Unfortunately, the boys and I picked something up in Dallas (a few people were sick.) Heron had a temperature of over 103 degrees for a few days and Rhino and I were throwing up and sniffly. I had hopes of getting out and seeing the town and playing with the kids, but was just so miserable. We spent most of the week on the couch, but after three weeks of running around, it was kind of nice to relax. 

We did go one day to get the boys haircuts (Heron's first!) They were getting pretty shaggy and Heron's bangs were almost down to the tip of his nose. Andrea picked a salon with a great toy store, Specialties, next door. When I was in the chair with Heron, Rhino was playing with Thomas trains the whole time! The staff there was great and didn't seem to mind the kids hanging out for so long. (We did do some shopping, too, — their Melissa & Doug collection was wonderful! And Andrea picked up a cool, blue pop-up tunnel which was a huge hit!) Rhino was great getting his hair cut because he knew that Thomas was waiting for him if he got it over with! Unfortunately, it was time to go and there was another huge meltdown in the parking lot because he wanted his trains. Heron's first hair cut was not as calm as it may appear in the photo above! He screamed most of the time and swung his head back and forth. The stylist was really great and patient. She sang songs, talked to him, showed him toys. Heron just wasn't impressed and clung to me for dear life. He really did seem to transform from baby to toddler after the haircut. He looks so much like Rhino now!

We went out to eat a few times (and I tried the local favorite, fried pickles. Ehh.) San Angelo didn't seem as bad as I had been led to believe. We did go out looking for all the local yarn shops that I found addresses for online, only to find they had all been closed down. Disappointing! We ended up at Michael's and picked up some yarn for Andrea and started up crochet lessons again. She's now on her way her own crochet afghan!

I'm so glad I got to spend some sister time with Andrea and that the boys and Amelia were able to play together! There were a lot of silly little toddler arguments, but I think they had a good time! This part of our trip was short, but it was time to head home. I think were all missing Japan / Matt! It's time to take that long flight back home!

We flew from Colorado Springs to Dallas on October 8 and thankfully had a short and fairly uneventful flight. Rhino wouldn't stay in his seat and keep buckled, but fighting with him was difficult with angry Heron on my lap! Maybe they make a child-proof airplane buckle attachment. I really could have used one! Rhino was in a bad mood. I think he was bummed out to be getting on another flight. One of the flight attendants got the entire flight to sing "The Wheels on the Bus" to Rhino to keep him happy (super sweet!) but he kept screaming No! Stop! until they stopped singing. Then they made up a "No Rhino No" song for him which he wasn't too pleased about! Once we got in the air and I had him watch cartoons on the iPod, things got easier!

In Dallas we stayed with Papa ("Pop" to the boys) and grandparents. My grandfather had just had surgery and was recovering, but not feeling so well. I wish I could have spent more time with him, but he stayed in bed most of my visit and the boys kept me running around the house a lot. It was hard to keep them entertained and keep the house from being destroyed! Unfortunately, Papa had to work a few days out of the week and the boys and I were just home watching cartoons. I did take them out on neighborhood wagon rides a few times and we played a lot with trains, too! 

We did get out to a few playgrounds. The boys always love playgrounds! They even played at one that Papa remembers playing at as a kid!

The Dallas Arboretum has a spectacular pumpkin display that we had to go see! There were over 40,000 pumpkins and gourds scattered around. They were built into houses, lining walkways, and placed on to hay bales. The boys had a fantastic time running through the pumpkins (Rhino especially!) He navigated through the hay bale maze and sat in the pumpkin huts.

There was a small petting zoo with a pony, some chickens, goats, and sheep that he loved! Heron pet the animals, too. Rhino especially liked the pony, but so did the other couple thousand kids there! He just wanted to hog it and was getting in the way of photos for other people and we were just spending too long with that pony. It was time to go and I had to pull him away from the pony, which caused quite a problem. I think we're starting to see a trend here! Another huge melt-down. He caused such a scene, screaming all the way through the arboretum and refusing to walk. He can be so exhausting some times! I know it's hard being away from our normal routine, having our schedules turned upside down with the time zone changes, and not having Daddy around. He wore me down with these tantrums, though!

As if the awesome pumpkin village wasn't enough for one day, we decided to drive out to Fort Worth and take the train to the zoo. Well, the train park was being renovated or something, so that didn't work out. We did take the little train that runs through the zoo! (We have to find train-related activities for Rhino!) The zoo was great and really pretty! We didn't get to see everything, but we did spend time in the Asia and Africa parts and saw some pretty great animals. The boys were definitely excited to see all the cool lions, zebras, gorillas, and giraffes!

When I was in middle school I went to the Colorado State Fair, but that was the last fair I'd been to. The Texas fair was going on while we were in Dallas and I thought that would be neat to check out! We didn't spend a lot of time there, just wanted to see the midway, have some treats, and let Rhino ride some rides. I wish I had all week to spend at the fair and see all the neat crafts and competitions, though!

Rhino was just barely tall enough to ride the kiddie rides. He loved (most of) them! The yellow airplane was fun while he was waiting, but once it got going, he hid and wouldn't come up until it stopped! He loved the whale ride and the bubbles, though! The boys and I shared a corn dog and they had their first bites of cotton candy (Heron really wasn't too sure what to do with his handful of fluff, but he watched Rhino and figured it out then screeched the rest of the time for more!)

