floor, thew down some toys and let her have a good ol' time.  As we were coming back upstairs to get some dinner, Sylvain picked up a bag of marbles.  Simple enough.  No big deal.  UNLESS YOU'RE SEVEN MONTHS OLD!  He started tossing it in the air from hand to hand and the look on Sylvia's face was priceless!  The sound and the bright colors - oh my gosh, it was a TOTAL PARTY for her!  She looked at him like he had just brought down the Ten Commandments from Mount Sinai.  He might as well have had a halo of light shining over his head.  I'm sure 75% of her fascination was with the marbles, but I know that at least 25% of it was just pure amazement with her Daddy.

As we were putting her to bed tonight, she was laughing and playing with him like she usually does, but it occured to me that she must think he is the most magical, amazing person on the planet.  I pointed this out to him, and told him that, if he plays his cards right, she will ALWAYS think so.  She will always think her Daddy is magic.  She will always think that he hung the moon and that he did it just for her.  I cannot explain the power he has over her, but I know it's true, because I still feel that way about my Daddy.

Sylvian has a big job to do.  I hope he's up for the task of being the world's greatest man alive.  I couldn't have a picked a better person for the job!

It's 11:59!!!

I'M THANKFUL FOR MY HUSBAND AND MY NUGGET!!

Phew!

Rest

I'm thankful for the gift of a weekend!  This is the first time in a long time that we have absolutely no plans.  I get to stay at home with the husband and the nugget and just enjoy being with my itty bitty family, instead of entertaining or visiting our super large family.  After weeks of running around, we need it.  And considering what's coming up in November and December (our calendar in the office looks like the dry-erase marker threw up on it), we need this weekend to prepare for the mad dash for the holidays!  (I'd be lying if I said I haven't been listening to Christmas music already....)

Being a Mom

Today is November 1, the first day of National Blog Posting Month.  Now, I'm not sure, but when I check their link, it looks like every month is National Blog Posting Month and you just pick the month in which you want to try to post every day.  Laura and I did it last November, and I think November makes for a great Blog Posting Month because it's time to really start thinking about all the things for which I am thankful.  I told Laura earlier today that there's no way I'd be able to do it this year, because I barely make it to the computer for a weekly post anymore, much less a daily one, but then I thought about it all day long and remembered how nice it was to sit down each evening and reflect on all of my blessings.  So here we go!  I'm going to give it a shot, but I won't make any promises.  I'll be brief (or as brief as I can be *wink wink*) and I'll be sincere.  Tonight, I am thankful for...

Being a Mom.

As I was putting Sylvia to bed tonight, I stopped for a second after getting up out of my chair.  I swayed back and forth before putting her in her crib and I looked up on the wall to see my shadow swaying over the tree we put up last year.  I looked at my silhouette, with the Nugget's little head on my shoulder, and remembered that this is exactly where I've always wanted to be.  I remembered that at this time last year, and for many years before, this has been exactly my dream.  And to see it there, up on the wall, in a faint outline, right before my eyes, made it very clear that no matter how difficult this may be, or how incredibly I might mess up, I'll always have this moment.  The one where I know without a shadow of a doubt that being a mother is the greatest job in the world.  So tonight, while the out-of-town guests are downstairs and the washing machine is filling up and the bottles need to be washed, I decided to sit down and give thanks for my biggest blessing.  Motherhood.

Extra Thankful

Well, today I'm just...THANKFUL! What a wonderful holiday. Today we get to spend time with our loved ones and celebrate all that we have with good food and good company! However, today is not JUST Thanksgiving in our family...it's Sylvain's 30th Birthday! Yes, we already had his party, and yes, it was amazing. But today is the day that he woke up as a 30 year old. So in addition to being thankful for everything we have today, I'm extra super duper thankful for my amazing husband.

I'm sitting on Mom's couch watching the Macy's Parade. The year Sylvain and I started dating, we went to New York with my family for Thanksgiving and had such a wonderful time at the parade. I remember when we got our pictures back, and I looked at one of me and my boyfriend on the streets of New York, with giant smiles of our faces. I looked at my own face and thought, "Wow. I look really happy. I should marry this person." So I did. And I'm glad! I've been smiling that way ever since.

Happy Birthday, Honey! I Love You!

Music

I drove up to Mom's house by myself tonight. She needed help cooking and Sylvain and Jordan are coming up together tomorrow. Usually I complain about having to drive by myself, but I was looking forward to it tonight. I know the holidays are filled with lots of running around and visiting with family, so I wanted some alone time to mentally prepare for the big rush. I turned my iPod on shuffle and sang my way all the way up North - and I loved every second of it.

