Finally....

Well I finally remembered to buy some batteries for the camera last week, so here are a few from the past week.

This is my new favorite picture: Regan playing on the "fragpo".
Grant hanging out in his favorite spot, the swing. It's right by the windows in our living room and he loves to look at the blinds.
Eric was blowing bubbles for Regan the other evening. She was cracking us (and herself) up!!
Does this kid look like his Daddy or what!?
A picture of us yesterday at church. We missed Grant's first official Sunday, but his second one is close enough!
Regan pulled out all of her books yesterday and was reading to herself in her room. How cute is she!?
Mr. Grant hanging out in the bathtub. He loves getting a bath... he still has never cried. Not once! And I'm proud to say that I still have yet to be tinkled on during bathtime!I went through a tub of clothes some friends gave us and got out Regan's summer clothes. These pajamas were in there. They came with socks and a hat, which we thought made her look like she was wearing scrubs!
We're doing well... Eric is super busy playing in the Symphony last week and the Opera this week, as well as starting to wrap things up on another school year. Regan has started back at Mother's Day Out and is doing great with that. She has a little friend named Emma there and she always talks about her after we leave for the day. Grant is growing like a weed... of course the kid eats every 2 hours on the dot, so he better be growing! :) I go to the doctor tomorrow for my checkup (can you believe it's already been 6 weeks since Grant entered our world!?) and will start back to cleaning on Thursday. That's a quick update... now it's back to the wonderful world of mothering! :)

Busy

Sorry it's been so long since I've updated... who would've thought that I wouldn't have as much time to mess around on the computer once I became a mother of two children?! :)

Since Grant was only 2 weeks old, we stayed home from church on Easter Sunday. (Don't worry, I'm pretty sure we'll still get into Heaven!) I'd already gotten Regan an Easter dress and so the day before, I got the kiddos all dolled up and we spent a long time trying to get a good picture taken of the two of them. Grant's outfit was HUGE on him!
Last week my sister Brandi and her kiddos came to meet baby Grant. We had a good time with them and were sad when they had to leave. Here's Regan and Kyle eating a snack.
Regan and Aubrey playing on the slide.
I can't believe Grant is already 3 weeks old!! He is such a good baby; he hardly ever cries... even when he's hungry he just makes sweet little noises, he doesn't cry.
Grant loves taking a bath!! He hasn't cried once!!
The other day Eric and Regan "cooked" a snack. They made graham crackers and homemade icing sandwiches. It's a special snack that Eric's dad used to make for him when he was little.
Here's Regan walking around in Daddy's shoes.
Eric's mom came for a short visit earlier this week. Her sister and niece were visiting Grandad so she came to see them. Regan loved the extra attention and yesterday afternoon asked me more than once, "Where did Grammy go?"
Another sweet picture of Grant with his eyes open.

Lots of Visitors!

This is Eric: I thought it might be fun to chronicle all of the visitors we've had who have come through to see Grant. So, here are some photos of our well-wishers, so far.

Kayla did an update below this one, so please take a look at it as well.

Here is my mother with Regan and Grant. My parents came out Sunday evening after church and had to leave on Tuesday.

My dad with a slumbering Grant.
Extolling the virtues of using a Mac.
Kayla's friends from Elkhart: the Weavers. Kayla used to baby-sit the girls when they were much younger.
Kayla's dad, Brad.

Kayla's mom, Bobbi.
Amanda and Katie Lynn stop by before a night of painting the town red.
Our neighbors, the Lutyens. Mrs. Lutyens was nice enough to bring over a belated Valentine's Day card for Regan.
Travis was a little worried that he might not handle Grant properly. It's been six days since your visit, Travis, and Grant is no longer showing signs of being handled improperly...
Another shot of my mother with Grant.

I wasn't able to get everyone's picture, so I apologize if you stopped by and we didn't mention you in the blog. This will give you a reason to make a second visit!

Adjusting....

