New Baby!

Meet KalEl

Yes, Superman's Kryptonian name is the baby's IT-name.  Dean kept lobbying for Kal as a name or middle name for a boy and I vetoed it, not wanting to name my baby after Superman.  So Dean decided to call the baby KalEl while we don't know what it is, and it stuck.  We also call it Number 2, but you have to get the voice right--you have to say it like Dr. Evil in Austin Powers.

Anyway, here are the ultrasound pictures.  We might post more later, but these are the good ones they printed out for us.  If we do more, we'll pull the frames from the video Dean made.  These are 3D images which are much more distinct than those we got for Robin.

And for good measure, here is a photo of the big brother after sticking his face into his macaroni and cheese.

Updates

We got to see my extended family, who came to visit, a few more times after Christmas was over.  This was taken at a Macaroni Grill, which we drove all over to find.  We were going to go to Cinzetti's, but the wait was over an hour so we drove all the way down the road looking for another italian place.

Robin and I did a lot of Christmas crafts last month.  You can see the pictures of them where I blogged about them on Science Fiction Mommy.

We also decorated the driveway with sidewalk chalk for Christmas, including tracings of Robin that became elves.

We went to Zoo Lights a few days after Christmas.  Going by ourselves turned into meeting Dan and Theresa there, which turned into Dean's entire family except Kathy.  It was a nice evening for it--it was still relatively warm before the cold snap.

These are the foxes that tried to move into our yard before the snow really started to fall.  We chased them off (and have only seen them a few times since.)  Robin really likes them, and keeps looking out the window and calling "fox!!!"  I wouldn't really mind, except I'm worried about them really setting up house here--I was concerned that one might be female and pregnant--and I don't want a protective mama nipping at us (especially Robin.)

We finally got some snow to play in!

Robin has really been enjoying his trains, and has discovered that his creative abilities to build tracks are much better when not hampered by keeping the tracks on the table.  He'll make tracks that go all over the place, and he seems to enjoy making them more than running the trains on them.  They don't last long before he salvages pieces to start building another.

Dean and I have joined in a bit, helping him connect separate sections into big loops, and we enjoy trying to make everything connect--though it's a losing battle, since Robin just wants to take them apart and do his own thing again.

Snow Vulcan, or Snow Yoda, depending on how you look at him.  The neighbor rang the bell the other day, and it was quite warm out and thawing like mad.  The snow had been too dry and cold to pack well when it fell, but the thaw made it perfect.  Robin wanted to run around outside in bare feet, but after a few minutes of chatting I insisted we go inside for his shoes and snowpants.

 

We'll have the ultrasound for the new baby next week!  It's been moving like mad, and I felt it much earlier this time (probably because I knew what I was feeling.)  Dean has even felt it a time or two.  I'm looking forward to when it'll be big enough for Robin to feel.  He knows that Mama has a baby in her tummy, but I know he can't really know what that means yet.

Christmas!!!

We all had a good time this Christmas, and for the first time ever, we opened our gifts to each other first thing on Christmas morning!  (Usually we haven't done that until all family stuff is over.)

Santa brought Robin a Thomas the Train tent, which he played with while we prepared the traditional sticky buns for breakfast.  Robin l-o-v-e-d the sticky buns and wanted to eat his weight in them.

Here we are opening our family gifts

After breakfast and gifts, we went to my parents' house for Christmas dinner.  I didn't take many pictures there, I'll have to steal them from somebody else.  I did get a couple group shots, though, before people dispersed.

We also got "4 Generation" photos for each side of the family.  It's probably been a year or more since we did that.

Then we did a gift exchange with my family.

We took the train tent with us so Robin could play with it some more (and so my engineer Dad and uncle could help us figure out how to fold it.)  Ama and Poppa even joined Robin inside!

I was sick on Christmas, and was pretty worn down by day's end.  I had to have Dean drive home, and both Robin and I snoozed along the way.  Robin insisted on wearing his sunglasses even though it was after dark.  Here he is, asleep in the back seat.

Then, the day after Christmas, the festivities continued!  Dean's family came over, and we exchanged gifts with them.

Our haul

Lastly, we went to Dean's parents' house for lunch.  What a full holiday!