Done. Done & Done.

He did it!!!! Kevin has officially mastered his Masters in Mechanical Engineer! 3 years in the making he submitted his final paper for his final class....ever! Such anticipation for this day leaves us feeling like it's all a bit surreal.

Congrats love.

The family is in town & between all of us we treated him to the Homeowners Delight: Wheelbarrow, Step Ladder, 6 pack & 2 lotto tickets - oh and a cute baby boy to help present it.
No more homework, no more books, no more teachers dirty looks.

Don't go Grandma Jo!

He's gonna miss the kind of love & attention only a Grandma can give. We had a great time, Love you - see you in November!

Lucky for Logan he's got more Grandparents comin into town tomorrow!

All nighter

We did it! 7pm - 7am ...no feedings :) He woke only once at 2am and needed help finding his thumb but thats it.

Wahoooooooo!

!

The best news from our party, deserving an entire separate post of it's own....

Logan giggled for the first time! Both Kevin & I heard it. He did it twice & we think he was looking at Dylan and the other dog that was at the party. By the time I ran in the house to grab the cameras (rookie mistake, a mom should ALWAYS have a camera in hand) he stopped :/

Logan & I camped out inside last night but I took him out bright and early in the morning to Kevin & Dylan so they could talk tent - hopefully part of that conversation was an example of how not to put up a tent...

Craving the next giggle.

Hawk Housewarming BBQ Bonanza

A success.

We started things off by watching the US play what is now considered their last game in the World Cup - boo. BUT we watched it on our brand new freggin Samsung 55" LED, sweeeeeet TV - YAY. I was on baby duty so I didn't manage to snap many photos of our gathering but we had a good showing & the weather held steady at perfect...not too hot, little bit of cloud coverage and the occasion drop of rain.

We played horseshoes

& Giant Jenga

ate & drank. And when the sun went down a campfire was lit and the whiskey & s'mores were brought out.....Kevin, Dylan & Dave camped out in the yard and thought assembling their tents by the light of a flare after a couple glasses of Jameson would be a good idea, but you be the judge.

11:00pm - the setting up of the tents by flare light

7:30am - I think a stiff breeze would have taken this bad boy out

My name is Logan...

...and I like mushy peas.

DIY'ing = Fun

On the flip side - hard work pays off. Here are two more rooms that are 90% finished. The guest room is still in need of a few more things to spruce it up a bit and the bathroom is waiting on a hamper from Home Goods. But it could be an undetermined amount of time before those things are figured out/purchased - soooo here they are, go figure we complete the guest room & downstairs bathroom before finishing our room & bathroom.

Guest Room

Downstairs Bathroom

DIY'ing = No fun

Don't let these smiles fool you.As Kevin would say we've been "flat out" since the day we moved in. One more room finished last night with 2 coats of paint and trimwork done. Next up: Kitchen/Dining Room.

I will pay anyone in the form of beer, food & hugs if they want to come paint our ceilings.

Sleeping Update

In a matter of a week and a half we went from Logan being totally swaddled & waking up for a feeding at midnight, 3am and 5am and NOW we are totally swaddle'less & waking up for just one feeding between the hours of 4am and 5am! It wasn't all easy - the first few days we were like walking zombies...he would wake up almost every hour. There was one night that I just sat in his room while he cried. I was tired of trying to help him calm down but it made me feel better to just be in there and know that he was ok that he was just having a hard time putting himself back to sleep.

In the process we learned a couple things:
1. Be consistent. Make a plan & stick to it. The other times we had tried we were too wishy washy & we both caved into his cries too easily
2. Not to take him out of his crib. Period. When he did need calming down - ie: patting his butt, pacifier, help finding his thumb, rolling back to his side, or all three it was done with him in the crib. As soon as we did that his waking up drastically decreased - or so we think.....
3. We also have been leaving the monitor off at night - his room is directly across from ours and we figured any noise worth attending to we would be able to hear without the monitor.
What a luxury that has been! It's amazing how many little noises come through the monitor at night that wake you up.

The past few nights I've slept sooo well - it helps that I've had my first 3 nights in almost 5months with 6 uninterrupted hours of sleep. I feel like a new woman.



On the road to a sleep filled night for us & baby!

Fantastic Fathers Day Weekend

We had an extremely productive weekend! Topping our list would have to be the completetion of our fire pit outside :) Saturday evening after running around doing things non-stop all day to get our house ready for our first visitors and housewarming party we grilled out, drank beers & made smores around our fire pit - a fantastic way to end the night and a great way to start Fathers Day.Logan & Dylan got Kevin some new work gloves and I got him a bottle of Jameson & made breakfast. And although we didn't do anything special Kevin said it was the perfect Fathers Day - that he got to do everything he could imagine wanting to do in one day:

Had breakfast made for him
Went to Home Depot

Built something

Grilled out wings

Starting drinking Jameson in the middle of the afternoon

And spent alllll day with his wife & son

Wonderful weekend.

Uhhh...what do you mean tomorrow is Fathers Day? I hope Mom picked up a card for me to give to Dad.

One minute 22 second glimpse

Into our day



And it just gets better from there.