So tonight, I'm thankful for my music! My Christmas tunes, my lullabies, my Taylor Swift and Old Crow and Bonnie Tyler. I always sing in the car, especially when I'm by myself, but these days I feel like I'm actually singing TO someone, and I got really excited when I thought about the day that my daughter and I will be able sing together in the car. I hope she recognizes some of these songs when she's out here in the real world, and I really hope she's ready to make some music.

Rest

I know that there are plenty of people out there who think that teachers have the easiest job in the world - babysit some kids for a few hours a day, a few months a year. And, even though I'm a staunch advocate for year-round schooling, I will never complain about the time off. However, I think there are a lot of people who underestimate exactly how hard teachers work. Correction: exactly how hard GOOD teachers work. There is a big difference between a regular teacher and a GOOD teacher. I'd like to consider myself a good one.

With that being said, tonight I am thankful for the rest that comes with the holidays. This is the time of year where I start to panic in the classroom. It's no longer the beginning of the year and it's no longer acceptable that my kids DON'T KNOW ANYTHING! I start to realize, right around November, exactly how much they really don't know and I start to hyperventilate at the realization that it's MY JOB to teach them what they need to know. Yipes! Why did I sign up for this?? It's a huge job, and in many cases, it's damn near impossible.

So, when I got home tonight, I dropped my bags of grading and lesson plans at the door, plopped down on the couch and said, "Ahhhhh......" The grading a lesson plans can wait while I recharge and think about what in the world I'm going to do with these kids for the rest of the year. I can worry about all of that on Sunday night. For now, it's sleeping in and eating lots!

Fourth Graders

I'm just hopping on here for a few minutes tonight to express my thanks for my students and my job. I know I complain about it pretty often, and I've had days where I wanted to go work at WalMart instead of set foot in that god-forsaken classroom, but when all is said and done, I can truly say that I love my job, and I love my kids!

I've written about their silly antics and funny quips before, and I wish I had a new one to add tonight, but I don't. All I can say is that 9 year olds are the most amazingly clever and astute people on the planet. Sure, they have a lot to learn, but the things they come up with and the discussions they have never cease to amaze me. No day is exactly like the one before it, and no child is exactly like the one next to it. The ups and downs are monumental, but the smiles on their faces at the end of the day make it all worth it.

I love fourth graders!

Sundays

Today I'm thankful for good, long, lazy Sundays - even though today wasn't lazy at all! We've been so busy for the last couple of days and things have been so fast-paced and exciting around here, that we really needed today to just unwind and get things done around the house. We slept in super late this morning. Thanks to a rocking Shellac show last night, this pregnant mama stayed out with the punk rock crowd until 1:00 AM! Am I the coolest person you know or what?

After we woke up, we puttered about for a while until it was time for me to finally get my National Board work started - again. I've been stuck on a couple of questions for one of my portfolio entries, so today was the day I had to force myself to sit down and answer them, whether I liked it or not, and I did not. Sylvain made the greatest lunch of all-time: homemade Shepherd's Pie! We enjoyed a nice, quiet lunch together, then I got back to work.

We tried to walk to the library to get some books we need for our Bradley class, but they were closed, so instead we just took a delightful walk around the neighborhood. Then I went to my National Board meeting only to find out that my mentor forgot about it, so I got to leave early and come straight back home! Hooray.

All in all, it's been such a nice, relaxing Sunday, even though we've both been doing lots of work. I know these days are numbered and soon there will be a tiny person controlling our every move, so I'm so thankful that we were able to spend this time together! I'm really looking forward to going home for Thanksgiving, too. We have lots of wonderful family to visit and lots of fabulous food to eat! Hooray for the Holidays!

Repeat

Well, I just can't stop looking at our ultrasound pictures and I've already shoved them in everyone's face, so if you're planning to be around me in the next couple days (umm...make that four months), get ready to slap a smile on your face and tell me how cute she is. While I was lying in bed this morning, I felt her moving around and decided that she deserves another day on the blog. This might be cheating as far as NaBloPoMo is concerned, but I don't care. I've never been so thankful for something in my life! So, if you're reading this today, I'd like to direct you to the post below. If you've already read it - then just take a look at those beautiful pictures and go "Awwww, isn't she the sweetest?" and get all teary-eyed (okay, the teary eyes might just be for me). If you haven't read it - WHAT THE HECK IS WRONG WITH YOU?! Get to it!

I'm Thankful for Our Baby Girl!

Here she is, world! In all of her girly glory - well, not ALL of it. I do have a scandalous "up the skirt" picture which will stay in our album. No need to start flashing people this early. Here are the modest pictures of her head, face, arms and tummy. I can already tell she's going to look like her daddy!

Profile of her face with her hand up by her mouth.

Here she is looking straight at you with her hand up like she's waving! Say "hi" to the baby!
The pics got a little blurrier when we scanned them :( but I still think they're pretty darn good!

