Eviction Notice

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any day now

Last Friday, Janelle’s OB told her that he would bet money in Vegas that she would have the baby by Monday (that’s right…yesterday). Naturally we were both really excited:

• Obviously to see our little girl for the first time (hopefully she looks like Janelle)
• Janelle is at the “just get out of my belly” point of pregnancy and wants to sleep on her stomach again
• and I get 2 weeks off of work once the baby arrives

Alas, this apparent false hope has had an anticlimactic effect. Now every day that she lingers inside her spacious womb is like torture to us (the parents). It’s like having the proverbial carrot dangling in front of our face….for days.

Naive Art

Here are some canvases I painted for the nursery. We decided to go with an Eric Carle theme (famous children's books author). These are based on the book covers of "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" and "The Grouchy Ladybug" (we gave ours a smile though).

what's in a name

Janelle and I have finally decided on a first name for the Pate princess.

Alaina (A-lane-a)

It meets all the qualifications:
>It can be shortened: Alaina is 3 syllables and as most people know I am lazy when it comes to names….and wasting time saying 3 whole syllables is exhausting and inefficient. So we (atleast I) will probably just call her “Lainy” more than “Alaina”
>It is flexible: at points in a child’s life (terrible twos, and pretty much the whole span of the teenage years) a parent has to say their child’s name more than they would like. So we try to pick one that gives us options to alleviate the repetitiveness. This one gives us: Alaina, Lainy, and Ally.

The middle name is still up for grabs though. Caden’s awesome middle name (which I heavily lobbied for) Crusoe sets a high bar. For us, it’s important for the middle name to have substance. Crusoe came from one of my favorite books Robinson Crusoe.

Any suggestions for Alaina _____ Pate are welcome.

Things Not to Say to Your Wife in the Last Weeks of Pregnancy

• Honey, come in here and see this horse giving birth on TV. Oh, man that looks like that’s gotta hurt.
• I challenge you in a touch your toes contest.
• Honey, I was just straightening up the bedroom…can you tell me if this is a fitted sheet or a pair of your underwear?
• No, I couldn’t eat another bite honey. I ate so much I feel…like you.
• Why don’t you go take a nice, relaxing, hot bath? But don’t put much water in the tub because it’ll overflow when you get in.

excerpted from familyman ministries

7 months in the hopper

5 months in the hopper

Today we found out the gender of the baby and its a....

GIRL!

Janelle and I are really thrilled. A girl is what we were both hoping for. Now me thinks I need to start on her chastity belt, saving up for a wedding and honing my intimidation techniques for her future boyfriends. With Caden and I on the watch, I pity the fool who gets the hots for princess Pate.

Bellybean

We had our first ultrasound today to get a peek at “butterbean”. Can’t be certain, but I think I see a hint of the infamous Poff chin.

Caden is getting company

Janelle told me that when I got home we needed to discuss something as a family. Her clues were that it wasn’t bad (yeah right) and that it could cost a lot of money. I of course was stressing out dreaming up the worst case scenarios like: we were getting kicked out of our house, we were being audited, or that she had been let go by the church.
Here is what I was greeted by when I walked in the door:

And here was my reaction

This is very early in the pregnancy so we don’t have a lot of info yet, but I guess you can figure out where you can keep up to date.