Photos by Aunt Amy

As we spent the day with Aunt Amy today, she took some great photos of Harper. Enjoy these as well!

Harper's Growing

Harper will be 4 weeks old on Sunday...she's growing fast! Other moms always say it goes fast, and now I know what they mean! Everyday we gain a little more confidence in our parenting skills! Today Harper and I spent the day at Aunt Amy's as she was home from work to receive new furniture. We had a lot of fun spending the day out of our house and hanging out with Amy.

Yesterday we had a professional photographer at our house taking photos of Harper. My good friends - Alissa and Julie - got us a gift certificate for the photo session. I got to see a few before the photographer left and I'm anxious to see them all. She'll post them on a website next week - so I'll share that with you when they are available.

Below are some new photos that I took this week of Harper - with her eyes wide open! We love to see those baby blue eyes! Enjoy.

2 Weeks

Harper had her 2 week doctor appointment Monday. She weighed in at 7 lbs, 9 oz and 19 3/4 inches. So she's growing great! Highlight of the appointment....when we put her on the scale, they made us take her clothes off and her diaper off. She decided to pee all over the scale! Thankfully they had put a cloth down. But it was quite funny!

Other highlights of our time with her.

• We love how in the middle of the night, after we feed her and turn the lights down to rock her back to sleep - she usually is wide awake and looking all around the room - so very peacefully.
• We love all the funny faces she makes.
• She's discovered her hands, just this week - so it's cute to watch her suck on her fingers and hands.
• She has smiled numerous times...but more when she's asleep. But today, she smiled at me when she was wide awake. That was super cute!

Enjoy more photos below...

Harper in her outfit from G'ma Karen.

Her first bath in her new tub - thanks Lori!

Meeting our friend Lori for the first time! Lori came home from Milwaukee to meet Harper.

I thought this was cute. Harper holding Alissa's fingers.

Resemblance?

So who does Harper look like? Vote on the right...

This is Noah at 3 weeks of age. Kind of hard to see the face. He was a little squirt when he was born - weighing 5 lbs, 15 oz. but a long 20 inches!

This is me in my hospital photo. I, like Harper, was born at Iowa Methodist in Des Moines. I weighed 8 lbs. even and was 20 1/4 inches long.

Harper's Latest Photos

Harper's Room

I couldn't share these before because it would have ruined the surprise..but below are photos of Harper's room. I got the idea from the bedding...which is called "Farm Girl". How appropriate, eh?

Happy Birthday Noah

Today is Noah's birthday - the big 31! Not an exciting day...he pushed snow all night, got home around 6:45 and grabbed a couple hours of sleep. We were planning to go out for dinner tonight, leaving Harper with G'ma, but it's just too darn cold. We're hoping to do this on Friday night instead. Our first outing away from Harper - hopefully I won't cry too much!

Notice Noah "multi-tasking" above...eating with Harper on his lap. He does this a lot...her on his lap while he's on his laptop and cell phone. Doesn't seem to bother her!

Winter Farm Fun

So Noah runs a snow removal business in the winter - has been doing this for several years. Helps keep him busy in the winter and earn a little extra $$$. Most of the time, Noah has to do this snow removal overnight before businesses open. That's left me home with Harper over night 3 times by myself. Talk about not sleeping well - for both of us!

On Monday, things just did not go well. Our friend Matt helps push snow with Noah. Matt headed to Ankeny with one of Noah's trucks, and Noah headed to Altoona with the other truck, trailer and skidloader. When Matt got to the first business in Ankeny, the truck died. Uh oh. So Noah had to leave Altoona, and go get Matt in Ankeny. Together, they finished their jobs - Noah in the skidloader and Matt in the one truck that was running. They get done...and head home. As soon as they pull in our drive way, the second truck decides to die...Noah couldn't get it out of drive. Talk about bad luck.

To shorten the story...Caleb (Mr. Fix It) was pretty certain he knew what was wrong with the truck that's dead in our driveway. He thought some part was frozen over with snow and ice. So he and Noah use a heater to thaw it out. They used bales of straw to insulate around the truck so the heat would not escape. Below is a photo of their efforts. And it worked! Hooray for Caleb! And the best part? It cost $0 to fix it. The other truck, though, they aren't quite sure what's wrong with that one yet. To be continued...

More Photos

Life at home is good. Harper is still fussy at night, but Noah and I trade off feeding and comforting her...so that helps. We keep telling ourselves she's only 6 days old, she doesn't quite have everything all figured out! And neither do we! Ha! As rough as it can be in the middle of the night, we remind ourselves that we'll never get this time back with her, so we might as well enjoy it - because before we know it, she'll be celebrating her first b-day!

Enjoy the photos below.

After her first sponge bath.

We love to see those eyes!

Harper enjoying some awake time on Daddy's lap.

Such cute little hands.

Snoozing on Mommy.

In her bouncy seat. She seems to enjoy this - we usually don't even need to turn on the vibration.

So peaceful...

Resting.

At Home

We went home from the hospital yesterday, and experienced our first night with a baby! It was a little rough. Harper was fussy for a majority of the overnight. Not much sleep for us or her! Hopefully tonight will be a better night as we get the hang of it all!

We had lots of visitors while at the hospital - thanks to everyone who stopped up. Some photos below... Noah's parents - Grandma Karen and Grandpa Bob.

Noah with his niece Bryn. She enjoyed holding Harper.

Noah's sister Sarah, and her youngest Shea. Seems like just yesterday that Shea was a baby like Harper, but she's growing up so fast!

Two "special" co-workers....Julie and Alissa. They really thought I should name the baby Julissa as a tribute to them. Oddly enough, that name is in the baby name book! It means popular.

Harper stretching out.

Harper in an outfit I thought would fit. Of course, we have nothing right now that fits her since she's about 2 pounds smaller than we anticipated!

So my own dear sister and her family missed out on Harper's birth. They were in Florida on vacation all last week. Amy texted me on Friday saying how it was going to be 80 degrees and sunny there. I told her to stop rubbing it in or I'd have the baby while they were down there. Sure enough, that happened. Mollie was quite distraught. But thankfully, we had the baby Sunday and they were coming home Monday. So the photos below are of them meeting Harper for the first time.

Max really enjoyed holding her. He couldn't get enough of her - which totally surprised us all! He's a very sweet, soft-spoken boy...he'll do great with her!

Amy was third in line to hold Harper - after Max, and after Mollie. She can't wait to start baby sitting!

And finally Mollie - she also loved holding her. In this photo, she loved that Harper was holding her finger. Too cute!

It's A Girl!

Harper Annie arrived 2 weeks early at 12:49 p.m. on January 4. She weighed 6 pounds and 14 ounces, and 19 1/4 inches in length. She made her mother very happy with a relatively easy labor! I feel very fortunate and lucky!

The birth story: At 11:30 p.m. on Saturday, January 3, my water broke. We stayed home until about 5:45 a.m. when the contractions were 5 minutes apart. We arrived at the hospital and got situated. At 7:15 a.m., we were 2 centimeters dialated. By 9 a.m., contractions were coming hard and fast. Got the epidural, and from there things progressed very quickly. By 11:30, we were ready to go. It took about an hour of pushing and our little girl arrived!

Arriving at the hospital, we still hadn't made a decision on a name. Noah really wanted Harper, so that's how we made the choice. Annie, is what my Grandma Sandquist would call me (she always said my mom should have named me Annie). Enjoy the photos below of our baby girl!

This would we my official 38 week photo.

Noah giving Harper her first feeding.

Harper snoozing on Mommy.

A close-up following her first bath!

The happy family!

Grandma Callie holding Harper!