The ultrasound visit was INCREDIBLE! I drank a little bit of Coke right before I went and that girl was moving and shaking all over the place! Sylvain and I held hands and watched for a good half an hour. Neither of us cried or got super sentimental, we were both too stunned and awe-struck. We saw her heart, her kidneys, her stomach, her SPINE, it was crazy! Everything was right where it should be and everything is in perfect working order, as far as we could tell. She weighs 13 oz and is still due on April 9th. Hooray for a healthy baby girl!!

After we left the doctor's office, we went out to lunch and then to Target to look for something cute and girly to buy. I got the cutest set of baby booties that look like little Mary Janes and a pair of striped leggings that were so cute I almost ate them up right there in the store! Then, I did what I swore I would never, ever do... I changed all of the bedding on our registry from neutral to downright, no-questions-asked GIRL stuff! I couldn't help it! I knew this would happen if we found out before it was born! I just couldn't resist the pink, green and brown polka dot bumper with the pink and white striped dust ruffle! I had to have it - no, SHE had to have it! What kind of mother would I BE?!

Oh, it feels so good to know. Now we can call her a "she" instead of an "it!" Now I can feel her move and talk about her growth and what kinds of things we'll do with her when she gets here! We have a pronoun and I love it!

Momversation

I've been following Heather Armstrong's story over at dooce.com for over a year now. She is kind of my hero of the internet world. Not only is her blog wonderful and her writing hilarious, she participates in the greatest invention of the digital age: Momversation! Each week or so, I get a new "episode" of Momversation from her website, but you can go to momversation.com to get them all. It's just a bunch of internet moms sharing ideas and philosophies and questions and stories about their lives. They talk about It All, including all the raunchy things you'd never talk to your own Mom about, so it's nice to know there are people who will go there. Heather, you're my favorite and I'm thankful for you, your website, and Momversation!

Operation Baby Room: Phase One...Complete!

Tonight I am so thankful that all of the painting and chair-railing is done in the baby room! Now we can move on to more important (and fun) things, like curtains and furniture. Here are some pics...

Working hard on the finishing touches, jamming to my Christmas tunes.

Aren't those stripes the cutest?! (Ignore the ugly curtains)

And how 'bout those corners, eh? Not too shabby!

This is exactly what I had in mind when I said "stripes and a chair rail" and I LOVE it! Really it wasn't that hard at all, just time-consuming. We painted the room green back in July. Recently, I measured the one foot stripes and marked them with chalk, then Mom came down to help me tape them up and slap on the paint. Here's my trick for making really straight, defined edges - use a level when you put up your tape and then take a wallpaper scraper and run it over the tape so it is DOWN good and tight, that way the lighter paint won't seep through to the darker color. After Mom rolled the white paint on, we took up the tape right away so that none of it dried to the tape, which was a huge problem when I did the baseboards over the summer. As for the chair rail, we bought it pre-primed from Lowe's and Sylvain cut it with his HANDSAW! He's so hard core. The angles worked out perfectly and we even got to take back an extra strip or two that we thought we'd need if we made any mistakes. We used wood glue and a level to get it up straight, then he nailed them into the wall, I covered the nail holes with wood putty, and put on the last coat of white paint! Voila! A lovely baby room for a lovely, lovely baby!

Moisturizer

I would like to interrupt these sappy-people-fun-fests to bring you a much more important item for which I am very thankful:

Moisturizer.

My wonderful parents have blessed me with many things...but good skin was not one of them. I have always had problems with acne for as long as I can remember and in the last few years my skin has become red and blotchy and wrinkly and gross. Pregnancy makes all of these things TEN TIMES WORSE! I realized the other day, as I was slathering on my Aveeno Ultra Calming Daily Moisturizer with SPF 15, that putting on moisturizer has NEVER felt this good. After I get out of the shower, when my face is all crazy red and almost cracked from dryness, I put TWO LAYERS of this stuff on, and...oh my heavens...it's like a glass of wine for my face. I literally stand in front of the mirror and go "Ahhhhhhh, oohhhhh, ahhhhh, yeahhhhh, ahhhhhh...."

Sylvain has equally bad skin, but he has found that keeping a beard helps with the acne and dryness problems, especially in the winter time. I keep trying to convince him that he should try moisturizer, but he's way to manly for that, so whatever. I do know this - between our skin issues and our allergies - our kid will have to live in a bubble. We've already looked into it.

So, today I am thankful for moisturizer (and the four hundred other Aveeno products I use every day). In fact, I can't wait until tomorrow morning when I get to put more on!

