Christmas Season

Well, it is that time of year again. WOW - what a difference a year makes! This time last year, we weren't even bloggers :). Since then, ourselves and a lot of our family members blog to keep in touch. Last Christmas, Tim and I were still getting settled into our house and beginning to think it may be time to start a family. Well, here we are Christmas 2007, and we now have little Drew with us.

About this time each year, we do a "year in review". This lets us rethink what we experienced and learned from the previous year, and what we'd like to improve on or do differently in the upcoming year. (It also makes for something to pass the time while we drive across the country for the holidays) :) Anyway, we really enjoy remembering the highs and lows from the past year, especially in a year such as 2007!! Tim and I have had two amazing life-altering years here lately. In 2006, we got married, and in 2007, we had a baby. It just doesn't get any better than that! Here are our 3 stockings. Tim is Santa, I am the snowman, and Drew is the elf.









We really do have a lot to be thankful for this year. It is so easy to forget how lucky we are and how blessed we are for all that we have. This year, more than ever before, family has taken a new meaning. The holidays are always about family, but now since Tim and I have expanded our family, it has a very special meaning.

It's amazing how much having a baby will change your life. Things that you never really thought about before suddenly become very vivid. One thing that I've noticed is Christmas songs, especially the old classics of Away in a Manger and Silent Night. I couldn't tell you how many times I have sang these songs over the years, and I know they are about baby Jesus. But this year, they have new meaning.

After having a baby, suddenly I'm filled with emotion over what Mary must have felt having no place to have her child. You sing the lyrics "Away in a Manger, no crib for His bed", but I never really thought about before what this truly meant. I know things were much different all of those thousand of years ago, but the passion a mother has for her child stands throughout time. I could not fathom being in labor and not having a safe place to have my child. And, then having my child and having no place to put him except in a stable. It gives a new appreciation as to what Mary must have experienced on a physical/emotional level. Of course, this not even considering what she was experiencing on a spiritual level.

Anyway, I know I'm getting a little deep, but so goes being a new Mom - still full of emotion! That is another thing that I've realized. I was already a sentimental person, but WOW - it's on a completely different level now.

Well, Tim and I want to say Merry Christmas to everyone. We hope that you take time this year to remember the past year and soak it all up before 2008 is here and everything is new. Remember to be thankful for your familes and for everything that you have been given and to give back to others. Many, many people are not as fortunate as most of the people who will be reading this blog.

Drew Update

Drew is almost 12 weeks old!! Crazy! At his last checkup (9 weeks) he weighed 10lb 14oz. So, hopefully by now he's well into the 11lb range. Poor little guy is still so skinny, but he eats all of the time! So, we don't know what to do to make him grow faster. Oh well. He's now 23" long, so he's getting a little bigger. Most of his 3month old clothes with feet in them don't fit anymore, so we are now onto 6 month old clothes (for sleepers). The 6 months are still quite large on him, but better to be too big than too small at this point.


If you read the email below this one, you know that Tim is home with Drew. Thankfully, Tim's company has paid paternal leave, so we took advantage of that! Tim and Drew are having a lot of fun at home hanging out. Drew just smiles so big when Tim plays with him; it's just precious. Drew will talk more to me, but we wants to play with Tim.





He's layed out in this picture :).






So, yes, he has quite the little personality. Thankfully, he's becoming more vocal and trying to express what he wants/needs more vocally instead of crying. He talks all of the time (or tries to talk) :). Sometimes you can tell he really wants to say something, but just can't get the sound to come out. He's almost giggling. He did giggle once, but that was it. He loves playing with his little doggie. I've posted a video to the right showing this. He now will hold onto doggie and take him around the house when we pick him up. It's so cute :). Of course, he would also love to eat doggie. He will put anything into his mouth these days.






I'm watching TV.


He's starting to sleep much more at night, so this is nice. He usually goes to bed around 7-8:00pm and most nights will make it to around 4-5:00am, so that's good. He's so cute when he's going to sleep at night. He sucks his little thumb and rubs his head with the other hand. If you ever can catch him doing this, then you've got him! It's time for bed. Of course, some nights he'll quickly wake up and act like he wants to play if he was caught drifting to sleep. Anything to stay awake for 5 more minutes.

