Onesies

I am lucky enough to still be friends with girls that I have known since kindergarten. This summer I had a shower with some of those girls and we decorated onesies. It was so much fun and now almost every single day Adelyn wears one of those onesies under her outfit. It makes me so happy to put these on her because I think of my girls and hope that one day Addy will have a group of girlfriends that are just as incredible as mine.
As requested, here is Addy in her special unicorn onesie & believe it or not I do even put her in the one that says I love cats, even though she will never be allowed to love cats.

Perfect Day!

Today has been such a perfect day. It started with a great night in which Adelyn slept for almost 5 hours! (must have been all that turkey) That meant mom and dad caught up on some much needed sleep and were feeling great today. After a relaxing morning, Brian stayed home with Adelyn & I braved the crowds and did a little shopping downtown. I quickly remembered why I usually avoid shopping on Black Friday, but it was nice to get a little break and do some shopping that didn't involve going to the maternity section!
Then this afternoon the three of us went for a walk in Seward Park. It was a beautiful sunny afternoon. Now I am listening to Christmas music and am going to put up our little tiny tree & Christmas decorations. I don't know how a day could be any better.

Thankful

Fall has always been my favorite time of year & is a special time for Brian and I. We met in the fall, got engaged & got married in the fall so I think it is very appropriate that Adelyn was born in the fall. It is also the start of the holiday season which brings families together and makes you appreciate all of life's blessings. This year I am thankful for so many things, but mostly the simple things in life. Family, friends and health. Even though Brian and I don't have family in Seattle, we certainly have been blessed with incredible families and we know they are thinking of us today. We are grateful that we have been "adopted" by a wonderful family to spend Thanksgiving with that has become our holiday tradition, (thank you Bennetts). We are also surrounded by incredible friends who have been so wonderful to us, especially this past month. And of course we were blessed with a happy and healthy baby girl who has already brought so much joy to our lives. It really is the little things in life that matter the most. Happy Thanksgiving!

4 weeks

I know I'm probably starting to sound like a broken record, but I can't believe it's already been four weeks since Adelyn was born. So much has changed already & I keep learning new things every day. In the past four weeks these are just some of the things that have changed for me.

I used to need a good 8 hours of sleep a night, now if I can get 2-3 straight hours of sleep at a time I think of that as a success.
I can now eat anything with just one hand & if you thought I was a fast eater before you should see me now.
Laundry went from a once a week chore to a once a day chore.
I find myself rocking and swaying back and forth, even when I'm not holding Adelyn.
I cry at any story about children, whether it's sad or not.
I feel a connection with all other parents.
I've learned there is no such thing as too many burp cloths.
I used to wonder what I would do being home all day, but now I've learned that a cycle of feed, change, sleep & repeat can easily take up your entire day.

And just when I think I can't do something or that I'm too tired for this, Adelyn will give me a look or a smile that makes me realize there is nothing I can't do.

Dress up

This weekend Adelyn received a gift from my friend Kelli. I know she meant for it to be used for Adelyn to play dress up when she's older, but I just couldn't resist showing it off now. Unfortunately, the pictures just don't do it justice, but you get the idea. I swear the whole time I was taking these pictures Addy was looking at me with this look of "what are you making me do now?" and "are we done yet?"
So maybe mom likes the outfit better for now but soon enough she'll be showing off her dance moves in the tutu, I just know it. Thanks Kel, it is priceless!

Diaper Duty

Since he is at work during the day, Brian is very good at doing his share of the diaper duty when he is home. Last night he was upstairs changing Addy's diaper when I heard him in a slightly panicked voice call for me to come help him. I walked into the room and couldn't help but laughing at the scene I was witnessing. Brian was holding Addy's legs which were covered in poop, as were his hands, the changing pad and the wall. Yes, there was poop running down the wall. I stepped in to help & Brian wiped everything down. Just as he picked up Addy to lay her back down on the just cleaned pad, she peed all over him. I couldn't help but run down to get my camera. Here was the aftermath of that particular diaper change. I laughed and laughed and thought it was hilarious, until the same thing happened to me this morning at 2 am. Suddenly I didn't see the same humor in it.
Adelyn definitely has a knack for knowing right when to let it go. We have a cloth diaper service & have run out of diapers every week so far. I've now increased it to 90 diapers a week, we'll see if that's enough to keep up with this girl & her diaper duties.

Grandma Barb

It was seven years ago today that my mom passed away from cancer. I find myself thinking about my mom even more during this time of the year, especially with the holidays. I would say this year I am thinking of her more than ever, but with a new appreciation of who she was. Now that I am a mom, I appreciate all mothers even more & I realize what a truly exceptional woman my mother was. I am very sad that Adelyn will never meet her Grandma Barb, but I know that she will always know what an incredible woman she was. There will never be any question about how much Grandma Barb loves her. I feel lucky that both Adelyn and I have an angel looking down on us & I know that is why my life has been filled with so many wonderful blessings.

