A Stitch in Time

Just before Christmas we had our first child-head-wound experience. We feel truly initiated as parents now.


Ellie's carefree climbing and rough-housing has been catching up to her lately.


This resulted from going too fast, tripping, and running headlong into the hard plastic of the humidifier we've had to have in our room for Charlie. We're trying to think of a cooler story for her to tell about the scar when she gets older.


She was OK once we got the bleeding stopped, but both Brady and I had to hold her down to keep her still while the doctor worked on her. She kept saying, "Hurt the bonk!" (Ellie-speak for forehead) and, "I'm cryin'!" which the doctor thought was kind of funny. Lately Ellie has thought it pretty important to inform us when she's crying.

She's had a pretty rough-and-tumble couple of weeks. Like I said, her lifestyle seems to be catching up with her. Trying to explain her maladies to us, she will tell us she "hurt the sock" when something hurt her foot, or "hurt the pants" when she falls down. She also recently shut her finger in the door, which worried us might be another emergency run to the doctor. Thankfully not.

One night we heard her usual chatter after putting her down for bed. Suddenly, we heard cries of, "Ow! Ow! Owchie! OW!" I thought she was trying a new tactic to get out of bed, but just in case I went in to check on her.

Without turning on the lights I asked, "What's wrong, Ellie? What's 'owchie'?"

Her immediate response, "Charlie bit me!" (She wasn't referring to her toothless baby brother, I'm pretty sure, but the youtube video.) Very funny, I thought. I laughed, tucked her back in and left.

A little while later we heard the protests of pain again. Finally, about two hours after bed time, Brady went in again, light on this time. He saw a little trickle of drool tinged with blood on her sheets. Turns out she had bit the inside of her cheek really hard and it had started bleeding. Oh, man did I feel bad. I guess "Charlie bit me," is 2-year-old code for "I bit me." We finally got her calmed down and sleeping.

The next few days she would bite her cheek again in the same place, inadvertently I think, because it was swollen and would stick out. So each night while tucking Ellie in, Brady would remind Ellie, "Don't bite your cheek." It became part of the routine for a while. Once he stopped saying that, Ellie would add it on for him. He'd say, "Goodnight, sleep tight, etc. . . ." and Ellie would pipe up, "Bite you cheek, Daddy."

Just the other night I went in to check her in the middle of the night. As I was leaving, I heard a groggy, "Bitecher-cheek, Mamma." I responded, "Bite your cheek, Ellie." I wonder if that will stick. She'll be 15, leaving the house, "Love you. Bye. Bite you cheek! . . . What? Don't your parents say that to you?"

Thank goodness for the resiliency of 2-year-olds. Ellie bounces back pretty quickly and it doesn't take much to please her. Here she is ready for another adventure, "puddle-whomping" with Daddy.




And not to be left out, here are some pictures of Charlie in the new hat he got from his Aunt Jana. Adorable, if I do say so myself. Check out those cheeks!

Belated Christmas Card

I'm even late getting an electronic Christmas card out. Here are a few pictures from a Christmas photo shoot.

We finally have a picture of all four of us.


We did have to bribe Ellie to keep her still for the camera.


Kids' interest is waning.


Time's up for Charlie.


And here is a video of Ellie singing some Christmas carols for you. She was trying to get us to let her stay up later and insisted that she needed to play her drum (last year's Christmas present). The sound is a little muffled because I was worried that if I got too close with the camera, she would realize what I was doing and quit. Hope you can make out some of the words. My favorite is here "Fa-la-la" chorus.


Hope everyone had a very merry Christmas!

One Month

Charlie hit his one-month mark on Thursday.


Not sure how much he weighs or how long he is since he doesn't have a check-up until two months, but he sure is growing. He's filling out his 0-3 month size clothing pretty well, with just a little room left to grow, and seems to fill up a couch cushion pretty well too.


We don't normally dress him like a convict.


He hasn't settled into a predictable routine yet, but most nights he goes right back to sleep after feedings, so we are getting okay sleep. Most nights.


Ellie is still pretty delighted with him, excited just to be in the same room with him most of the time, though she often insists on holding him and will try to pull him right onto her lap with or without our help. She also likes to give him high-fives when his hand is poking out and "pat-pat" his back (we have to burp her to occasionally too lately).


Sometimes it's hard to tell who babies look like. Charlie seems to be a pretty good mix. If anything, he reminds us of Ellie as a baby. But most of the time he just looks like Charlie. I have discovered my contribution, though. Charlie's hair frizzes after we wash it.

This is what he thought of me setting him down after his bath to try and get a picture of this.


Here is a close-up after he calmed down. You can see the frizz a little bit, though the lighting is pretty bad.


Ellie's hair does this after we wash it.


So there is a bit of me in these kids.