Good Morning Tuesday

Love,
Logan

World Cup

Saturday morning before the USA vs. England World Cup game, Kevin's work people got together for a friendly World Cup game of their own. His job involves a partnership with an England shipyard, so this was a legit USA vs England match!! The sidelines were filled with fans and the sun was just barely hidden by some clouds.

Halftime England 1 - USA 0.

Kevin stepped it up a couple notches in the second half and scored the only US goal of the game to tie things up :) It then went into pentaly kicks to decide the winner. Again Kevin scored which contributed to a USA VICTORY!!!!

Before we left England last November Kevins co-workers got Logan an England jersey & although we were definitely rooting for USA during yesterdays games we couldn't think of a better time to put him in his England "kit".

After the work game we met up with all the players and families at a bar in Groton to watch the real World Cup game. Oddly enough the result at the end of regulation was 1 -1, a draw. It's too early in the tournament for a penalty shoot out, but I'm sure the USA would have won!!

Kisses all around

4 months!

getting shots at the docs yesterday :/

Height: 25.5 inches (75th percentile)
Weight: 13.2oz (25th percentile)
Clothing Size: 6months
Favorite Foods: Momas milk & rice cereal
Likes: baths, mirrors, kicking & standing
Dislikes: being hungry, shots
Favorite Toy: His new rainforest jumperoo & the plastic monkey that hangs on his carseat
Is looking forward too: Getting more hair & eating his next meal

This month has been deemed the month of a lil bit of tough love. We're all talk when it comes to letting him cry it out, we've made it 10mins but I don't think either of us have a wall up strong enough to let him cry longer...perhaps as he gets older that will become easier. We're also in process of eliminating the swaddle blanket at night. He doesn't nap with the swaddle but apparently naptime and bedtime are totally different. We've attempted on several occasions to put him down cold turkey no swaddle, with no success. So now plan B, this week one arm out, next week two arms out, the following week -free as a bird. Annnnd to add to the tough love theme...I'm working on doing what I can to get him to sleep through the night. For a while now he's been going to bed at 7pm and consistently getting up to feed at midnight, 3am'ish & sometime between 5am-6:30am. So for the past couple days I've just tried to get him to go back to sleep at 3am instead of feeding him. So far so good. If all goes as planned by months end we will have a baby that can sleep through the night without being swaddled :o Jackpot.

On the parenting front things have definitely been getting easier. Of course I say that this morning - as I'm gulping decaf coffee in hopes to soak in the minuscule amount of caffeine because Logan & I spent the hours between 3am and 5am trying to get him to go back to sleep until we finally got up and watched the news until 7am. He naps now and although Kevin told me to nap with him today, I'm up. In Logans defense he had shots yesterday at the docs and we were told he might be in pain and be a little extra fussy for the next 24hrs...doesn't make being in a zombie state any easier.

If I had to - on a difficulty/stress scale of 1 -11. 1 being easy breezy and 11 being the equivalent of climbing Mount Everest with no food or sleep. Months 0-3 of raising our first newborn baby would be an 8. And while I don't think for the next 18 years we'll ever be at a 1, we are definitely on our way down the scale - I'd be so bold to say we've dropped to a 6 which is similar to running a half marathon everyday ...still tired and still no walk in the park but we've had 3 months to get in shape & now we just enjoy the scenery as we make the run :)

Starting the week off with a smile

Who says Mondays are drab?

NYC

One of Kevin's co-workers while in England was bringing his wife over the big pond for a quick 3 day visit to the city of all cities - NYC. We had told them a year ago when they made plans to come out that we could meet them and tour around with them when the time came. First of all I can't believe a year ago we were in England and for secondly - my how time flew.

It started at 5am. Getting up and getting us & baby out of the house. First stop: Howie & Beckys. Friends of ours that live near the Stamford train station and our babysitter for the day. Thats right folks, Logans first legit babysitting experience. For the month prior to this trip I was apprehensive about leaving him and up until the day before we left I considered just bringing him with us into the city. Kevin assured me he would be fine so a brief rundown of the flexible schedule I knew for Logan and we were on our way to the train station. To celebrate: Coffees all around, caffeinated ones!!!

Oddly enough after getting off the train at Grand Central station John & Cheryl were right there in Grand Central as well...we couldn't have planned it better. Empire state building, hot dog vending carts, ground zero & a 4 mile walk later we left John & Cheryl to catch a ferry around the Statue of Liberty and we headed back to our baby - who from several calls and texts wasn't doing so great away from Mom & Dad for so long.

7pm back.

Did Saturday happen - what a blur.

House Update

Chocolate Froth, Mountain Haze, Bayside & Chianti

We're painting!!

I keep wanting to post more pictures of what we've accomplished so far but none of the rooms are completely finished yet. Matter of fact it could be a while until rooms are complete to the way we are happy with. Our list of things to do & buy I swear grows everyday. Most recently we've changed our minds with what to do with the office and the sitting room. The office will now become a playroom and the sitting room, an office. These decisions required us to rearrange the only completed room in the house, Logans. So just yesterday we scooted things around in order to fit into his room the chair I've been using for nursing. Done. Last night we put the second coat of Chocolate Froth on the entry way walls. Done. Next up - Bayside in the bathroom, Mountian Haze in the living room and Chianti combined with a chair rail in the kitchen area.

Perhaps by summers end we'll have another room or two to show off.



Makin progress.