Hi everyone, Calvin here. Let me get you up to speed:

on Monday, the 17th, I had my first bath.  It wasn’t all that pleasant.  In fact, I was pretty unhappy throughout.  Mommy says we’re lucky to have the big slate sink because she can put my whole bathtub in there and wash me easily. I do have some nice towels, though.  This one has a hood on it, and a lion.    I like animals.  I have animals on the walls in my room, and stuffed animals, and animals on some of my clothes.

On Saturday, Nana and Grandpa came over. They’re going to stay a while to help mommy out. At least that’s what they say.  Judging by what’s happened so far, they came to hold me.  They hold me a lot. It’s nice.  Uncle Steve and Sarah came down for a day, too.

I’ve got some moves that I like to do when I’m in the papasan and the carseat.  Mommy gives them names.  There’s “rollercoaster” when I put both hands up, “I have a question” when I just put one up, this one is “air guitar”   and there’s “he shoots, he scores”   .

Today is Christmas Eve.  I’m resting up.  Here’s a picture of me napping in my swing. Daddy had a tough time with that picture because I was in motion and the lights were off in the room.  You can see my reindeer with Christmas lights shirt, though.

So that’s it for now.  I’m sure there will be lots of pictures taken of me tomorrow.  I hear that it’s a big deal that it will be my first Christmas.  Great Grandpa is coming over, and Uncle Cory, and Grammy and Grampy, and Great Grammy, too.  I’ve never met Great Grandpa, Uncle Cory, or Great Grammy. That should be fun.

Merry Christmas everyone.  Say hi to Santa for me.

-CPE

You people are lovin’ me.  People keep telling daddy to get me to update my blog.  Let’s see, I last wrote something on Dec 6th, my 1 week birthday.  What has happened since then?

On Friday, Dec 7th, mommy and daddy took me to get a Christmas tree.  We went to Target first.  I like Target. Mommy and daddy seem to like it, too. We drove far to get the tree.  It was somewhere near a late 19th century mill. There were a lot of trees.  I don’t know how mommy and daddy picked one.  We walked down aisles of trees and suddenly they stopped at one.  All I saw was green.  5 minutes later, they had looked at a few more, but went back to the second one.  They call it “tree b”. While we were there, all of this cold, white stuff started falling from the sky.  Mommy called it snow. Mommy put my canopy up so the white stuff didn’t land on my face, but it was neat nonetheless. When we got home, daddy brought our tree inside the house.

On Saturday, Dec 8th, Uncle Todd and Jenn came down to meet me.  They were nice.  Uncle Todd held me for a long time.  Here’s a photo.

On Sunday, I watched the Patriots game with daddy. Mommy dressed me up in my Patriots hoodie for the occasion.  Thankfully, they won.   They picked the Steelers apart. It was like they were toying with them at times.  That bonehead Steeler guy had to open his big yap. Dummy.

On Monday, we all went to the library again. Mommy and daddy needed movies. The library is quiet.  There’s always this weird guy there sitting at a table right in the middle of the main aisle. He’s been there both times that I’ve been. Daddy says that he’s been there every time daddy has over the past 6 months.

On Tuesday (12/11) I had a checkup at the doctor.  I weighed in at 7 pounds 6 ounces, up from 6lb10oz at birth.  The doctor said that I look healthy. She also said I’m cute. She said that at the hospital, too.  That time, though, she said that she usually doesn’t say that to parents. Apparently, I’m quite the stunner. I guess I don’t get that from dad. After the doctor’s visit, we went to Target again.  At the mall, though, I got my picture taken with Santa.  I look like I’m hammered.  I don’t know if Santa has ever held a baby before. So then we went to Target.

I turned 2 weeks old on Dec 13th.  My celebration was fairly low key.  Mommy and daddy took me to Target again.  We were supposed to pick up our Christmas cards, but some website messed up and they weren’t ready.  Mommy was tres unhappy. On the plus side, I think mommy and daddy bought me a Christmas present.  I was pretty much asleep through the whole Target experience, but I think I heard them talking about it.  Of course, I can’t see more than 18 inches yet, so even if they did get something for me, it’s not likely that I would have been able to identify it.  I do know this: every time we go to Target (which is fairly often) the wagon gets crowded. When we left the store, it was snowing again.  This time it was snowing hard. It took us a long time to get home. I was unhappy.  Mommy was unhappy that I was unhappy. Daddy was unhappy with the other drivers.

