Happy New Year

Welcome to 2021. It already feels better. I know that nothing has magically changed, but it feels nice leaving one whole year with the hope that this one could be just a little bit better. Plus, there will be a great sense of calm and relief come January 20 that we won't have experienced in four years, so that is a huge leg up!

And now I can post this photo that I've been working on since March, which sum up both mine and Sophie's 2020's...

 We were able to spend our New Year's Eve at our friend's house. They are really strict about quarantining as well, especially because they live with their immuncompromised mother in law, so we really trust them.

We gave Sophie a bath before going and honestly, bathtime has become so much fun because she really likes it! She just relaxes and loves splashing her feet in the water and we like to just stand there and watch her chill out.

It was a pretty perfect NYE for this year, just a really nice dinner, hanging out and counting down to midnight. It was really cute though, because their three-year-old was obsessed with her and didn't want to leave her side, and she loved watching her eat and kept showing me her own nipples so she could feed the baby and kept begging her dad to come watch the baby eat hahaha! He came and sat next to us and kept his eyes on the TV and she kept saying "You're not looking at the baby eat!" it was super cute. 

(For the record, after you have a baby, you sure do view your body differently. After being completely on display for the delivery, and having no shame in needing all the help in the world getting to the bathroom, using the bathroom, trying to manage all the blood and hemorrhoids, and needing help getting breastfeeding going, and then living with your boobs out 24/7 to feed the hungry baby... there's really no shame anymore - not that there should be shame! - but I swear, if it was all the same to everyone else, I would answer the door in the mesh granny panties and boobs hanging out and not have a care). Now tell me girls don't run the world!

We counted down to midnight and cheers'ed with some Moet Chandon, which made us want to watch the Moet Chandon SNL sketch and then went down a small rabbit hole of SNL sketches. 

And that was our New Year's Eve.

Our 2021 has been off to a nice start though! It's always nice to have a happy baby...

No doubt she's AJ's little girl either...

And, take a seat boys. Guess who not only dominated in Maxout this NFL season, I had a completely immaculate season and shattered the previous record holder's points that was at about 500. And I'm ahead of second place by 157 points!

One more time for the people in the back this 2021... girls run the world!

December Days

I know this is that week between Christmas and New Year's where everything's just a weird haze, but my days have been and unstructured like that since the beginning of November, so it's all the same to me right now. But we have had small little events lately.

One of AJ's Christmas gifts for Sophie was this insanely adorable little polar bear onesie. He said they only had it in newborn size, and while we can just barely fit her into it, there's no room for growth and is arguably too small at this point, but she just looks so sweet squeezed into it! And it's so funny to pick her up in it because she's so stiff and is like the kid in A Christmas Story because it's so snug and thick.

It also occurred to me that I hadn't been taking any videos of her, which I need to start doing because she's getting really cute and making the coos and squeaks now. This video is highly uneventful, but I do love how she can see better now and is able to look at the stars hanging in the pack and play bassinet.

Here's her being cute, lounging in her boppy

And one of my gifts to her was a personalized name sign for her bedroom, and AJ got it up the other day.

And here's a look into my life in the wee hours of the morning LOL

And lastly, Rob and Rafael were driving through and decided to swing by our place and we did a quick little photo... it ended up being perfect- Sophie is waving to the camera!

Aaaand that's our life lately.

Sophie's First Christmas

We had such a nice Christmas over here, which was really a surprise because it definitely felt like Christmas was canceled this year - not just because of the pandemic, but because we're too exhausted being parents to a newborn right now. 

Even so, it turned into such a nice Christmas for all of us and Sophie really cleaned up! A wooden name sign for her room, leg warmers, headbands, a Bumbo seat, the most adorable warm polar bear outfit, moccasins, little Fox slippers, a Sailor Moon onesie, a Ravenclaw onesie, some super chic outfits from England, a Christmas tree ornament, and I'm probably forgetting even more. It was so fun, and actually it's really nice now to be able to focus on the baby since we're blessed enough to not be in want for much of anything.

On Christmas Eve my mom dropped off gifts for us and we were able to get a picture of Sophie with her two grandmothers.

We spent the evening watching Christmas movies with eggnog and a fire going and AJ made us our usual Christmas Eve steak dinners. And, Debbie bought us matching pajamas which we donned for the evening.

 

In the morning I woke up to these two cuties cuddling and stretching awake. We didn't open presents until later on since we're all on different sleep schedules with our baby shifts and don't normally all converged until about 10 or 11a.

We took pictures of her while we opened her gifts from Uncle Luke and Aunt Shannon in England, even if she slept through it all...

And then I had do a little photo shoot of her in this onesie I found in her drawers (and can't remember where it came from!)

...but she sure is the best gift ever, and made this the first of very memorable Christmases.

Christmas Season

Hello there from six weeks postpartum. I think this has been a really good turning point for us and things are feeling much more manageable, we're in more of a routine, AJ and I know what we're doing a bit more, Sophie has had a few nights sleeping like a complete angel which has been super energizing, and hey, it's almost Christmas!

She had been so fussy but just wanted
to be held by him <3

Peng is the best babysitter!

I just loved this scene of our home
from our very minimal Christmas
get-up this year. (This is 99.9% of all
the decorations we put up)

Her grandma got her this sweet little onesie!

AJ and I began a tradition of buying
a Christmas ornament every year that
somehow encapsulates that year. I bought
this kit from Pottery Barn to make an
ornament of Sophie's handprints.
The perfect 2020 touch for us

Hope you are all staying safe and well, following guidelines, and able to experience some nice holidays, no matter how different they look this year.

A Month Later

Life is still a blur but we're still here. Sophie is already a month old (what!) and here's some scenes from around.

This was on Thanksgiving LOL

Meeting Heihei

I love the little llama feet!

She doesn't really dare come much closer than this

She loves Peng!

Our lives these days

Her one month photo

Her big head couldn't fit the headband
so she looks like a karate kid

The outtake. Be sure to zoom in

She only reads the instructions in Spanish.
Hola!

AJ's bottle of the day

 

We've been able to do a small amount of decorating for Christmas, which feels a little extraneous this year, but it really has brought some cheer regardless. So, Happy Holidays, 'tis the season, deck the halls, spin the dreidel... and everything else.