We are slowly but surely adjusting to a new life in the Rath household! Grant is such a good baby. He doesn't ever really cry; he just eats, sleeps and poops! :) Regan is doing great with him -- she likes to look at him in his bassinet and say "hi Baby Gant!" (there's no 'r' when she says it; it's SO cute!).

This is before we left the hospital. Grant is such a pretty baby. He has the same skin color as Regan did when she was born; unfortunately that probably means he'll turn white like she did when he's a couple months old!
A decent family picture from before we left the hospital.

Dad had to go back to Elkhart last Friday. After he loaded up his suitcase in his car, we told Regan to give him kisses bye bye. She ran into her room and came out with her own "suitcase" which was a leap frog toy that had a handle like Dad's suitcase. :) She kept telling us bye bye because she wanted to go home with Papa!

Grant with his eyes open. I love when he stares into my face; I just know he's thinking, "Wow, you're the coolest mom ever! I should've come out to meet you a looong time ago!" :)

We had a one week checkup with the doctor last week. She said that Grant has a tiny hint of jaundice, so she told us to put him in the sunlight for 20 minutes, 3 times a day. Here he is sunbathing the other night. Look how sweet and tiny he is!!!

The hardest adjustment to make has been that Mom left on Wednesday. After being here for 2 weeks, I know she was ready to be back home with Dad, but it sure was hard letting her go. I have the most amazing mother in the world and we are so blessed that she was willing and able to stay with us for so long. Regan definitely loved all the extra attention that Nana gave her. After she had been gone for about 30 minutes, Regan went to the front door and stood there saying, "Nana.... Na-a-a-na." It about broke my heart because it was the first time she'd ever gotten sad like that because someone had left. :(

And here's baby Grant getting in some tummy time!

Going Home With Lots of Hair!

Yesterday we got to come home! We had to sit around for a while and wait for a specific operation to be made on our male son (if you get my drift), but about 2 p.m. we loaded up the car and showed Grant a tour of the house. Here's his little outfit replete with toy trucks and other manly features.

Waiting for the car to be brought around:


What a full head of hair!
No doctoring was made to this photo (or to his head for that matter). He has a lot of hair, and at least in this picture, it looks perfectly styled.

Regan meets Grant

I almost titled this blog entry "Regan versus Grant" but that wouldn't be all that truthful. Regan got to meet our little guy this morning and was pretty enamored. She was quiet through much of their meeting; I'm not sure that she knew what to think about all of this...


With a little help, she could hold Baby Grant and did not want to let go. Regan held him for a considerable amount of time.

I love the look on her face here. Between myself and Papa Brad, we must have snapped dozens of pictures! I think this is her, "Paparazzi, quit taking my picture!" look!

With some prompting, Regan would give Grant a kiss. Given the relatively low-tech camera I have, I had a really hard time getting a shot of Regan's lips touching Grant's forehead. But this is pretty close:

I always forget that my camera has a movie capture function on it. There's no audio when you record like this, but I still think it's fun to see video instead of quick snapshots. And now that Blogger will allow you to upload videos, I can show you what I shot:

and another one:

Then about the time Regan got used to Grant's presence, the Sharp Family showed up. Really, the timing was perfect. Regan got to hold Grant for a while, the the Sharps were able to come and hold Grant and visit without it taking any time away from Regan.

Here are some photos from James, Kristen, and Hudson's visit:

Quote of the day: "Hudson! Quit hitting Grant with Dog!"

And here's the burrito that Regan, Hudson and I shared. It's all about the tortilla...

Our new addition!

Tonight we added our son to our family! His name is Grant Thomas (Grant is in keeping with our Presidential Names-theme, and Thomas is a family name on my - Eric's - side).

He's 7 pounds, 10.5 ounces and 20 inches long. And he was born at 7:15 p.m.

We have Kayla's parents, Brad and Bobbi, here. And at this moment, Kayla's grandparents, Sammie and Leone are watching Regan at our house. Regan will be here in the morning to see who is going to challenge her supremacy!

Kayla did great! She is in really good spirits and Grant is busy eating. After 42 weeks of pregnancy, he has worked up QUITE an appetite.

Enough of the talk; on to the pictures!