On Friday, Dec 14th, I continued my falling apart at the seams routine.  This time though, I lost something , but gained a belly button. Then I took a nap.

The weekend  was pretty chill.  I did a lot of sleeping, eating, and diaper filling.  We went to the library, the hardware store, CVS, the grocery store, and the milk farm on Saturday.  Mommy wanted to stay home Sunday because it was supposed to be lousy outside.

Yesterday, daddy went back to work all day. Mommy’s friend Michael came over to meet me.  He’s a tour guide on busses. Cool! Today, mommy and I made cookies. Mommy says we’re going Christmas shopping tomorrow. Fun!

There – now you’re all caught up.  Hope you enjoyed the recap.

Keep your feet on the ground, and keep reaching for the stars!

-CPE

I’ve updated my blog from that boring layout that daddy gave me.  Hope you like the new look.

I’m a week old today (actually, later tonight, when I’m sleeping to fuel up for the morning wide-awakeness)!

Many of you have been telling mommy and daddy that you want to know what’s going on with me and wonder why I haven’t been blogging. Well, there are a few reasons. I’ll blame it on daddy, though. You see, I’ve made two trips outside, which have taken up some time, and daddy won’t show me how to turn the computer on yet (I may be smart enough to type, but switches still confuse me. They look the same when they’re on or off.)

Here’s a picture of me and grandpa that was taken on the day I came home, last Saturday.

Since then, I’ve been doing a lot of sleeping. Here’s a close-up of me sleeping

sometimes, I sleep with daddy, and sometimes he sleeps, too, like this:

Sometimes, I sleep with mommy, and she sleeps, too:

and sometimes, my new friend Charlee joins us. She’s still curious about me. I don’t think she knows quite what to think about me.

You might get the feeling that mommy and daddy sleep too much. Ha! I’ve got them right where I want them. I let them sleep off and on during the day and early night, but then, around 2 am, I come alive. I cry and scream and fuss until they hold me all through the morning. I think they like it, because they have long discussions about who is going to get to hold me.

On Monday, mommy needed to get out of the house, so I got dressed up and we went to the library. I don’t have a library card yet, so I couldn’t take anything out. Mommy and daddy took out some books and movies, though. On the way home, we stopped for ice cream. Mommy and daddy like ice cream sundaes.

On Tuesday, mommy and daddy took me to the doctor. The ladies there said that I’m doing well.

Yesterday, we went back to the hospital so mommy could buy something. We stopped so mommy could get something at White Electric again (she must really like that place). Then we went to mommy’s office and saw her friends. Then we went to daddy’s office and saw his friends. We were there for a little while while daddy did some work. I slept.

I have been spending most of my time sleeping, eating, and just sitting awake in my papasan while mommy and daddy wait for me to sleep. I’ve also gotten quite good at gripping things, like fingers. Here’s some of my most gripping (hey, my first pun!!) work: and

So, that’s about it. I’ve got to go get some sleep so that I can be up all night with mommy or daddy. I think it’s mommy’s turn tonight.

- CPE

the suspense is killing you, isn’t it?

Today has been a big day. Lots of new things.

After the sun came back, daddy woke up. I went back and forth from mommy to daddy, and over to the baby room a couple of times, and I ate a little, and tore through a few more diapers. Then daddy started packing up all of our stuff. He left for a few minutes, and mommy tried to change me into a new outfit. It was too big though, so she put me in a onesie and wrapped me up nice and snug. I did get a new hat, though. It’s nice. It’s red and it has a reindeer on it. This is me in the hat, ready to go home.  Mommy’s wearing her “spicy number” shirt.  From what I hear, there’s some sort of holiday coming up and I’m like a present. I guess this holiday has something to do with the color red.

After she dressed me up, mommy put me in some kind of chair with a handle on it and we left the hospital. mommy carried me on my first time outside! It was big out there.

