1. I have a LOT of odds and ends posts that I’ve been saving, haven’t gotten around too, or have been otherwise held up on and am getting to them in fits and bursts. Is that a saying?
2. I recently uploaded pics from both Tony’s phone and mine. Like, a year and a half worth of pics. I’ll start with Tony’s. View his full collection here.

I was in early labor!

Remember this?!?!

Perfection.

At Off Our Rocker in January.

Jordan and Becky outside of his new apartment.

The view from his balcony.

On Easter Sunday….fell asleep during service.

Just last week.

…to be continued with my phone. Probably later tonight.

Catching flies at six days old.

Daddy bought this onesie for Christmas…Ali’s first present!

She LOVES her fingers. And yesterday I caught her sucking her thumb.*

This is where she looks just like daddy, it’s all in the one-eyed squint.

Conked out after feeding.

Sleeping angel.

Last night her umbilical cord fell off. The remaining belly looks so painful, but I guess that’s the way life goes. Pics to come, probably.

* I sucked my thumb until I was twelve years old. Which is very embarrassing to admit! I only stopped when I got a herbst (a lovely piece of orthodontia that involves top and bottom retainers hinged together with a key to screw the top one further apart every week and widen the roof of one’s mouth) and could no longer fit my thumb in. I’d prefer Ali suck something that can be taken away…like a pacifier.

We’ve been four nights home now and it really hasn’t been so bad. Note to Cynthia: No, she’s definitely not one of those that sleeps through the night straight off and I don’t haveto wake her up to feed. She does that just fine! Nursing puts her right to sleep though, which is good and bad. On one hand she’s out like a light, on the other she’s up and hungry again 90 minutes to two hours later. But I think that’s how it’s supposed to be, so I have no complaints. The hardest time for me so far has been evenings and early night. That’s when I am just absolutely beat (I haven’t yet managed a nap during the day, even though she seems to sleep almost non-stop through the afternoon), so Tony has been doinghisbest to get me a couple hours from nine to midnight or so and then I do the rest of the night. Which really just means a change and a feed (or maybe cleaning up a blow out) two of three times. I am so glad she’s a summer baby. By four-thirty the sun is up and it feels like we’ve made it. I can’t imagine it being dark until seven…and then getting dark again at four-thirty!

These are a couple pictures I snapped about an hour ago. She looks so much older already, with her cheeks beginning to fill out. Too bad I didn’t use the flash in all of them, please excuse the darkness and lack of clarity.

Now to start thinking about getting dressed. Or showered. Or lunch. Where to begin?

On a side note: we had our first doctor’s appointment yesterday. We’ve decided to use the family practitioner Tony began seeing this year. The appointment went well and was pretty routine. We hovered and attempted comforting like the nervous newbies we are. Ali’s doing great, she weighed in at 6lbs. 15oz. Only three ounces less than her birth weight, so not much ground to make up at this point. My milk has been coming in over the last few days, and has not been anywhere near as bad as anticipated. Mostly I just feel like I got a couple bean bags, or rocks, or something strapped to the front of me. Breastfeeding is another topic I hope to touch on more soon.

So without further adieu, here are some photos of Ali coming home from the hospital. The non-bobblehead editions.

Video

Okay, so in all the hubbub I misspelled my daughter’s middle name. The corrected is above — "shirlie".