Daddy's Girl

This picture is from back just before Christmas, but it shows Jeremy at his happiest: when he's holding his little Clara! Jeremy is back in school now--this is the first full week of classes--and pretty much the first thing he wants to do after his long day is snuggle with Clara. I think she enjoys it, too!

We have finally gotten our winter weather in Syracuse: lots of snow and cold but very little sunshine. Clara and I think this is fine, as it helps us to maintain our milky complexions (some might call us pasty, but we resist that label).

This second picture shows one of Clara's favorite pastimes: staring at the ceiling. There's no accounting for taste...

Then and Now

Jeremy and I can barely remember Clara as a teeny tiny baby. When we brought her home from the hospital just under two months ago, she weighed 5 pounds, 2 ounces, which we thought was an impressive gain from her lowest weight of about 4 pounds, 2 ounces a few days after her birth. We did not understand what impressive weight gain was back then! Yesterday, after returning from a drive around town we decided to snap a picture of Clara in her carseat. What a difference two months (and more than six pounds) makes!

Mommy and Me

Jeremy decided that yesterday was the perfect opportunity for a mother-daughter photo shoot. We'd just returned from Clara's first brunch (an important milestone for all babies) at our friends Ryan and Emilee's house, where we were wonderfully and blissfully overfed. Clara spent the event sleeping in her carseat in their guest room, since she is still under relative-seclusion orders from her pediatrician. At any rate, we had a happy morning--evidenced by the near-smile on Clara's full face!

Clara's Shots

Our home health nurse visited the other day (a county service for babies who spent more than two weeks in the NICU), and Clara's new weight is 10 pounds, 3 ounces. For a little girl who started out so tiny, she has certainly worked hard to catch up to her full-term peers! I have a feeling that by the time she is three months old on February 4, she'll be too big for her 0-3 month clothes. Who would've thought?

Enjoy these pictures of Clara's post-immunization trauma. Poor baby.

Retrench!

As a modern nod to the classic Pioneers in Petticoats, Jeremy and I have declared our intention to retrench in 2007 (having an expensive hospital stay and a tiny income also contributed to our decision). Part of our retrenchment includes my goal of dividing sometimes cumbersome household duties over several days so as not to feel backed up and overwhelmed (some may remember similar strategies during our "Vigorous Living" stage).

So now, the days of my week are divided as follows:

• Monday: Makin' Bakin'--this is the day I bake bread and other tasties.
• Tuesday: TCB--this is the day I "Take Care of Business" by paying bills, filing, and managing other household elements.
• Wednesday: Wild Card Wednesday--this is my day off, which means that other than taking care of Clara and showering, I can do whatever my heart desires.
• Thursday: A Day for Laver--taken from the French verb meaning "to wash" (pronounced lah-vay), this is the day we do laundry and ironing.
• Friday: Freewheeling Friday--this is the day I go out on the town to get groceries, go to the library, etc. Jeremy has no morning obligations on Fridays, so he can parent Clara while I roam Syracuse.

On Saturday, we divide household chores and enjoy one another's company (and Jeremy usually reads for school). And of course Sunday is the Day of Rest, so we go to church, play games, and talk to family on the phone.

So far, our cry of Retrench! has been going pretty well. We're trying to make the most of our resources, which takes a lot of creativity. But if there's anything we enjoy, it's fashioning solutions to seemingly difficult tasks. Carry on!

Winter in the Northeast

When Jeremy and I moved to Syracuse on May 31, we encountered one of the warmest days of the year: hot, oppressively humid, and almost intolerably sunny. But of course, this is upstate New York, so despite the heat people almost immediately began to tell us that we'd never survive the winter. (Why anyone would assume that two people most recently of Montana wouldn't be able to survive the cold and snow is another question for another day.) At any rate, the summer and fall passed with many an ominous warning about "lake effect snow" and the other horrors of winter in the Northeast.

And of course I believed everyone--and why not? NOAA lists the average snowfall in Syracuse at over 100 inches, so lake effect obviously affects life up here. But, courtesy of El Nino, we have joined the rest of the east coast in enjoying unseasonably warm weather. In fact, when the mercury rose to 62 degrees this weekend, I couldn't help but remark to Jeremy that this winter is more reminiscent of winter in California than any other place I've lived. Sure, we have more than our fair share of gray, rainy days, but overall it's been a pleasant winter.

No doubt my enjoyment of this mild winter will be short-lived, as the snow can't stay away forever. In the meantime, I'll keep my parka in the closet and enjoy whatever I can of these waning mild days.

Clara at two months

Our little Clara is really growing up! Today marks the end of her second full month of life, although perhaps we are a bit too entrenched in our sleep-deprived haze to fully recognize the significance of that fact. But we are so pleased with her and her continued growth. At last check, she weighed 9 pounds, 9 ounces--a 13 ounce gain in just one week. We're hoping that her rapid weight gain tapers off eventually, or we'll have to resort to using a crane to get her in and out of the house!