When my niece Sydney was born, my mom wrote her a letter & so when Adelyn was born my Dad wrote her a letter. Here is just a piece of that letter.
"Another story I have to tell you is about your grandmother, Barbara. You won't ever meet her but you'll get to know her just the same. Oh, the stories we tell about her! Some are sad, some are funny, but all are loving. She would have loved you very much, so I guess I'll just have to love you twice as much to make up for her not being here."

I think Addy will miss out on some things by not having her Grandma Barb around but I know that love will never be one of them.

Ridiculous

It is ridiculous to me that Adelyn is already 3 weeks old. I honestly don't know where the time has gone. I never imagined my days would go by this quickly. Now I know why "old people" (I am now included in this group) always say to cherish the moments because they go by so quickly. She is changing so much every day & has the funniest facial expressions, I am just loving it.
Here are some of my favorite pics that my friend Ginny took. I can hardly stand how cute they are. It's really just ridiculous.

The Big Weigh In

Last week at Adelyn's 2 week appointment she had only gained 2 ounces and was still 4 ounces below her birth weight. The Dr. was not impressed so she assigned me to project "Baby Feed" and I was to follow every feeding with a bottle to make sure she was getting enough to eat. Since our feedings were already taking 45 minutes to an hour this meant I would be spending a good ten hours a day feeding. Who knew feeding a baby would be so much work! Well we just got back from the Dr. and I'm happy to report the effort paid off and Addy gained just over 6 ounces in a week and is now over her birth weight weighing in at 8 pounds 8 ounces.
Here she is showing off her hard-earned belly.

No Prob with the Bob

Yesterday we took Adelyn on her first walk in her new stroller. We walked down to Lake Washington and enjoyed the last of the fall weather without rain. We think she liked the stroller, but she slept the whole time so it was hard to tell. I do know however, that her father loves the stroller. I've never seen anyone act so macho about a stroller. He showed us several times how the front wheel can either lock or swivel depending on the terrain. He commented multiple times about how going over the curb or tree roots was no problem with this stroller & someday we could take it on hikes with no issues. He showed off the shocks of the stroller & how it turns on a dime. I think I even saw a little smirk on his face as we passed other strollers & he compared them as if there was no chance any other stroller could compete.
So Addy, hopefully you do like your stroller, but if you don't I'm sure when you are old enough your father will explain to you all of the reasons why you should.

Hey Little Bucky!

It is still up for discussion as to who Addy should be rooting for on football Sunday, but there is no question who she cheers for on college game day. She has no choice but to be a Badger fan & lucky for us she has a closet full of Badger apparel. It won't be long before she is joining her mama in singing "if you want to be a Badger then come along with me". And I can already see her swaying side to side singing "Varsity, Varsity, U-rah-rah Wisconsin." She will definitely be a Badger through and through, but there is no way she will ever be a cheesehead.

Already Two Weeks

Adelyn is already two weeks old! We can't believe how quickly it has gone by. In the last 2 weeks she has had lots of visitors, including her Papa Swanson, Aunt Keri and Cousin Sydney from Minnesota and her Grandma and Grandpa Evert from Wisconsin and of course her Chef'n family. Here are a few pictures of Addy and her visitors. Notice she is sleeping in almost every photo, she is such a good baby.

It's Adelyn, not Tadelyn, Madelyn or Abilyn

It's a lot of pressure to name a baby. It was something that Brian & I took very seriously. We each would throw out names and if the other could think of a terrible nickname or something bad then the name was out. Back in the spring one of the characters in a book I was reading was named was Adeline (like Caroline), I kind of liked the sound of that & added it to the list. Brian really liked the name Addison, but I couldn't get past the Grey's Anatomy character. We had one of those baby name books and found the name Adelyn which was a nice mix of names we both liked. It is a German word meaning "noble kind". We added it to our list.
After a couple more months the only name we kept coming back to was Adelyn and pretty soon that's what we were calling her to each other. By the summer we knew for sure that would be her name & we just had to decide on a middle name. My middle name is Lynn, as is both my Mom and Dad's. Since she would already have Lynn in her first name we couldn't use that. I really liked Ruby which is the name of my only living grandparent; my Dad's 92-year-old mother, who happens to share her birthday with our wedding anniversary. We thought it would be cool if we had our daughter on our anniversary & on her great-grandma's birthday (which she was only off by 1 day!). My Grandma also happens to be incredibly smart, kind, loving, honest & funny. I figured if any of her traits were to be passed onto Adelyn it would be a good thing.
After she was born I called my Dad with the news, it took him about 5 tries to get the name right (his hearing isn't that great). He thought I said Madelyn, Eleanor, Addison, finally he got Adelyn. Then I got a funny email from my brother Tad saying "naming a beautiful newborn after someone is certainly the greatest form of flattery and I think that you could not have made a better decision. Honestly, Megan you and I have been very close through out the years, but I really never expected the admiration that you have shown by naming little baby Tadelyn Ruby after me." Nice try but not so much. Then my niece Sydney came to visit and kept referring to her as Abilyn. We finally had to make a rhyme to help her remember it was Adelyn.
So for any of you who are struggling with our little girl's name, I have a very easy solution for you, a name you can't mispronounce. It's Addy & you can always call her that. Here is a pic of Addy with her oldest cousin Sydney.

