June 25, 2012

A week and a half

Elsie is now a week and a half old. I bet you think I am going to post adorable pictures from all her 11 days of life. But you are so wrong. I am going to put up the lost pictures of her with her older siblings on her very first full day of life. Or out of womb life anyway. Turns out the camera malfunction was more of a human error, as in, all the pictures weren't transferred to the computer. So here they are. Pretty much, I have been in a haze of adjusting and snuggling my cute babies, so I haven't been doing the 100 pictures a day of my new baby that good mothers do. But believe me, she is cute. And she looks like she is hunkering down to continue to be cute for the foreseeable future.

And then there are more pictures of recent happenings.

On a side note, today is the first day of Orianna's summer vacation. She is currently sewing teensy-tiny little pillows for her Barbies/pollly's/or any other doll. Pillows are cool. And easy. (Well the "rustic" ones she makes anyway.) Except when she getting impatient which she just announced she is. "Everything is tangled!" She also is displaying her newly honed ability to tattle and arbitrate Lily and Gilbert's fights. She is a great big sister, but occasionally her big sister-ness gets on Lily and Gilberts nerves. So we will have some adjusting to do on that front as well.

After a few days of hot, hot, hot, I am sitting here in a sweatshirt at 61 degrees. I am loving it. I have been thinking about Alaska a lot lately, as I do every year at this time. When the thermometer hovers at 90, I miss those Alaskan summers--the ones where you knew you could layer on any given summer day and your wardrobe really WAS year round. No fooling around with packing away long sleeves and sweaters until the fall. I have never really got over my love affair with hoodies that 4 years of Alaskan living instilled in me and as much as I love summer, I miss being able to cozy up in a sweatshirt of an evening. So hooray for a cool, Alaskan like break in the weather!

And now, back to those pictures I was yakking about a few paragraphs back.


Flowers Mom brought to the hospital right after we got there so I could have something beautiful to look at while enduring labor. Isn't she nice? 


They WERE beautiful. Hydrangeas, pink, pink roses, stock, and dark purple statice. 


The kids meeting our Elsie girl. 




There was a lot of hugging and smiling going on



Lily was very huggy. 


Gilbert was very grin-y


And Orianna was very pleased and proud as all get out



Discussing baby fingers


Look at that grin! 




A bit unsure


Love this one! 


Gilbert loved the foot operated scrub sink. He thought it was terribly clever to operate it by sitting on it.



Amy and Connie stopped by on Saturday with a yummy casserole! Much to the delight of the kids--they all think Amy is the bees knees. 



Lily was fortunately there to inform Connie that Elsie's neck had to be supported. Just in case Connie had forgotten from raising six kids and holding lots more. 


Very serious stuff, baby holding


Auntie Tori


The pals, Rilla and Lily


And Orianna and Elliott




Our first family of 6 family picture 



A very nice picture of Mom and Dad


Elsie June and daisies. 




Owen trying to be Napoleon or something


Ashley endures a lot


Aren't they cute? 




Clover and her kiddos. Lincoln wasn't really interested in looking at the camera in any of the pictures. 


Grin-y boy


Orianna's kindergarten graduation. Which Elsie and I skipped. I will feel bad about this when Orianna is 10. At the moment it was just too much with a brand new baby. Justin took the day off for it, so Lily and Gilbert got to go at least! And Aunt Ashley went too, so Orianna had people who loved her there. 




With her teacher, Mrs. Aubrey


Orianna on her last day of school. She really wanted to wear the fascinator Ashley made her, so she did, even though it wasn't a total match with the outfit.


Gilbert had to get in the picture


And then Lily too. But then we realized the bus was HERE and they had to hurry to grab bookbags or wave to the bus. 

June 16, 2012

Elsie June, our baby girl

Elsie June Cotten came into the world on the sunshiney evening of June 14, 2012 at 7:27 PM. 

We are all twice as pleased as punch with her little self. She is sweet and gentle and incredibly cute.
 

Isn't she perfect?

. She was 8 lbs 6 oz and 21.5 inches, our smallest baby!


VERY glad to have a baby to cuddle rather than looking forward to a baby to cuddle through a haze of dreaded labor. I am a wimp. 



The kids are completely entranced by her littleness and baby-ness

We suffered an unfortunate camera malfunction, so all the pictures we had of the kids holding their brand new sister are somewhere in the nethersphere of nowhere. I might cry. 


Lily wanted to take pictures



She was born on flag day, so I made Justin go buy the patriotic little sleeper I had seen a few days earlier


Checking out the wonders of a hospital bed


Cheyenne being the big cousin


Rilla being very careful



Ashley helped Orianna and Lily decorate our house for Elsie's homecoming. So sweet! 




This makes me sentimentally sad that we didn't work Gosha into her name somehow. But.... 



I love Gosha baby girl