We're Still Alive

July 6 to July 11, Bob and Melissa came to visit and help out with the baby. Melissa cooked several wonderful dinners and desserts, and they both took turns holding Aerin whenever I wasn't feeding her. It was so nice, I was tempted to sabotage their trip home. Sadly, they're back in Colorado now. Fortunately, my cousin Abby is here for the new few weeks to help out.

Two weekends in a row, we've gone up to the playground on Monte Sano to let Micah blow off some steam. We got lucky this past weekend with some unusually cool weather, although we weren't nearly so fortunate when Papa and Melissa were in town.

At 4 days old, Aerin weighed 6 pounds 9 ounces. Two weeks later, she weighed 8 pounds 12 ounces. I'm sure she's well over 9 pounds by now, and she's almost out of all her newborn outfits. This is a huge difference from Micah, who didn't hit 8 pounds until much later.

I love this picture.

Also, I got a new lens. You know what this means.

Hey, so, there was a Christmas! And a big trip out to Colorado Springs to see Papa and Melissa! And it was fun, yay!

Papa and Melissa had two Christmas trees, a fact that just about blew Micah's mind when we first arrived. He was especially enamored of the ornaments on the little tree, and came back to look at this airplane and a glass train over and over and over.

We were some of the most boring guests on the planet, I'm sad to say. It's so rare we get to just sit around (I got a chill just typing that), that we were perfectly content to veg out on the sofa, while staring slack-jawed at the How It's Made marathon the Science Channel. But they were eventually able to pry me out of the ass-dent in the couch for a couple trips to the local park, Cheyenne Mountain Zoo, and Garden of the Gods.

Papa even got in on the playground fun. You know what will make you smile? A 6' 7" man playing on a swing set with his tiny 3' grandson.

And then there was Christmas morning. Oh gosh.

Micah's still a little too young to completely understand the concept of Santa Clause, but that didn't stop him from being excited about everything Christmas, from the lights to the songs to the special Christmas books to the presents and candy. He doesn't quite get what we're all on about, but HE LIKES IT.

Papa and Melissa went ALL OUT. That boy had a Christmas morning you'd have to have seen to believe, and he loved every minute of it.

A particular hit was the Caterpillar train set. Also, the miniature school bus. Apparently that's the stuff of which toddler dreams are made.

We paid a visit to the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo on the day after Christmas, where Micah got to feed some giraffes, meet a lioness, be terrified of the monkeys, and ride a carousel for the first time.

This picture was taken right as I realized that if Micah were to freak out during the ride, there was nothing I could do about it. My expression says, Oh shit. This could be interesting. Fortunately, while he got a little nervous sometime in the middle, I managed to calm him back down and not have both of us fall to our deaths. That mofo was spinning really really fast, y'all.

After Micah came down with a cold and we paid a nice visit to the local Urgent Care, we settled back into our sofa ass-dents while Micah played with his Papa and the dogs.

And then, before we knew it, it was time to go home. Pikes Peak gave us a lovely send-off as we made our dawn getaway.

Thanks to Papa and Melissa for a WONDERFUL Christmas. We had a great time and really enjoyed seeing you. Micah has asked to "get onna pwane, go see Papa an Mewissa" at least once every two or three days since we got home, so I can say with some certainty that he misses you both.