Fun in St. Louis!

We are all moved in and loving St. Louis!

We live close to downtown and have found there are tons of fun things to do for free. So far we have visited the zoo, the science center, the botanical gardens, and heard free concerts in the park. Our favorite concert featured the "champion whistler" who whistled away under a gazebo in the park with a full band behind him. Unfortunatly, Stephen would not let me challenge him to a whistling showdown.

The Botanical Garden is about a mile from our house and has an amazing japanese garden. It puts the phoenix botanical garden to shame; however, it had the most pathetic prickly pear cacti we have ever seen.

This was my favorite part of the St. Louis history museum. It is a plaque of WWI heroes. It also proves I'm a big nerd.

Here is David all ready for a day of fun--which means sleeping in his carseat.

He put up with the hat for a while...

But eventually decided the hat was not as cute as we thought it was.

David has also started to give us semi-genuine smiles. Since his usual facial expression is either suspicious or mildly disgruntled, the smiles are a nice change--even if they are fake. This is either a smile or an impression of a pirate.

He has also started using stealth to sleep longer.

Our new bedroom is not nearly as dark as our room in mesa, and Stephen likes to sleep in absolute darkness. I made him a sleep mask which has been effective. The look I was going for is "insane fox".

Dad also mentioned he would like a statue for the Secret Garden. We will be sending this one to him shortly.

More photos of the boy

Here are a few more pics from the last two weeks. He is now almost three weeks old and getting bigger all the time!

Mom has the magic touch and can calm him, even when he is "apocolyptic baby".

Sleeping on the rug

getting warm

after bathtime

Presenting David Ethan

The long expected and long over-due David has finally arrived. He made his debut at 9:15 on June 6th weighing in at 6 pounds and 13 ounces, and measuring 21 inches long.

After 36 hours of persistant resistance, they decided to go in after him. He did really well with the C-section and it turned out to be the safest way for him to arrive. He is a pretty content little boy who loves to eat and sleep all day, and eat and play all night. We are all recovering well and learning how to function without sleep. Here he is just minutes after arrival.

Daddy and David

He loves to be swaddled tight- thanks Alex and Catherine for recommending the swaddler.

Here we are, very ready to leave the hospital after being cooped up for 5 days.

David:

Softie book

 

Softies are coming from this charming Japanese book.  The instructions are clear and the outfits cute.  Makes a great baby gift.  If you can avoid making them look possessed.  Catherine, I can't wait to see those turtles made!

Photo Walls!

I love cute photo walls, I have been trying various layouts.  

And this one:

New Softie

New Softie, not so psychotic!

Softies!

Tail-less-Monkey above (Spo thinks it looks like Hannibal Lector, maybe not a good friend for a child.)

First attempts at making softies from socks. the elephant is ugly.  the monkey has no tail.  Softies might not be my big talent.