And here is Ellie dancing with Daddy to Nat King Cole's "A Christmas Song" before bed. We're all getting excited for Christmas around here!

Grandparents and 12 Days of Christmas

Since having kids I have decided that grandparents are the best idea ever. Ellie heartily agrees with me. And Charlie hasn't come right out and said as much, but I think he likes the idea too. He has gotten some good grandparent time in his short life so far.

My mom could put Mary Poppins to shame with all her babying skills and help.


My dad can't resist a turn to hold Charlie. One night before dinner he was holding Charlie and kind of bouncing him, trying to get him to stop fussing a bit. Ellie, who was playing under the kitchen table at the time, was watching and said, "Grandpa's dancing!" She hurried out from under the table to join in, spinning and goose-stepping. She's quite the little tag-along to her grandparents.


Brady's parents surprised us with a visit during Thanksgiving weekend. They were in the neighborhood, if you consider only a six-hour drive to be "in the neighborhood." I may be partial, but I think that a new baby Charlie is pretty hard for any grandparent to resist. It was really nice of them to make the sacrifice to come all that way to see us (well, let's be honest, Ellie and Charlie) for such a short visit.


Before they left, they gave us a fun bag of gifts to open, starting on Dec. 1. Each day for the first 12 days of the month was a fun gift to get us into the holiday spirit. The first day was a couple of advent calendars with a chocolate for each day. Ellie never fails to remind us about the "chocolate calendars."

Some of the other days included:

Some Christmas crafts to decorate. Ellie was really excited about the "pon-pons" and started ordering the sequins around like they were people ("guys, you go over here . . . c'mon guys, over here . . . on this one, guys . . .")


Cookie cutters and play dough. For some reason Ellie is convinced that the candy cane is a letter 'r.'


A Santa decoration. When Ellie first saw this, she kept introducing herself to it ("Name is Ellie, name is Ellie . . ."). Meanwhile, when we went to take her to actually sit on Santa's lap, she played mute the whole time. Go figure.


And a Santa Pez dispenser. This quickly became one of her "guys." She spent a good hour showing him the Christmas tree, making him climb the tree, ride the rocking horse ornament, etc. She was pretty excited later when we showed her that there was candy involved.


There were also ornaments, books (which Ellie loves reading at bedtime now), a plate for leaving out Santa's cookies (Ellie pretends to eat and feed me cookies from this regularly), and other fun things. We have had a lot of fun looking forward to the presents every day. Plus, there's still Ellie's favorite, the chocolate calendar. Today Ellie and I made a thank you card for all the fun presents. Just in case it doesn't arrive as the artist intended it (some of the sequins have already been pulled off by a toddler who will remain nameless--we didn't even try for pom-poms), here is a picture of it. Thanks again for all the fun!

A lot to be thankful for

I'm a little late on a Thanksgiving post here, but we've had a lot going on. We've had a lot to be thankful for this year, most especially family. We had a great holiday visiting with family, and lots of help from aunts, uncles, cousins, and especially grandparents with our two little ones. Here are some pictures my sister took of both kids on Thanksgiving day.

Charlie is nine days old here.


He sleeps for what seems like 90% of the time. It's a rather restless sleep during the day, so he wants to be held a lot, but it's still sleep. Probably just so much work for how fast he's growing.





And he has been growing so fast. You can almost just sit and watch him grow. At his two-week check-up last week, all his measurements were in the 75th percentile. The doctor explained that means that out of 100 babies, he would be bigger than 75 of them. What surprised me was that there would be 25 babies out of 100 bigger than him. He is getting so big!



I guess that means I better get on the ball and take more pictures before he completely outgrows his newborn phase.


This is his funny old man look.

Ellie basked in all the extra attention of extended family. On Thanksgiving my family was so nice to take her to the Festival of Trees. She has been pretty excited about Christmas trees ever since she got to help Grandma put one up and then decorate it. She learned from They Might Be Giants that they are conifer trees and often requests to go look at the conifer tree and turn on the lights. So a whole conference center full of conifer trees was pretty exciting.

This picture is blurry, but it really captures her excitement.


A more thoughtful analysis of the Sesame Street trees.


Working on some crafts in Santa's workshop.


Sticker art.


A treat from Santa (which apparently Ellie stopped in her tracks to eat on the spot).

(Incidentally, Ellie picked out her own clothes that day. It's the outfit I'd like to think she'd wear if she ever got to be a guest star on "The Cosby Show.")

Meeting Santa's reindeer.


And, of course, climbing Santa's workshop.


All in all, a pretty good trip. Thanks to all our family for the help and support and making it a great holiday, even while I was out of commission.

Baby Charlie

Introducing young Charles Bradford. He's "Charlie" to us. (Otherwise it kind of sounds like we should say "Sir" before his name and he should start talking with a British accent.) Note the chubby cheeks already. That was one of the first things I noticed about him when they held him up to me.


