Happy Halloween

Featuring Webber the heavyweight who checked in at 5 pounds FIFTEEN ounces at his first doctor's appointment on Monday, and at that rate is tipping the scales at well over 6 pounds as we speak.
And no, he didn't wear the pumpkin to that appointment.

- Nicky and Nate and Webber

Picture catch up...

(click to enlarge pictures)

Nate holding Toonces at 4 in the morning
before we left for the hospital 10-18-07.


Nate holding Webber a few days later
for a picture of the 4 generations of Sylvester men.


The many faces of Webber.


Aunt Punchy helping Webber model his HUGE infant-sized clothing. (No, his legs are not that long and made of noodles.) Thank goodness for premie clothes. And premie diapers. Seriously.




Webber's first outing, 1 week old. A walk in town Hallowell on a beautiful fall afternoon. I realized when we got back from that walk that I forgot to shower that day. And by then it was practically the next day, so, you know... why bother? My son still feeds from me, and his nose is right smack in armpit vicinity.


Dad and son...




Thoughts of the week:

These pictures do not do justice to Webber's cuteness. Would it be too far fetched to think I could spontaneously absorb some photography skills and/or a better camera?

Who needs sleep, anyway?

Thank you to friends and family for love and support = food, clothes, space, well wishes.

Life is good.

-- Nicky and Nate and Webber
Day 11
No I don't think I'll keep up the daily counting forever...

Finally a word from the Mommy

If Nate could have just told everyone way back in March that all I'd have to do for him to post a blog entry was to deliver his firstborn, it certainly would have spared us all a lot of wasted energy, now wouldn't it have? Although we did get to learn some pretty entertaining things about him in the meantime :)

Many pictures of the past few days are being held captive in Nate's laptop, which I am not on right now and don't have the technological savvy to retrieve, but I will just share an oldy but goody - a picture of one of the other best days of my life, when Nate and I got married, on Webber Pond 5 years ago. I guess the name Webber had occurred to both of us at separate times, and after months of mulling it over, we decided that it was the one.


And one from yesterday - what a happy family.


There's been so many blog-worthy moments in the past few days -
At some point I'll share the extended version of Webber's amazing birth story for those who have not yet been blessed with my concise-as-always recounting of it. But as you can imagine it will take me a bit to put together 14 hours of start-to-finish play-by-play which I'm sure you're all anxiously awaiting. So thanks for your patience.

In the meantime, I must also say that Nate should get the Best Supporting Partner Award - he's met needs I didn't even know I had. He's been the most amazing, attentive partner ever. I've wondered if he took a class in it on the side.

So, my brain is mush,
nothing else matters right now.
I am a mommy and I love it.

Nicky and Nate and Webber
5 days old

Webber Mathieu Sylvester....

....was born Thursday, October 18th at 4:24pm in Waterville, ME. He weighed in at 5lbs 13oz, 18" healthy and hungry. This is Nate by the way, my first post. Mom was/is amazing and is very healthy and has more energy than I can believe. I wouldn't be surprised if she chimed in here later. I am posting a few pictures while I have a moment, more about the birth and first few days later........




Webber 4 days before he arrived.....


The fam. Webber fresh out of the oven.


Webber and Mom


Webber and Dad


Webber Mathieu Sylvester


Stay tuned for more........

Nate and Nicky

Baby Dribble Drabble

Name ideas from our SIX-year-old friend Jackson:
"Angela" for a girl
"Irving" for a boy
(happy birthday, Jackson!)

My littlest sister Lilo has insisted twice that the name should be "Bob" if it's a boy.

This is the same littlest sister who used the word "boobs" in conversation a few times recently, much to our amusement. One of the times, in a story involving boobs, she clarified, "like she has", pointing at yours truly. WOW. And we all know that kids don't lie, right? Hey, I'll take it where I can get it.

The project of this weekend has been to make sense of all of the wonderful gifts we received last weekend. I did a lot of sorting the day after the shower, but nothing could be put away yet because we were still waiting on the changing table and armoire. So everything went into the crib, see below, to allow for floor and maneuvering space for Nate and his dad to lug those pieces upstairs and into the room. And I do mean lug.


I enjoyed a fabulous Friday night with Aunt Punchy, watching the season premier of the show we got hooked on last year, Men in Trees. We made an event of it by adding the crucial accompanying activity of beading. Which of course involved further organizing my inventory of beads, and disassembling projects that I've determined I will simply not return to. I tell myself that this act helped to clear some space in my mind for new beginnings, ensuring that the next time I have an hour to spare and the creative energy to bead, I won't have to sort through any pesky clutter in order to get started. I consider bead organization to be a couple steps above cleaning the coffee maker on the OTP list.

Sylvester birthdays;
Aunt Kara on October 9th,
Grammie Debbie on October 13th,
and an early 90th birthday celebration for Great Grandpa Ralph last night, as he'll be at his winter home in Florida when his actual birthday comes in December.

It was fun seeing the Sylvester side of the family, since we don't get together with them as often as we do other families. A fun bunch. We were reminded that we'll be having the first great grandchild in the family - no pressure, right? So of course there was plenty of baby related talk amongst the cousins (at the "kids" end of the table). And predictions about the odds of our child coming out "normal", given the gene pool we're starting with. And last night only represented one quarter of the genes that are being passed on to Tot. Should be interesting.