Friends

How many days until Thanksgiving? Well, it's not enough days to count the blessings we have in all of our wonderful friends! Sylvain and I have been so lucky to have known many of the same people for such a long time. In fact, we kind of knew each other before we really knew each other because we hung out with the same crowd at UK. Now, we have our Lex buddies, our hometown buddies, and our NKY buddies to summon up on any given Friday or Saturday night. The memories made in Lexington since we started dating are fun-filled and sweet - lots of drinking, game playing, downtowning, karaeokeing, cooking, cupcaking and the like. Now that we live in L, our new friends (which are partially made up of old friends from Lex who have since moved here as well) have introduced us to many new places, new music and new food that we adore. I also can't forget to mention my work friends, both new and old. There's something about teaching with other ladies that bonds you together for life, especially when you share your first years of teaching together! Then, of course, there's my old standby buddies in NKY - my old friends from high school whom I think about often and miss when I'm lonely.

Where would any of us be without a good friend? In the gutter, that's where!

Grandparents

What with a large "blended" family, it turns out that I have four sets of Grandparents! Since it's Sunday night and it's been a long weekend, I will list for you my favorite thing about each set, thus fufilling the "thanksgiving" portion of the blog in time to snuggle in bed and watch a movie before I go to sleep. Here goes:

Grandma Neltner: My mom's mom. She's a country granny through and through. She lives in a beautiful little house on top of a hill with the best Kentucky view you've ever seen. She makes a mean Christmas Ham and I love to sit on the porch with her in the summer time and talk to her about....everything. Boy does she love to talk! My grandpa Louis died long before I was born, but the family he left behind is the lovingest, laughingest, merriest family in the world.

Nana: My dad's mom. Nana is a very faithful, patient and quiet person. I love to visit with her on Sunday afternoons, sit in her living room, and hear about all her life stories. She loves to hear about my life stories, too, and she's full of great advice. She's the one who constantly reminds me to stop worrying (I get that from my Mom's side of the family). She has never worried about a thing in her entire life because she knows that God will take care of it. And he does. Pop passed away when I was in college and we all miss him terribly. He was a hard worker and a great Grandpa. Recently, on the family camping trip, we all reminisced about his insanely powerful, dish-rattling, earth-shattering, sneezes. Seriously, he could knock your house over.

Grandma and Grandpa Stine: My stepmom's parents. They are the sweetest couple you've ever met. Grandma is soft spoken and has never said a bad word about anybody. She thinks that anything her grandchildren create is masterpiece. Grandpa loves scotch, golf and having a good laugh with the family. They're always fun to be around.

Granny and Grandpa Eiben: My stepdad's parents. Unfortunately, both of Jay's parents have passed away, and we miss them terribly, too. Grandpa flew a bomber in WWII, ate at Skyline Chili every day, and constantly complained about things that everyone insisted would make his life easier. He took care of Granny when she was in a wheelchair and he loved to tell or hear a good joke. Granny was a huge Cincinnati Reds fan and she loved her grandkids with all her heart.

These are the people who came before me and the people who created my world. I don't think any grandchild can ever find exactly the right words to say thank you to their Grandparents. When I think about all of the miraculous things that had to happen in order for these people to meet, fall in love, and create new lives in this world, I get goosebumps. My Nana hopped on a train to Texas just to marry Papa while he was in the Army! How cool is that? Their blood is my blood and their character built my character. I love them with all my heart.

The Rest of the Siblings

And now for the brother and sister on Mom's side of the family! Matt and Jenny...

Matt and Jenny are Jay's kids and we've known each other for a very long time. When Mom and Jay started dating, Matt, Jenny, Jordan and I would pretend to be brothers and sisters and we would BEG our parents to get married. It only took them seven years to finally listen to us, and by then, we were all in middle or high school. We moved in together and formed lots of happy memories on W. Drive.

Christmases were particularly eventful at the Eiben house. Jenny and I used to drag our blankets and pillows into Matt and Jordan's room on Christmas Eve so we could all wake up at the same time and get downstairs for presents. One year we all woke up in the middle of the night to hear Mom and Jay banging around in the basement trying to put the Pop-A-Shot and Ping-Pong table together. We laughed about it all night long and tried to pretend like we didn't know what they were up to the next morning. We still get together every Christmas, despite our multiple family events on both sides, and we see each other as often as we can throughout the year.

Matt and Jenny hold a special place in my heart. And now their side of the family has grown to include two more sweet additions: Matt's wife Jen, and their precious, adorable, cuddly cutie-pie son....CHARLIE!! He was born on July 3rd and I do say he's the luckiest little boy on the planet. Jen is an amazing sister-in-law and mother, and I'm so glad she's going through all of this newborn stuff before I do. I plan to use her as a resource for...well, the rest of our lives, pretty much! Here they are in all their cuteness:

That's the end of my immediate family, for which I give many thanks! I have one more post about my incredible grandparents and then I'll get to the fun stuff.