He was born at 8:09 a.m. on Nov. 15 (Daddy's birthday). As you can see, tipping the scales at a whopping 9 pounds, 4 ounces. He was 20.5 inches long, head 14.75 inches around. Turns out the C-section was wise for many reasons. For comparison, Ellie was 7 pounds, 10 ounces and 18.25 inches. So he's starting at Ellie's 6-week weight.


Getting acquainted with Charlie after the surgery. Things went really well with the C-section and I am having a slow-but-steady recovery. Even though things were very different than Ellie's birth, being in a hospital instead of a birth center, having surgery instead of delivering naturally, we still had a really good experience. We went in calm, knowing what to expect, prepared for him to come, and yet still had that laughing/crying-at-the-same-time euphoric moment when we heard his first cry, as if it were a total surprise that there was a baby at the end of all this.


Still in recovery. Brady said I was a bit loopy. And, as you can see, still quite swollen all over in my hands, arms, and face. It's slowly going down and I got to comfortably wear socks over my swollen feet for the first time today.


We got lots of visits from Ellie in the hospital. Here is a video of her meeting Charlie for the first time:


I wasn't sure how she would take it. For so long "Baby Charlie" was this growing mound in Mommy's tummy. She would come up and press her mouth into my stomach and say a muffled "Hi, Baby Charlie!" We thought she might be getting the concept until one day she did the same thing into Brady's shoulder. She seems to have overcome the transition from abstract to reality pretty well.


She's pretty enamored with him. (She's also finally learning to pose for the camera and say, "Cheese!" which has led to some pretty cheesy smiles.)


Here Ellie is introducing Charlie to her beloved "Schnappie" cartoon, among others.


She loves getting to hold him. Every time she does lately, she has this sort of nervous giggle the whole time, especially when he wiggles.


All dressed up to go home. We were actually grateful for the time in the hospital to recover and adjust to this new little guy. He is pretty mellow most of the time and eats like a champ. It has been such a different experience than all the struggles we had getting Ellie to eat, and then all the difficulties she had once she did start eating. It's one of the best things in the world to watch him eat and eat and swallow like it's no big deal. And then he burps and eats some more and it's so easy. And then we can just set him down after. No big deal. And we wonder, is this what it's like for other people when they have babies, or are we just playing house here? I felt bad always comparing him to Ellie that way, but Brady pointed out that Charlie was difficult on the inside, Ellie was difficult on the outside, so I guess they both have had their easy and difficult moments.


Charlie with Father of the Year. I realize there are a lot of good dads out there, but I think this past week Brady has taken the cake. He has done more than his fair share of taking care of this kid, sending me off to sleep more so I can hopefully recover faster. And he manages to take Ellie out now and then too.


Ellie is still adjusting to her new life with Charlie. She absolutely adores him and is great with him. It's the rest of us she doesn't always have patience with. Grandma and Grandpa have been saints, putting up with some pretty good tantrums that come with the age, the adjustment, and the budding two-year molars, and putting up with her non-stop chatter the rest of the time. If she is awake, she is talking.

The first day we got home with Charlie, we got him all bundled up and settled into his little bed. Ellie came in the room and peered over the side. She kept patting him tummy while he slept, saying, "Baby Charlie sleepin'. Night-night, Charlie. Sleep tight . . . bed-bugs bite . . . love you . . ." Whenever she sees him, whether he's crying or not, she will try to pat him and say, "It's okay, Baby Charlie, it's okay." And several times a day she wants to, "Go hi to Charlie," (go say hi to Charlie). So she is becoming a good little mother hen. The question is if Charlie will be able to keep up with her, or ever get a word in edgewise.


Stretching out and yawning after a bath, which he didn't love. Ellie wanted to get him some boats to play with, but I told her I didn't think that would help yet.

Now a quick story about his name. After giving Ellie a name that had so much significance to us, we wanted to give this baby a name that would be meaningful to him and us as well. So we decided we would also give him a family name. Technically, he is named after Brady's grandpa, John, who went by Jack, whose nickname was Charlie. It was a few years after we were married before I knew that these were all the same person. The story, as I heard it, is that years ago someone left a mug (or something) with the name "Charlie" on it at Brady's grandpa's house. When his kids were young and would ask him for something, he would tease them and say, "Oh, I'm not your dad. I'm your Uncle Charlie." (Some of you might recognize the beginnings of Brady's teasing humor.) The name stuck as kind of a joke, I guess. Brady grew up knowing him as "Grandpa Charlie." So Charlie is named after his Great-Grandpa Charlie (or John, or Jack). Technically we could have had three sons named after him, but we're pretty happy with the boy we have now!