5 week photos by Marji

My friend Marji has a photography studio at her house and took these pictures of Elaine at 5 weeks (last week). She's growing every day!!

http://marjiguyler.zenfolio.com/elaine5weeks

My personal favorite:

Elaine's Second Road Trip!

This past weekend we traveled to Milwaukee and back for Amy's shower and bachelorette party!

Here we are on a pit stop for some milk on our way up north.  Becoming a fan of rest stops!  Eric and I also have a system worked out to minimize the stop time.  I start feeding as soon as the car is in park.  He gets gas or goes to the bathroom, then takes over burping, finishing the bottle, and changing the diaper.  Then it's back in the carseat and on the road again.  All about teamwork!

 On Saturday, Amy's bridesmaids hosted a shower with a shoe theme (if you know Amy, this makes perfect sense).  Here is the guest of honor at the shower.

Then we hit the town to celebrate Amy's bachelorette party.  Here is our group at the Water Buffalo, a great restaurant on the water!

We made sure Amy got the special treatment at the Safehouse, a spy-themed bar.  Here she is on a throne that literally comes up out of the floor.  SO FUN!

Sunday we got to have lunch with Kristin, Matt, and their daughter Kaleigh (and baby on the way)!  We had an insane amount of food at the brunch buffet at Saz's.  Highly recommend if you're ever in Milwaukee!  What a great visit!!!

Elaine's first road trip!

Over the weekend, we went on Elaine's first road trip to Madison, WI for Amy's bridal shower and Dan's bachelor party. 
Here is Elaine in the car.  Off we go!

Extreme closeup - she's so cute when she sleeps!

Here is the happy couple - only 6 weeks until the big day!

Here is me and Grandma Julie with Elaine in her party dress!  What a fun shower!

Those crazy parents of mine...1st blog by Elaine

Elaine here with my first blog post.  I must speak up to tell you about these crazy people called mommy and daddy.  They certainly do some wacky stuff, and I've got pictures to prove it.
First, mommy got this strange apparatus called a Pikkolo that she straps me into so she can do stuff around the house.  I do like falling asleep in it but when she eats wearing it, she drops food on my face sometimes, so that's kind of annoying.  It's hilarious watching her try to brush her teeth wearing it too.  But I just pretend to be sleeping so I don't embarass her.

My dad likes to sit on the deck with me.  These people used to do all kinds of cool stuff and now they are just perfectly happy to just sit and smile at me and talk in funny voices.

Mommy takes photos of me just sitting looking around the room.  I don't get what is so interesting about that but they sure love it when I have my eyes open.

Daddy likes to hold me while he watches baseball games.  zzzzz.... snoozer!  So I usually fall asleep in a position similar to this one.  I'm usually pretty relaxed when he holds me.

I saved the best for last.  You're not going to beleive this.  Daddy loves to read to me, and he also loves to read about the Packers.  So he does both.  He reads about the Packers TO me.  Mommy actually caught him reading obituaries to me today.  Is this guy for real??

Busy growin!

Growing up is hard work!  Luckily Elaine is up for the task.  :)  Here is her first "tummy time".  Growing a strong neck, she is!

Stretching those arms up high, trying to grow while she sleeps - SO BIG!

And of course growing that brain of hers with some quality literature narrated by dad.

She'll be reading to us in no time!

And here is a live video of the tummy time - she is incredible!



Staring at the curtains...

So Elaine's vision is slowly coming into  focus and one of the things she can stare at in any room is the window treatments when they are closed.  I know this is really gripping footage but it's a treat to see her eyes open!

Elaine makes friends!

In the past week, Elaine has already made a bunch of new friends! 

Elise
LeAnn and Savan live just blocks away, and had a little girl just one month before us!  (They also happen to have VERY good taste in names - Elise was actually the name front runner for a short time.)  We have seen them at least 3 or 4 times since Elaine was born.  Elaine was already borrowing her (premie) clothes her first two weeks of life!  She's safely now in newborn sizes.

This was when LeAnn and Savan stopped over on a run with the running baby stroller.

This was our first "playdate" Friday afternoon.

Alivia
Brian and Leslie's daughter stopped by last Sunday so Alivia could meet Elaine and was that ever an adorable introduction!  Alivia is just over 9 months old now and gets more beautiful every time we see her!

Quinn
Nikki and Jay's daughter came over with Jay yesterday, and since she is just over a year old, she was probably the most interested in the introduction.  With parents as social and fabulous as Nikki and Jay, duh!  She said "baby" over and over and touched Elaine's head as softly as a one year old knows how. 

The Johnson Family
We have a lot to learn from this crew!  Ryan and Jamie stopped over to bring us dinner with their growing crew, Ben - 8, Clare - 5, and Anne - 2.  They sure know what they're doing but boy do they have their hands full!

Burke

Nick and Kelly Price stopped over as well to see the baby and their son Burke is almost exactly one year older (within 3 days)!  If Elaine likes older men like her mommy, Burke could be a potential love interest!  First things first though.  :)

Daddy's last day of freedom.

Well the dreaded day is here when Daddy must go back to work.  Call me hormonal, but I've probably cried just thinking about this day 100 times, and I'm not even the one going back yet!  He was lucky enough to be able to take two glorious weeks off work, which I would have needed anyways since I wasn't supposed to drive for two weeks (partly due to pain meds I was on, partly to make sure I have strength back to be able to push the break and carry the carseat).  SO, tonight we are having lots of snuggle time. 

To celebrate my re-entry into the outside world, being able to drive, being off all medication, AND for our last dinner before dad returns to work, we got take-out from Cosi Cucina, and busted out our bottle of wine I so carefully selected weeks ago and have been patiently waiting to taste again.  Let me just tell you, my one glass was worth the wait.

And for your viewing pleasure, here are a few new photos of our growing girl!  After our two week checkup today, we learned our little peanut has not only gained her birth weight back, but 6 ounces on top of that, giving us a total of 7 lbs, 3 oz!  I'll just say we were high fiving doing a victory dance over that scale at the doctors office.  All that hard work feeding is paying off!

So on Eric's first day back, I'm planning a few light activities around the house, like assembling her tummy time activity center, maybe a walk around the block in the stroller, we're doing lunch with daddy, and a few other odds and ends things to keep my mind off the fact that our family vacation is over and my biggest teammate and best helper in the world is not just around the corner in the house to grab the burp cloth or get the next bottle ready or just come have a family hug.  (So, how long can I safely blame the hormones for being so emotional?)  Every day is a new normal, and this whole experience has just been so amazing that I can't even explain it except to say that I'm on a whole other planet of happiness!