January updates

Here’s what’s up with our boys this month:

Calvin got some jigsaw puzzles for Christmas and he’s totally into them. When he started out he was asking me for help with every piece, but as soon as I left him alone with the puzzle he had the whole thing put together in about 2 minutes. I guess he was just trying to make me feel needed

He also got this cool drawing table, which he digs and which is helping us to reclaim our dining table:

He LOVES to draw, and is starting to do some stuff that’s recognizable. He’s been doing mostly balloons and happy faces for the past few weeks, but now he’s branching out. Today he drew several birthday cakes that were really good!

He’s gotten really into the baby lately, and wants to hold him and try to get him to smile all the time. It’s very sweet. He’s still a little jealous of the attention that Henrik gets, though, and will sometimes try to act more like Henrik in order to get attention for himself.

He’s picked back up with potty training and is doing pretty well, although he seems to think he has to take off all his clothes every time he goes to the bathroom. Actually, I think it’s just an excuse – the dude loves to be naked.

Henrik is doing great. He’s sometimes a little fussy in the evenings, but overall still an easy baby and a good sleeper. He’s smiling a lot now, and is much more alert during the day.

I took him to the doctor on the 13th and he was a little over 13 pounds, and 22.5 inches long, so he’s growing well.

We are all enjoying the family time we have right now before I have to go back to work. It’s been a real blessing to be able to stay home for a good amount of time. We’re very grateful.

Butch Hansen, 1943-2012

It’s been a rough month. At the end of December we found out that Eric’s dad had stage IV cancer, and he passed away on January 10th. Eric flew out to Florida with his brother and Uncle and was able to be there for the memorial service.

Butch was one of a kind, and it’s hard to believe he’s gone. I’ve been trying to think of a story or something to illustrate who Butch was, and I keep coming back to his letters. Butch was a great letter-writer. He wrote regularly to the local paper. In fact, he kept writing letters to the editor of the Sun Post (in San Clemente) well after he moved to Florida! He always typed his letters on an electric typewriter – just couldn’t get his head around the idea of using a computer instead.

After Calvin was born he started addressing letters specifically to Calvin, and I’m so glad we saved them because they are a treasure. I’ll let Calvin read them all some day when he’s old enough to know better than to use some of the words Grandpa Butch taught him! But actually, the letters paint a pretty great picture of Butch. Yes, they were often full of the bluster and BS that he was known for, but they also capture his sweetness and love for his family.

Here’s the one he wrote to Calvin the day we went to the hospital to have Henrik (click on it to view larger):

For those who are interested, a couple of links:

• Butch’s obituary in the Daytona Beach News Journal
• Video that was played at the memorial (created by J.G. Pasterjak, Butch’s son-in-law)

And here’s the Butch I’ll always remember, laughing and playing with Calvin:

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We’ll miss you, Butchie!

A teaser…

We got some cute pics this week. Here’s one to tide you over – more tomorrow, I promise!

We’ve been busy, busy, busy with family visits and remodeling, and have been pretty bad about taking pictures and videos in the past couple of weeks. My sister and her family were here right after Christmas – she’s going to send me some photos because I only took 2! I will post when I get them, but here’s a picture of Henrik with his cousin Thelonious: Thelonious was really good with the baby, although he had to fight my sister for holding rights! Henrik continues to get nice and chunky. I haven’t weighed him recently, but he’s awfully chubby and cute: He’s started smiling, too, but I haven’t caught it on camera yet. So sweet! He smiled at Calvin a couple of times the other day and now Calvin gets right in his face whenever he can and yells, “Do a smile, baby!” like a little drill sergeant. I haven’t been able to convince him that this is counter-productive. Speaking of Calvin, this is why we’ve had to hide all the markers in the house: He not only colored all over himself, but on several walls and pieces of furniture, our sheets, the floor, a bunch of toys…thank God for washable markers! Calvin turned three last week! I can’t believe how grown up he is. We were pretty much partied out after the holidays, and Calvin makes it easy to keep it low-key. He still knows how to have a good time, though: We’ve made a ton of progress on our remodel. The framing is pretty much done, and the roofer is here this week putting a new roof on. It’s been noisy and messy, but we’re surviving just fine.  It’s fun to see it all coming together, and that extra 400 square feet is going to be SOOOOOO nice!

That’s it for now – I haven’t done any video editing recently, but I’ll try to put some up soon.

The latest happenings

The holidays are fast approaching. We took the boys to get some photos taken for a Christmas card/baby announcement. Henrik was not exactly thrilled with the experience:

But we did get a few cute shots. This is my favorite:

Since Calvin has destructive tendencies these days, we didn’t do a big tree and get out our nice ornaments. We’re using our little fake tree this year, and had Calvin make all the decorations with a little help from me and Nana. He did a great job!

Henrik went to the doctor on Tuesday. He weighed in at 11 lbs 1 oz, and is now 22 inches long, so he’s grown quite a bit. He made the jump from 50th percentile weight at birth to 75th percentile now, so his doctor is very happy. He’s still a pretty mellow, easy baby, for which we are grateful. He’s pretty noisy though – he makes lots of grunting noises, like a little pig. It cracks us up!

Calvin is a lot of fun these days, even as he gets more challenging. He’s got a bunch of his favorite books memorized, and recites them throughout the day. His current favorite and the one we hear most often is The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle. Here’s a little bit of it (you might need to turn up the volume for this one):

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“Waterlemon” and “comacheache” are two of my current favorite words that Calvin says. So dang cute!

