Hello all you red and pink Starbursts!

Last week, two very awesome things happened to me.

1. I became an aunt
2. I became a chi-sitter

The high dose of cuteness was simply too much for me to handle. Here I was, driving down the highway on a sunny Saturday, Henry cozied up in a coil in his carseat (yes, he has a carseat), on the way to see my baby nephew who I had not been introduced to. On top of that, my parents finally moved into their new house and I was going to be their very first house-guest. My cheeks LITerally hurt from smiling and this time – no Redbulls were consumed. Just me, Henry, an awesomely entertaining book on tape and a couple fun-sized Snickers.

I arrived in Kennewick and went straight over to the new digs. Nan and Gare are going to be so happy there, but right now moving-mode has made them both cray. I totally get it.

We promptly went over to Megan and Ben’s and wouldn’t you know it, Big Gare was holding Tate in the little chair by the window. He looked so tiny wrapped in my Dad’s embrace and yep – I started to cry.

Tate is very small. I don’t know what I was expecting – like an 8 pound BB is big? His head is pretty much totally round and he has a little bit of blonde hair. He has all ten fingers and ten toes and his skin gets red when he cries. He loves to wave his hands around and most of the time, they are right next to his mouth or on either side of his head. His legs get all stiff when you change his diaper and he has that gross belly button clip thingy so you have to fold the diaper down a little. I could talk about this tiny little human forever, I guess.

Megan only had one or two long-sleeved newborn onesies, so Nan and I ran to Fred Meyer to get more. I happened upon a couple a 40% off the lowest marked price racks and tried on a couple skirts (go fig!) to no avail. We bought a bunch more newborn things, a bottle of white wine and a bag of Pirate’s Booty. The we hit up Kennewick’s wide array of fine dining establishments for take-out. We got KFC for Nan and Ben and Bruchi’s for Meg and I. YUM.

That night, Nan and I opened up a bottle a’Hogue and I slipped into these awesome jammies.

The next day I woke up, drank coffee and ate cereal with measuring spoons (again, not everything has been moved to the new house). I threw Henry’s chewie around for a while and then he curled up in a sunny spot. Then we went for a little walk!

My mom and I brought Megan a Starbucks and she happily drank it while Nan and I gave Tate a bath.

Basically he screamed his little head off and Megan was yelling at us because we got his little belly button wet and apparently you aren’t supposed to. So, we scooped him out after about 15 seconds (no joke) and I got to lay with him while he calmed down and my heart was bursting with all the love and joyness.

A couple hours later, I had to drive back to Portland. I got stuck in traffic right after Hood River and my book on tape ended so I went ahead and scream-sang Sister Act 2 until my voice was hoarse. Henry slept through it all 🙂

The Hawks lost to the Packers that day but the warmth of Henry’s little body laying by my side made everything okay.

Oh, and here is Tate today!