Are you prepared for the best baby picture ever?

Awwww, he has his daddy’s ears.

p.s. This picture happened totally by accident.

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH GROWTH SPURT AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!

Baby Evan nursed for an hour and a half tonight and is already at it again. If my nipples don’t get at least a 6 hour break tonight I’m concerned they’re going to pack up and leave tomorrow morning. Like, NO WAY DUDE, we didn’t sign up for this. Your baby needs as much milk as four babies? GROW ANOTHER SET.

1. I was planning to work out first.
2. You’re only supposed to wash your hair, like, twice a week anyways.
3. I used all the hot water on the laundry.
4. My “natural” scent helps the baby bond with me.
5. Something about the environment.
6. I cleaned the bathroom this morning and can’t bring myself to get it dirty.
7. The shower is upstairs and the baby is sleeping in the swing downstairs and I can’t hear the monitor over the sound of the shower.
8. I can put a hat over my greasy hair but not over my disgusting floors.
9. Babies don’t can’t if you’ve shaved your legs this week month.
10. I am just plain old lazy.

Yesterday went like this: bad, good, really good, bad, really bad, NAP, good, really really good, super fun good, sorta bad, really bad, OMG will the screaming never end bad, EIGHT HOURS OF SLEEP.

Since our Friday night plans got cancelled because of thunderstorms, we wanted to check out the Harbor Festival yesterday. Our town is celebrating it’s 350th anniversary and has been holding events for the past few weeks. They’re doing parties and lectures and walking tours of the mansions and gardens and there’s a tall ship down at the harbor and unfortunately I have made it to exactly zero events. As of today I have still attended zero, because I have a three month old. Baby Evan just didn’t give a crap that there were balloons! and pirates! and cotton candy! and a drum and fife band! None of those things interested him more than my boob, so with my handy nursing cover I fed him on a park bench. It went pretty well. It would have gone better if I’d had a pillow. Or if it hadn’t been a million degrees. Or if the drum and fife band hadn’t fired their muskets right when I got the baby latched on. causing him to almost rip my nipple off.

In the evening, we packed up the baby and some lemon bars and went over to E’s former co-workers for a cookout. We set up camp in the baby-corner with four other sets of parents and had a great time lying in the grass surrounded by kids and dogs and food. We made it two hours and one feeding before my back started screaming in pain and my head felt like it was going to explode. Baby Evan was grumpy from being awake for too many hours and once the yelling started I knew it wasn’t going to end. Although he napped in the car on the way home, he was too hungry to sleep for long and I spent the rest of the evening nursing him almost constantly to keep him from wailing.  At 11 pm I gave up and turned him over to E hoping I could get a couple hours of rest. At 7 am I woke up and found both my boys had slept in the living room and I had gotten EIGHT HOURS of sleep for the first time in 12 weeks. I needed it. Today we’re going to do nothing structured and just let baby (and E) nap as much as he wants.

Pictures:

Baby Evan’s outfit is a hand me down from when my brother (now 20) was a baby.

Using my nursing cover.

Baby, blanket and beer at the cookout. E even wore the sling for a while, despite some of the guys giving him crap. It made the other moms really jealous of my awesome husband.

I love my father. I really do. He’s kind and caring and always tells me he’s proud of me. But DEAR GOD that man needs medication. He is so OCD about details I thought we would never get our porch finished. Dear Dad firmly believes there is a “right” way to do everything from painting a wall to putting on a belt. In his mind, “right” is the same as “morally correct and therefor not to be challenged even if it means painting every damn piece of wood for this porch THREE TIMES and buying four different kinds of molding”. Perfectionism, thy name is Biff.* But thanks to his planning and knowledge – and his awesome air-powered framing nailer – we have a new front porch. E did an amazing job of both tolerating my father and working his butt off to get everything done even though the weather was crap and he had his actual job to do during the day. And he was out of beer. I totally thought about teaching Baby Evan to play the world’s tiniest violin for him.

But now the project is DONE (Ok beside a little tiny bit of touch-up painting I am totally planning to do as soon as I get a free afternoon when the baby is sleeping and I’m not exhausted. Soooooo…….2024, give or take a few months)  and we have a fantastic new porch on which to enjoy lovely New England evenings. There are two rugs for baby play time on the floor, balustrades to keep tiny children and dogs from falling through the screen, throw pillows for lounging on, a cafe table for morning coffee, patio furniture for games and wine and a swing to rock Baby Evan to sleep at night. Check it out from old to new and be TOTALLY JEALOUS.

*Ok, William, but even his business cards say Biff.