1+1=2..... or does it?

katie and her handsome soon to be 1(!) year old son, Arlo

Auntie Ceeeeeej (Gigi's mommy)

Hazel, who just moved here with her wonderful family to Chapel Hill from Baltimore

Ryann, just back from her month long trip to Africa - Ruby now has the coolest I heart South Africa t-shirt

here's some notes about the latest in the Monast household:

• Ruby has a raging case of baby acne - we did not experience this with Luci - Luci decided to bypass 'normal' skin conditions and go straight to that horrible staph scalded skin syndrome where all of her skin peeled off - so we are extremely grateful for baby acne - though it does mean that there's a lack of close-up photos of the babe
• We are slowly adapting to Ruby's 3-4 hour days - essentially she eats, is alert for a short time and then goes to sleep and repeat.... and repeat.... makes no difference whether it's day or night, this is the way it is for now
• Luci continues to want to help with all things Ruby - she also constantly wants to hug and kiss 'she'. when talking about the baby, she refers to it as her baby. at the same time she has exhibited some classic jealousy behavior - telling me that Ruby does not need to eat when she does, asking me to hold her when i'm holding Ruby and waking up at odd hours of the night and asking me to come sleep with her - she is definitely looking for validation for her place in the family
  
• Having 1 kid comes with a certain amount of hard work and transitions (e.g. to a sleepless lifestyle) - you'd assume that the 2nd kid would double this effort, but instead there's that 'x' factor - the interaction/dynamic between the kids that seems to create an exponential increase in the amount of patience, love, and care required, so it's more like 1 + 1 + x > 2; i have no idea how people with more than 2 kids survive
  
• We are so blessed to have such wonderful family and friends who have helped make this chaotic time in our lives easier - either by coming by to visit (the ones i remembered to photograph pictured above), bringing us food (and margaritas!), cooking us dinner, sending ruby and/or luci little cards and presents and just generally providing support - it really does take a village to raise a child and i love our little village
  

Ruby for Lucy

Promise will provide a comprehensive update post soon, but in the meantime, how cool is this? there's a band named Ruby for Lucy - http://www.myspace.com/rubyforlucy

And here's some recent shots of the sisters. I like how Ruby is attempting to eat Luci's arm in one. Sisterly love.

Luci takes the Plunge

These photos were taken on Labor Day at the Woodcroft pool party. At the beginning of the summer, Luci would tell us that she wanted to jump off the diving board and then when she walked to the edge would ultimately turn around and walk off - she just wasn't quite ready. But then as summer progressed and with the added confidence gained during swim lessons, she revisited the diving board and showed us that she could jump off with NO fear and 20 something times in a row! We finally got some photos of our little daredevil during one of the last summertime pool days. Luci also got some very cool arm art done by Mimi the Clown (not to be confused with Mimi the Grandma) - she has a birthmark on her arm that served as the inspiration for the chain of roses.

We Are Family

Taty with her newest grandchild, Ruby Alexandra

Just Jonas and Auntie Maggie meet Ruby for the 1st time

Poppi's 1st encounter with Ruby

Mimi and Ruby bondCousin Eme and Auntie Heather with Looch and the Roo

Luci taking Ruby out on her 1st walk

Proud Papa with his 2 girls

Luci is constantly asking to hold Ruby - she tries her best to be gentle, but her definition of gentle needs some reworking

Luci acting goofy as Ruby tests out the swing for the 1st time

Ruby with her Mimi & Poppi

This is really the best photo of the 4 of them we could manage - it's got a certain charm

Mimi & Ruby

Mimi with her two granddaughters

Ruby Alexandra Makes Her Debut

Our hearts all grew a little more as our baby girl came into this world at 1:46 am Saturday, September 3rd. Labor was relatively short - about 4.5 hours from 1st contraction until her arrival. We arrived at the hospital at 12:40am and experienced a fairly harrowing hour before our beloved Ruby was born. Ruby weighed in at an impressive 9lbs 1 oz and was 20 inches long.

Big Sister Luciana is in awe of her little sis. She is very happy that she got what she wanted, a little sister, as opposed to a little brother - I think we all thought I was carrying a boy and were trying to prepare Looch for that, but she insisted it would be a girl. As part of her new big sister responsibilities, Miss Luci has agreed to share her blog with Ruby. We will do our best to update the blog with stories about our daughters and the Goose Family.

anticipation

we have this awesome tent, but have never taken it anywhere, so we decided to try camping in the backyard - we cooked over a fire and then luci and kai read stories by flashlight in the tent. it lasted about an hour - apparently the 'bugs were too noisy' and luci had to come sleep inside.

luci spent a lot of time this summer playing with our neighbor Allison. she gets super excited when there's an Allison sighting and then starts jumping up and down begging to play with her. luckily it seems that Allison enjoys playing with Luci just as much.

Luci helped paint the new toy storage bins that we bought for the playroom.

mysteriously a lot of the paint ended up in luci's hair and is just now coming out.

after some rain, luci and kai usually go to the creek to stomp in puddles in rain boots and to make a dam

we worked in a visit to the zoo and one of the rare non-90 degree days - luci was very particular about which animals she wanted to see. the elephants were her favorite, but she refused to see the lions or gorillas - too scary. though the next day she said she was ready to go back to the zoo to see them.

we did the 4D Dora movie at the zoo - it was pretty cool - they splash water on you! and you get to wear some pretty groovy shades.

sweeping the driveway wearing wreaths of leaves - why not?

when hurricane irene came through we got lots of wind and very little rain, but it was a day mostly spent indoors. so kai invented a great fishing game, which involved going fishing with a noodle, string and clothespin. all sorts of treasures were caught.

it's official - our house is on its way to being completely taken over by the children. bye bye dining room and hello playroom. thanks to heather, eme, taty and captain for their hard work in helping paint the room and for donating the futon. and thanks to poppy for the new ceiling fan/light fixture.

the crib has been reassembled and is ready for baby.

all the neutral clothing has been washed (luci helped - she likes to push the buttons on the washing machine and dryer) and organized.

and luci has transitioned nicely to her new 'big girl' room complete with fairy wall decals.

I realized that I didn't update the blog at all in August - this is mostly due to the fact that we've all been a little preoccupied lately preparing for baby #2's arrival (official due date is today). so here are some pictures from the dog days of summer, which in reality were a whole lot nicer than the beginning of the summer. all in all the summer of 2011 was wonderful - several trips to the beach, trips to see good friends in Charlotte and DC, lots of popsicle eating on the front steps, birthday parties, including Luci's!, several days/evenings spent relaxing at the pool (luci now goes down the slide all by herself and jumps off the low diving board), cook outs, visits to 2 aquariums and the zoo, and lots of fun times playing with our little girl who will soon get to be a Big Sister.