So Long Rainshadow

As soon as we found out we were pregnant we started getting a lot of advice from other parents. The most common piece of advice we got was to not share the name until the baby was born. Everyone said you end up getting all kinds of feedback that you aren't looking for. People can't help but share that they once knew someone with that name that they didn't like, or offer up some negative nickname that could be associated with a particular name. So we took that advice, and before we even knew what we were going to name our child, we agreed not to tell anyone, and believe it or not we didn't.

Of course this wasn't easy, especially for my family. It drove them crazy that we weren't sharing. My Dad must have tried a hundred different times to get the name out of us. It was hard for us too and of course we needed something to refer to her as when we were with other people. So after yet another inquiry from my Dad on what her name would be, we told him we were going to name her Rainshadow. The name stuck and for several months we referred to her as Rainshadow to our family, friends and coworkers. Most conversations would start with "how is Rainshadow doing today?" or "what did you learn about Rainshadow from the Dr. today?" It was a perfectly ridiculous name for our little girl & it helped us keep her name a secret. I am definitely glad that the secret is out, but I must admit I am a little sad to know that Rainshadow is now gone forever. Thanks Rainshadow, we'll miss you.

Picture Perfect

Before she was even 24 hours old, our little Addy had already had two photo shoots. One from the professional photographer at the hospital & one from our semi-professional photographer friend Sarah. Here are a few of our favorites from Sarah. (thank you!!)

An Anniversary to Remember

Brian and I celebrated our two year anniversary on Tuesday, October 27th. It was an unusual anniversary since I was 5 days overdue and filled with anxiety about possibly being induced the following evening. We had a nice dinner at home and agreed to not finalize our inducement plans until the following morning. I needed a night to sleep on it and my plan was to just go into labor by the following day so I didn't have to decide (I'm always the optimist). After dinner I remembered that we had an "Anniversary Book" which you are supposed to fill out memorable moments from the last year and include a picture from that year. I summarized our year and then looked through our photos for one to add but couldn't find one that was good, so we decided to set up our camera and take a photo on our actual anniversary. I wasn't thrilled about being photographed at 41 weeks, but oh well. Here is one of the photos taken at 9:30 pm.



We got ready for bed shortly after and wouldn't you know around 10:30 pm I started to feel crampy and uncomfortable. I was hoping and praying it was labor but I didn't want to jinx it so I just laid in bed trying to will contractions to start. An hour later I was still feeling weird and it was getting worse. I got up and walked around and searched through all of my pregnancy books to read up on labor & how to determine it if was real or not. So far all signs pointed to the real thing. I didn't want to wake up Brian for nothing so I continued this for another couple hours until the contractions were about 4 minutes apart and 40 seconds long. Finally by about 1:00 am I couldn't do it by myself so I woke up Brian very gently with a huge smile and said "Honey, I'm in labor and am having contractions". It took him a moment to really wake up and then he jumped into action. We found a watch and started timing things for real. We called the Dr. around 2:00 am and were told if this pattern continued for another hour or two we could make our way into the hospital. The contractions never slowed down and only got stronger so a little after 4:00 am we made our way in. I checked into triage and got checked and was told I was not progressed far enough to be checked in so I could either go home (a completely inconceivable idea) or walk around the hospital until things progressed further. We chose to walk around and found an empty stairwell where I just walked up and down and struggled through contractions. I got checked again a few hours later and luckily had progressed enough to get checked into the birthing room. After several more hours of the worst pain I've ever experienced I asked for an epidural, once I got it I went from one extreme to another and felt a wave of euphoria I had never experienced before. At one point I told Brian if we happened to have a boy instead we would name him after the "Epidural Man" who I had just declared my new best friend. After the epidural, which was about 15 hours after my first contraction, I was actually able to fall asleep for the first time in 30 plus hours and when I woke up I was told it was almost time to push.

I couldn't believe I was so close to having this baby I had waited months and months for. After 45 minutes of pushing, at 3:04 pm, I heard her cry and felt more love than I have ever felt in my life. We had our little girl, Adelyn Ruby Evert, who was actually not so little at 8 lbs 6.5 oz's and 21 inches. In less than 24 hours our family photo was changed forever and the two of us became three. It was worth every painful contraction and every minute of waiting to see her and kiss her. I immediately knew what every other parent had told me about the emotions you feel on the birth of your child. It truly is the most amazing thing I have ever experienced and we couldn't be happier about our little angel Adelyn.