Soon, the biggest man I ever saw named Leo came out and got in the car with us. Daddy held me in the front seat, while Leo got in the back seat and strapped part of my chair down. Apparently, he was working hard on it. Mommy was asking him questions. Then Leo snapped my piece of the chair into the other piece that he had strapped down to the seat, and he said goodbye and left. Mommy and daddy got in the front seat and we went away.

We stopped for a while at some place that mommy called White Electric ( ). She came out with a cup that she was happy to have. Stephanie brought her one of those cups yesterday, too. She must really like that stuff. Then we drove a long way. We stopped someplace else and mommy got out again. While we waited, the sun was in my eyes, so daddy held up a red hat with a P on it to make shade on my face. When mommy came back, she said that was cute. Then we drove a short way to a place that mommy called “home”. I guess this is where I’m going to stay.

When I got inside, nana and grandpa and Uncle Steve were there, and I met someone called Charlee. Charlee sniffed me and breathed on me. Her nose is wet and she smells funny and she’s furry. She looked at me for a little while, then went away.

I got to see my new room, too. It’s cool. I like the orange walls and the animals and letters designs. I’ve already used one of my swings. That’s cool. It swings and makes noises.

I was a bit unhappy, so mommy changed me for the first time in my new room.  Of course, everyone had to watch.

We’ve been hanging around all afternoon. I napped for a long time on grandpa while mommy and daddy went on an errand and then took a nap. We’ve been watching football, too. Uncle Steve was disappointed to see BC lose to the Hokies.

So that’s about where we stand right now. I just ate, and now I’m going to rest some more.

Have fun out there.

-CPE

I was a little tired and somewhat cranky yesterday afternoon, so I didn’t blog. You’ll understand why in a minute.

Yesterday afternoon was a time to say goodbye and hello. Just after noon, my first visitors showed up. Jael, Stephanie, and Terri (from mommy’s office – whatever that is) came to visit me. I guess they came to see mommy and daddy, too, but they wouldn’t leave until they saw me, so obviously, I was the reason for the visit. Unfortunately, I was not in the room when they showed up, so they didn’t get to spend as much time with me as they would have liked.

The reason that I was not home is the big goodbye of yesterday – I was upstairs bidding a fond adieu to a portion of my boy parts. You know, it’s a little weird that mommy and daddy made this decision without consulting me. I mean really, they didn’t even ask. All of a sudden, a nurse came in, asked them if they wanted it done, and when they said yes and answered some questions, off I went. Thanks for the consult there, people. The nurses gave me some medicine before what I like to call “the incident”, so I was a little out of it for much of the afternoon and into the evening. Daddy squirmed when he saw what they had done to me. I heard him tell grandpa later, though, that he saw a picture of it in a class beforehand, so the shock was lessened.

Here’s a picture of me before the incident. 

Anyway, let’s put that behind us. I came back and hung out with the ladies – I like this hanging out with ladies thing, by the way – for a while, and then they left and we all got moved up to the 6th floor of the hospital.

Right then, grammy (daddy’s mommy) showed up. Daddy left, and she came in. Grammy couldn’t get enough of me. She held me for a long time while she talked to mommy. Then daddy came back with grampy. He seemed to like me, too. He held me for a little while, too. They took a lot of pictures. I barely remember what was going on because I was really tired and sleeping a lot while they were there. Then they left.

Soon, nana and grandpa (mommy’s mommy and daddy) came in with Uncle Steve. They drove from far away to come see me. That was nice. Apparently, nana was happy to see me. She was crying a little bit. They stayed with us for a while, and they took a lot of pictures. They all took turns holding me. I was still pretty zonked by the medicine, so I only remember bits and pieces of their visit. They left after it was dark.

Nighttime with mommy and daddy was a blur. This was when I started to get grumpy. I was hungry, but still hadn’t gotten the hang of the eating thing. I’ll blame it on the medicine, because I thought I had it down pat earlier in the day, before the incident. I went back to the room with the other babies for a little while and then came back to mommy and daddy when I got hungry. Daddy was asleep for a long time, and he was making some really loud, really strange noise. It wasn’t crying, but it was just as annoying. I had some alone time with mommy. She fed me and changed me and cried a little, and we took a few very short naps.

to be continued…