This outfit came all the way from England. It's a soccer team in the UK. Our friend, Alex, gave Drew this to make sure that he started out life supporting the correct "football" team. :)







We have a lot of cute Christmas pictures that we took of him in search of the perfect photo for a Christmas card. But, we can't post these yet, since then you won't be surprised when you see your Christmas card. But, we'll post these soon. We didn't use this one picture, so I'll post it now.

What's New With Us

I will preface this post by saying that while I do agree that all good posts should have a photo, I don't think this one will. Sorry :(. But, we will post more pictures very soon!!

So, all of the posts lately have been about Drew, so I thought I'd take a minute to update you with what Tim and I have been up to. I was able to stay home with Drew for almost 10 weeks, and now Tim is able to stay home with him until January. We were very lucky that Tim's company allows paid paternal leave for dads!!

Another exciting thing that has happened is that I am about 2 weeks away from receiving my MBA!!! I am SO excited and cannot believe that it's finally over. After 2.5 years, I must say that completing this degree has been a pretty big accomplishment for me. All along the way people kept saying that it would be too difficult to finish, trying to work full-time and go to school full-time, especially when in the middle of all of this, I got married, moved cities, and had a baby!! I even had teachers telling me that I would struggle to complete the program. Well, I did it!!! All of my requirements for graduation are complete, and now I am just waiting on the final grade. Tim and Drew even went down to school with me last weekend, so we made a family day of it - the last time I had to drive to Columbia, SC for school.

We stayed here over Thanksgiving and enjoyed just some quiet time and hanging out. It was actually very nice, since we have always travelled for the holidays. However, we are very much looking forward to Christmas and getting to see all of our families.

I have a new nephew!! My brother, Justin, and sister-in-law, Rebecca, just had a little boy. He is just precious! We cannot wait to meet him and introduce him to Drew!! Christmas will be very special this year. Both my brother and I have both become parents in just the last few months.

Tim has finished another year of "busy-season" with his company, which is always a good thing. For the most part, their job is nice and very flexible, but from Sept 15th-Dec 15th of every year, it is "busy season", which means lots of travel and late nights. But, Tim was able to skip out on some of this since his paternal leave started mid November.

Well, hope everyone is doing great! Just wanted to give an update.

More Pics

He is 8 weeks old today, hard to believe it!! He's doing much better at holding up his head and can stay sitting up for a little while when propped against something. I still haven't gotten him to really smile at me. He looks like he's trying to smile, but then quits. He smiles all of the time in his sleep though, so it's really interesting that he can involuntarily smile so easily but then you have to beg him to socially smile at you. He's definitely gaining weight. He's a chunky monkey with his fat little cheeks. We have no idea how much he weighs, but we'll find out at his 2 month checkup.


This is his "Mama quit taking pictures and feed me" face :).




He's trying so hard to talk, making a lot of oohhh sounds, so that's really cute!! He absolutely HATES being on his tummy. I've had to start making him lay on his stomach a least a couple of times/day to develop his neck muscles, and he screams the entire time. He can pick his head up pretty far when he wants to, and you can tell he's trying to flip over because anything would be better than being on his stomach. But, he hasn't flipped over yet..








Here is his pouty face. He makes this face ALL of the time, and it's just adorable. It's so hard not to laugh at him when he does it. He just looks at you, sticks his little lip out so far, and then cries. Who knew that babies knew how to pout. I've never seen a baby have a pouty face before, but it's just too cute. And, very hard to get a picture of!
Starting this week, he now will sleep for a 5-6 hour stretch at night, then about another 2-3 hours, so this is nice. The only problem is that he's up all day and will not nap, and he goes to bed around 7-8:00pm. So, he might sleep for 5 hours, but that just means that he's up again usually around 1:00am. Then, around 4-4:30am (if I'm lucky), then around 6:00am. So, I think this is a LONG way from saying he "sleeps through the night", but it is progress. He was doing almost a 8:00pm, 11:00pm, 1 or 2:00am, and 4 or 5:00am, so at least this has dropped off by about 1 feeding at night.











He was trying so hard today to put his paci back into his mouth. He's never done this before, so I was quite shocked when I looked over there and saw that he had managed to grab the paci!! Then, I saw that he was actually trying to put it back into his mouth, and I had a "proud Mama" moment. Of course, he couldn't understand why the flat part just wouldn't fit back into his mouth :). It was just precious.



Anyway, just wanted to give an update.

Almost 6 weeks old!