Eric and his Uncle Scott got the subfloor done for the addition on the house. We have an inspection tomorrow and then the framers can get started. It’s good to see some progress!

The larger room on the right will be the new master bedroom. Our current bedroom will be Henrik’s room. On the left is a smaller room that we will use as an office/guest room. The two rooms will be connected by a hallway, and outside the hallway between the two rooms will be a deck. There’s a lot that still has to be done, but we’ve seen some significant progress. Having Eric’s mom here for several weeks to help out with the kids allowed Eric to spend more time working on the house and he accomplished a lot, in spite of some weather delays. And Uncle Scott has been a huge help the past couple of weekends – we owe him big!

We did all of our Christmas shopping online, so that’s done, and the Christmas cards are going out tomorrow. It always feels like an accomplishment to get a card out at this time of year, but this year it feels monumental! Everything takes longer these days, but the fact that we’re getting our cards in the mail before Christmas makes me feel like we’re managing pretty well.

My sister and her family are coming for a visit the week after Christmas, so we have a lot to look forward to before the end of the year. Calvin has a little bit more of a clue about Christmas this year, although the greed hasn’t set in yet, so it should be a fun holiday. I’ll try to blog between now and then, but in case I don’t, we wish you all a very wonderful Christmas and a Happy New Year.

4 weeks!

Poor Henrik. Only a month old and second child syndrome is already in full force – we just haven’t had the time and energy to take as many pictures and update the blog as much as we did with Calvin.

We’re all doing well, though. Eric’s mom has been here visiting and has been a big help. Henrik is a really easy baby so far – very mellow and rarely fussy (knock on wood). Overall we’re settling in pretty well.

We go to the doctor again next week, I think, so we’ll have an official weight update then, but Henrik just switched out of the newborn diapers into the size 1 diapers – he’s chunking up nicely.

Here are a few shots of what we’ve been up to lately:

Nana and Henrik

Brothers

Making garland for the Christmas tree

Sweet little face!

Our room addition continues. The foundations have been poured and now Eric’s getting pony walls built to support the subfloor. If all goes well the framing contractor may be starting next week.

Holiday Cards

It’s that time of year again! Time to pick out our family Christmas card. We’ve been doing photo cards for years, and this year is no exception. In fact, this year’s holiday card is going to do double duty as a baby announcement, since there’s no way I’m going to be able to get my act together enough to send out two separate cards!

This year I’m ordering from Tiny Prints. We got our baby announcements from Tiny Prints after we had Calvin, and I loved their selection of designs. The quality of the announcements was great, too. They’re printed on high quality paper and they really looked great:

Now we just have to choose a design for the holiday cards.

Tiny Prints has some very cute flat photo cards on semi-glossy stock:

But there are also several options that allow you to use more photos and include more text. I like several of the tri-fold card designs, including this one:

But if we can come up with one really great photo, I may just go with one of the ornament designs and make something that’s more of a keepsake for our family and friends:

Such a cute idea!

Full disclosure: this post is earning me 50 free cards from Tiny Prints. Sponsored posts are very rare on this site, and whether a post is sponsored or not I will only promote products that I’ve used and can heartily recommend. I was thrilled with my previous Tiny Prints order and have no hesitation in promoting their products and service to you.

 

First week

Henrik is a week old, and doing great! We went to the pediatrician today, and she’s thrilled with his weight gain (he’s up to 8 lbs 2 oz). She noticed that he was a little tongue-tied (short lingual frenulum, if you want the technical term), and so she snipped that little tendon under his tongue. Freaked me out a bit, but he wasn’t bothered by it. There’s no nerve there, so he wasn’t in any pain and there was only a tiny drop of blood. It makes feeding times a little easier, which is great.

We’re all still adjusting to the changes in our family. Calvin’s first meeting with Henrik in the hospital went very well:

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But he’s definitely struggling with having a baby at home. He’s not acting out towards the baby at this point, for which we are very thankful, but he is testing boundaries and seeking attention in any way he can get it. When I’m holding the baby he’s all over me. And of course he’s regressed with his potty training, which had been going pretty well. Normal stuff, but it takes a lot of energy to deal with and Eric and I are both pretty tired.

Henrik is a pretty easy baby so far, and that definitely helps. He’s sleeping two to three hours at a stretch most of the day, and he’ll usually have a couple of three hour stretches at night. But of course some things are slipping through the cracks right now. We’ve barely even taken any pictures since leaving the hospital!

We did manage to capture a visit from Uncle Ivan and Aunt Treana:

My mom has been helping out a lot, entertaining Calvin so we can get some things done. He’s been having a lot of fun at her house and gets an extra dose of attention, which is great. He stayed with her while we were at the hospital and had an absolute blast. Eric’s mom is flying in at the end of the week, so we’re looking forward to that as well. We’ll try to get more pics up soon!

 

 

 

Baby has a name – finally!

After much deliberation, we decided on Henrik Ivan Hansen. I guess that means we’re keeping him!

He who must not be named

Calvin’s little brother arrived last night at 11:24 pm. He’s doing great so far! He weighed in at 7 lbs 13 oz and is 20 inches long. We’re still deciding on a name, but we promise he won’t come home without one! We think he looks a lot like Calvin did when he was born – take a look at the blog posts from January of 2009 and see if you agree.