Sept. 16 - Visitors, Football and One Month Birthday Celebration

Holly here - well my angel Daniel decided that he wanted to play with Mommy in the middle of the night after a diaper change and bottle. Athough Mommy was very tired, it is so precious to hold him on my chest while he is trying to fall asleep. I love this time where I get to rub his back and smell his sweet baby smell - it is pretty much heaven on earth. We did listen to a wonderful CD of lullabyes that Jen made for baby Daniel and he loved it (so did Mommy b/c some of the songs bring tears of joy to her eyes).

Michael got to take over in the AM after I fed and changed Daniel so I could have a much needed nap and peaceful shower. Michael is so good with Daniel who loves his Daddy.

While Michael was out running errands, Judy and Richard stopped by from church with a rose for baby Daniel. We have a tradition in our church to put a rose in the sanctuary for the birth of babies. Today in Trinity's bulletin it said the following, "The rose in the sanctuary today is in celebration of the arrival home of Daniel Lewis, son of Michael and Holly." Our church family has been and continues to be so important to us. We know that once we make it to church Daniel is going to be cuddled by everyone!

Then we had a wonderful visit with Christy, Greg and Nicholas (the first Gladney baby in our group). Christy LOVED holding Daniel and we got to catch up on our whole experience last week at Gladney. Oh, and did I mention that Christy brought us 3 frozen meals - including homemade chicken soup! Greg had to fight off Christy to get a chance to hold Daniel. In the meantime Nicholas was so much fun - he is a big boy and enjoyed running around outside with Michael and Greg. Plus Nicholas can say Baby Daniel and he loves babies. And Nicholas liked watching the Ravens game - yes he can say football, touchdown and Ravens (although the Ravens part was really just to make Michael happy, but Michael now has all kinds of ideas of what to teach Daniel starting at an early age). Yes, football on Sunday is the one exception to the no TV rule for the first year :) I am happy to report that the Ravens beat the Jets - I think it is because Michael was wearing the Raven's Dad tshirt that I bought him!

Tonight we made another attempt at a bath and this one went much better. Instead of using the Mother's Comfort Bather that came highly recommended from my research, we went all out at Babies R Us and bought a baby spa. (Mike - it really wasn't all out - it was on sale at Babies R Us. The best feature isn't necessarily the "spa", it's the shower-head attachment) Plus Marsha gave me a hint to put a warm wash cloth on Daniel's stomach and one on his head to keep him warm during the bath. This bath went much better and Daniel loved being cuddled up in a warm hooded towel after his bath. Then we put Daniel in his Raven's PJs!

Well I decided that we needed to have a family celebration for Daniel's one-month birthday. So Michael bought a little cake and we lit a candle and said a wish for our angel. Daniel managed to get in the pictures with the cake, but Mommy and Daddy were the lucky ones who got to eat it. Overall, I cannot imagine a more perfect Sunday!

Michael has now posted all the pictures. :-)