WOW! Time is passing so quickly. These past 6 weeks have been amazing. Drew has changed SO much since he was born. He is much more alert and interactive now. He makes cute little noises all day and definelty has a personality! His favorite thing to do is watch the ceiling fan. He just loves it, and it's so cute. He will almost break his neck to look around and find the fan, if he's not facing the right direction.


He had his 4 week checkup and that went fine. He's starting to finally gain some weight, so that was nice! He was such a chunk when he was born that it's taken a while to get back past his birth weight. He had to get a shot at the DR :(. WOW - that was NOT fun! He screamed like you had just stabbed him. I really do NOT look forward to the 8 week checkup when he gets 3 shots! I told Tim he has to go to that one with us. I don't think I can stand watching the little guy scream like that for 3 shots.


Drew is just like his parents. He does not like to be dirty. Drew can not stand to have a dirty diaper not even for a minute!! I swear sometimes I think he cries before he's even wet just to let you know to get ready. I know this because MANY times he'll start crying, so I start to investigate if he is wet or not. Of course he isn't, and then he decides to pee - ON ME! Yeah, funny you may think. But, I've gotten faster at changing the diapers and getting a shield ready!!


He's starting to smile and be more social. It's so sweet to see him grinning at you!! He almost rolled over the other day on his playmat. He doesn't quite have it figured out yet, but we are hoping soon.

I posted some links to videos over on the right of this blog. I couldn't figure out how to post them within the text, so I had to do it this way. I'm still frustrated about that!

Well, nothing else much is new. Tim and I are doing good. Still getting some sleep at night and waiting for Drew to start sleeping longer than 2-3 hours at a time! We are also waiting on my brother's baby Graham to be born!! He is due November 20th, but it could be anyday!!

Just wanted to give an update and post more pics. Hope everyone is doing well.

More pics

My family.
His belly button finally fell off, so we were able to give him a real bath. He actually didn't seem to mind. He didn't cry until the very end when we poured water on him to rinse him off.



I'm a burrito :) Drew is not a fan of being swaddled!! I couldn't decide if this picture was cute or mean. He kept waking himself up by his arms flying around, so I thought I'd give it a try. I should have taken the picture 10 seconds after this when he was screaming his head off.

I'm 3 weeks old!

So, it's been a VERY fast 3 weeks. We've learned a lot, lost a lot of sleep, gotten peed and pooped on more times that we can count, and had a ton of laughs! It is just incredible that we are parents. We look at him all the time and can't believe that we made such an amazing little person!!

It is very true how you quickly realize "what was our life like before?" - you just can't imagine life without the little one :). It is also hilarious how your conversations now revolve around - how many pee diapers did he have today?, is that poop the right color?, is he hungry, wet, cold, hot, bored, or what?, what was that noise?, and on and on....

He's been really good so far. He's fussy some afternoons, but he sleeps for about 2-3 hours at a time, which is really nice at night. He constantly has the hiccups, which seems to make him mad. Also, it appears that he's realized the difference between night and day, since when I put him in his bed at night, he doesn't fuss anymore - very nice!.

Here is a pic of his bed - of course, he's yet to spend a single minute in here. This bed is just way too big for him, and I can't stand him being that far down the hall from us. So, it will probably be a while before he's in this big bed.








This is adorable.








Tim's family came to visit little Drew. Drew's cousin Cooper was a little jealous of his Mom holding a different baby, but we got him calmed down for a quick picture :). I love my Grams, Uncle Ricky, and Aunt Becky.




Naked baby :). He is not really a fan of being changed, but he was doing good in this picture.

Me and Mom.
Drew's first "bath". It's just a sponge bath, but it went pretty well. I'm sure when he has a real bath, it will be a different story :).

I've learned how to hold my paci in my mouth. I just haven't quite learned yet how to put it back in when it does fall out.

Our Little Man

Andrew Gavin Penrose made his arrival on Sept 21, 2007 at 1:05pm, weighing 8lb 5oz, 21.5" long.

My Daddy is already smitten with me.
My first diaper change by Daddy.






My grandparents are so excited to meet me!

My sweet little fingers.

Time to go see where I live.



Here's where I spend a lot of time - in my Pack N Play. I do this pose often - it's the "Touchdown" pose :).

My first outting, had to visit the DR for a checkup. I like my car seat; I sleep so good in it.
I did not like the DR office. They made me get naked and lay on this cold sheet. But, at least they said I was doing good.
I'm just too cute.