My cousin-in-law Mike asked if we could do him a favor and let him know the name and actual date of delivery so he could finish up his needlepoint that he's been working on for the baby's room. Well Mike, just for you, I've hidden those secrets in this blog entry, in encrypted computer code that only someone with your technological savvy could figure out. Just don't tell anyone else...

Okay, off to fold my first load of baby laundry...
*SIGH*
*dreamy look on face at the thought of handling all those soft and tiny onesies and booties and receiving blankets and-*

It WILL always be this cute of a task, right?
Right?!?

-Nicky and Nate
36 weeks 4 days

or, if you were little baby Nate, only a week and a half or so before you took your parents by surprise by deciding you were ready to be born a couple of weeks early.
!!!!!!!!!!!

The Mother of All Baby Showers

I can't take credit for the name of the event that I survived / was blessed with this weekend - I heard both my sister Leigh and friend Amy use the term. But I must say, it is quite fitting.

There is no way I could do this event justice by simply describing it, so I'm including several pictures to give you a sense of the excitement, sentiment, and organization that were central to this amazing gathering of women. (click on each picture for an enlargement)





There were planning committee meetings.
There were clipboards. For each guest. For "Baby Shower Bingo", "Guess the Tot", and the like.
There were Debbie's Famous Whoopie Pies. With pink and blue frosting.
There was a book assembled with computer-simulated predictions of what Tot would look like and people's guesses of names, sex, size, and arrival date and time. And some wise words of parenting advice.
There was a scarecrow/mannequin of Nate's sister Kara since she was otherwise engaged in SanFrancisco. She was wearing some killer boots.
There was a Baby Castle. With tiny plastic babies scaling the walls of it, and dozens of diapers packed inside.







I was amused by a story from our friend Sara about her shopping trip with her 5-year-old Brennan as he helped her shop for their gifts. He told her, "I know why they call it a baby shower. Because everyone gives gifts for the baby to take a shower."
"Well, not really" she explained. "I mean, sometimes there are gifts for the baby's bath, but it's more like people shower the mommy with gifts for the baby."
I guess he had quite the puzzled / horrified look on his face at that point.
"You mean," he asked "She stands there naked and you throw things at her?!"

I just love Kid Think. Can't wait to get our own source for these kinds of gems.

Despite the fact that it can, at times, FEEL as though you are naked due to the sheer number of eyes on you, I am happy to report that I remained fully clothed at all times at my baby shower. Even though it looks like I got a bit shortchanged on some denim at the bottom of my maternity jeans - see below. Classic.
Isn't it a rule that the person with eighty eyes on them for 3 hours gets told if there's some kind of fashion faux pas like that going on?? Or at least a designated person to make sure that an oversized gift bag gets strategically placed in front of her calves for the remainder of the shower?!? I also noticed when I got home that evening that I had a huge piece of spinach in my teeth for who knows how long. And a booger on my nose. Okay, okay, I guess it could be worse - it was really just the highwaters. But still. I wouldn't want to get away with looking too classy at my own shower.

On a more serious note, I must share the very touching quote that was at the top of the Baby Castle. If you don't cry after you're reading this, I regret to inform that, in my unprofessional opinion, it appears that you have been born without a heart.

Okay, maybe I'll concede to being a little hormonal these days. But this quote hit me as being so profound, and actually, a positive spin on the woe-is-me mood I was in yesterday as I spent a dangerous 2 hours in the car, alone with my hormones and music. The overriding theme that continued my crying jag, to and from work, was that "My life as I know it will soon be over."

This life-as-a-non-parent. With only myself to answer to. And be responsible for.

It's been a good life.
With freedom, flexibility, control, late nights out, late mornings in, restaurant meals, cross-country road trips, crafting marathons, and theme parties. Our biggest problem on a Friday night consisting of figuring out what to do, because there's nothing that we HAVE to do. Stopping at a few stores on my way home from work and calling to say I'll be a couple of hours late. And to let's just do our own thing for dinner. Obscene amounts of free time to write blog entries of this length.

And I know, I know - we decided we were ready for a change. The ultimate next step. It's been a fine status quo, but we didn't want to continue with it for the rest of our lives.

I know that the freedom I have now will be replaced with overwhelming responsibility, but also unimaginable love for someone who is still a stranger to me. Intellectually I know this, but I haven't lived it yet. So, it's still the unknown to me. And the unknown can be scary. Even though it was our conscious decision to pursue this unknown.

So, yeah yeah yeah, I'm still Nicky... but Nicky will soon be fundamentally changing.
Stay tuned, everyone.

Nicky and Nate
36 weeks
Or, T-minus 28 days. -ish.

Rabbit Rabbit Rabbit

Growing up, our family practiced the superstition of saying "Rabbit Rabbit Rabbit" on the first day of a new month before we said anything else that morning. It was supposed to ensure that we'd have good luck that month. Forgot to do it that month? You were screwed.

Midnight of New Year's Eve 2000 was quite the test - we had to say Rabbit 15 times - 3 each for the month, the year, the decade, the century AND the millennium. Okay, maybe we didn't HAVE to, but we felt it would be a good insurance policy to do so, to help cover any forgotten months for the rest of our lives.

Well, even though I said my 15 Rabbits at 12:00:00 am on 01/01/00, clearly guaranteeing me a charmed remainder of life, I said three more this morning anyway.

And then I realized: when people ask when I'm due, my response is now "Next month."

What happened to "November" sounding so far away?

Nicky and Nate
34 weeks 5 days