On the bookshelf...

We are big readers over here, each with our own genre preferences and reading styles.

Baby is only 4 months old so he of course enjoys board books and picture books. He loves to look at  the illustrations, touches each one, and likes to try to turn the pages. When we read a book he enjoys he gets super excited, kicking his legs and making loud squeals. He spends a lot of his time staring at our bookcase at home, admiring all the colorful spines and their vertical arrangement.

Husband's favorite books are historical fiction, dystopian futures, military-based novels, action, mystery, things of that nature. He dives deep into a book and won't put it down until it's finished. He typically has one book checked out of the library, and perhaps one more audio book checked out that he listens to during his commute to work. When he completes one book, he returns it and checks out another.

I, on the other hand, am more of a "skimmer". Husband teases me because I often have up to 10-15 books checked out from the library at once. I enjoy fiction but it has to grab me right away or I get restless and move on to another. Most of the books I check out from the library, though, are nonfiction. These are the books that I skim. Topics range and often seem scattered and unrelated. I've been known to have a stack of books on my nightstand; one about personal finance, a vegan cookbook, a biography of a serial killer, and a history of the public school system in the United States. If someone were to look at my library record, they might think I'm crazy. I'm fascinated by a wide range of subjects and I want to learn about all of them. I flip through the pages, get my "fix", and move on to the next.

To share our favorites with you, as well as to keep track of books we've read for our own personal records, I've decided to start a little recurring topic I'll call "On the bookshelf...". Here you'll get a list of the books we are currently reading in case you are looking for recommendations.

Enjoy, and please send along your own favorites as well-- we're always looking for suggestions!

BABY

Mouse Paint by Ellen Stoll Walsh

Animals by Bright Baby Series

Gossie by Olivier Dunrea

Belly Button Book by Sandra Boynton

     

MOM

The Joyful Child: Montessori, Global Wisdom for Birth to Three by Susan Mayclin Stephenson

The Happy Sleeper by Heather Turgeon and Julie Wright

Hands Free Life by Rachel Macy Stafford

Falling Through Clouds by Damian Fowler

         

DAD

No Easy Day by Mark Owen

The Fourth Trimester

We all know about the three trimesters of pregnancy. The first is all about the nausea, the fatigue, the morning sickness, the "I swear I'm pregnant, not just getting fat" phase. Then comes the second with its cute baby bump and maternity clothes, the flutters in your tummy and feeling baby move around in there. Arguably the most fun part of pregnancy. Then finally there's the third trimester. The uncomfortable, can't sleep, can't wait to meet the little one part. The "ok, this-was-fun-and-all-but-get-this-thing-out-of-me" trimester.

You power through the three trimesters, birth your adorable cherub, and that's it, right?! Wrong.

Enter, the fourth trimester. 

This is a crazy, confusing, challenging, bittersweet, precious time. Baby is brand new in the world and adjusting to having his world turned upside down. Mom and Dad are adjusting to this new life of zero sleep, heart-bursting love, and learning how to keep baby happy and healthy (or at least alive and not screaming his head off).

Mom, more specifically, is still all sorts of jacked up physically from labor and delivery. An unmedicated vaginal birth, a "give me all the drugs!" experience, c-section warriors, whatever. It doesn't matter. Recovery is difficult and I feel like doctors don't prepare us enough for that. We're so focused on the pain and preparation of the delivery itself that no one mentions, "Oh by the way, you may be dealing with stitches in your hoo-ha, painful surgery scars, a displaced pelvis, hemorrhoids, raw, cracked nipples, and baby blues all while wearing ridiculous diaper-sized pads and trying to keep a tiny human alive." Uhhh thanks for the heads up!

In other words, "Holy shit! This is hard!" It's survival mode, baby!

Yes, it's not so glamorous, but there's also the good stuff. The teeny tiny fingers that grab onto yours. The middle of the night baby snuggles that make waking up at 3am to nurse a lot less annoying. The soft newborn skin. The new baby smell. The first time he smiles, even if it's just because he has gas and isn't intentionally smiling at you. The feeling of victory when you figure out the perfect combination that lulls your tiny tyrant to sleep (white noise + paci + swaddle + vibration, for the win!)

It's rough. It's exhausting. It's magical. It's fleeting.

It has been 17 weeks since I last wrote here on this blog, with the last post being the day before I went into labor. I can't believe it's already been nearly 4 months. I'm blown away by how much my life has changed in such a short time, how much I've changed, how much I've grown.

I hope to document this new life a little more consistently here, but I'm also giving myself grace when I don't make writing here my priority, or when I simply can't find the time to post. Recording the little moments is important to me. Living them is more important.

And so it begins...