My brother, Matthew, plays the guitar and sings (covers and original compositions) at the Lakewood Bar and Grill every Wednesday night. I love that he has a creative outlet like this and I just think it's really neat that he is performing now! I have wanted to see one of his shows, but it just wouldn't work out with the boys. They couldn't stay home, I wouldn't get a babysitter, and they couldn't hang out with us and be calm and quiet in a bar! So we went out to dinner after the fair at a Black Eyed Pea that was right next door to LBG. I popped in for a song to see Matthew and snap a photo and applaud while Papa and the boys waited outside. It was cool to see him up on stage! I hope this is something that he can continue with or at least keep writing songs. I'm so proud of my musical little brother!

All of my uncles and aunt live close by, so it's nice to go visit one place and see the whole family! One day we went out to spend time with my Uncle David. He took us to Lake Grapevine for a little hike and to play at the playground there. It was beautiful! Heron was in a dinky little stroller that was hard to push through the sand and over the roots, so we didn't go very far. Rhino was really excited about the lake and just wanted to throw rocks and sticks into it! We went over to Uncle David's house after for a steak dinner (what I crave every day) and relax. The boys played (banged on) his guitar and played with toy cars. It was a nice, relaxing evening with the boys and Papa and Uncle David!

I planned the timing of our trip around Papa's birthday. His birthday was on Saturday and Andrea was coming up and Matthew lives in town, so it was the first time that we all have been together in Dallas in a long time! We had a photo session with Papa's friend, Dave, in the morning. The kids were all mostly cooperative! Heron fell off the picnic table and got a big bump/gash on his head (to match Rhino's dog bite in the same spot.) Then we all headed over to Uncle Andy's house for Papa's birthday party. Hot dogs, hamburgers, Uncle David's famous macaroni and cheese, lots of fruit – yum! It was a little too chilly to go swimming in Uncle Andy's pool, but Amelia and Rhino had fun splashing their feet in the shallow end and walking the "boat" (pool thermometer) around the perimeter. They'd take turns doing laps around the pool, holding on to the little rope. It was bound to happen — someone fell in! Amelia slipped by the shallow end and fell straight in and Andrea waded in right after her and she was fine. Amelia was scared at the time, but spent the rest of the afternoon telling everyone what fun she had swimming!

Because the pumpkin village at the arboretum was just too awesome, we had to go back now that Andrea and Amelia were in town! At least Rhino was better behaved this time (the petting zoo wasn't there any more!) Matthew joined us this time and wheeled the kids around in a wagon, which was too sweet. They weren't in a very cooperative mood for group photos, but they had a good time! 

I wish that Matt would have been able to spend this trip with us. The boys definitely missed him and I know he was lonely and missing us, too. I'm very thankful that we were able to make this trip to see everyone. No one in Texas had met Heron yet and Rhino hadn't been out that way since he was nine months old. It was three weeks away from Matt when we left Dallas and I definitely was missing home! It was so nice to see my dad and grandparents and the rest of the family and am thankful they got to spend some time getting to know the boys!

I’m really not remembering much about November! A few things stick out, though. Rhino started crawling around, we got our first Misawa snow (and Rhino’s first snow ever!), we had two nice Thanksgivings (one with the church, then a second in our home with our friends), and we discovered we’re going to have another baby in July ’09! This of course is very exciting and just the age spacing we were hoping for. Thanksgiving was nice, too, and not very hectic at all. Liz, Nicole, and I split up the responsibilities. Really, all I had to do was make up some cranberry sauce and veggies and provide a clean home. The food was all wonderful and we had a terrific first Thanksgiving in Japan!

December will take a while to describe. I had my first prenatal appointment and we saw the ultrasound of our 8 week-old little bean! Heart’s beating, there’s only one in there, everything’s looks fine, that was about it! Two days later we began our trip back to the States to visit with family for Christmas. This was wonderful, but tiring! I’m so glad we got to see all our family (though not as many friends as I had initially hoped. Everything was getting too hectic!) and have Rhino meet the rest of the folks that didn’t get to come out when he was born.

Matt wrote up a big post about the horrible details of the travel itself. He pretty much covered it all, though he didn’t mention how uncomfortable a 9 or 12 hour flight is for a pregnant woman with morning sickness. Airplanes definitely were not my friends. I won’t take this space to complain further about travel and how we never want to step foot on an airplane again (we can stick out Matt’s career here and retire in Japan!) All our destinations made the flights more than worthwhile.

We flew into LA, so we decided to rent a car and drive up to Lompoc to see our friends and recuperate for the weekend. We left at 10pm on a Friday evening and it’s an overnight flight across the international dateline to California. When I booked this flight, I just assumed: leave Friday evening, overnight flight, land Saturday morning. I know, now that I think about it, it doesn’t make any sense. When we landed in CA and the captain said that it was 2pm on Friday, I was so confused! I hadn’t planned to arrive on Friday! So, it was my first time going back in time! We picked up our car and, 3 seconds off the lot, Matt almost gets into an accident! We’ve gotten quite used to driving on the left side and very slowly in Japan. When we got on the freeway, Matt felt all nervous that he was going so fast! Well, “so fast” is 45mph and he definitely needed to kick it up a bit, as everyone else was going 80! It was scary interesting watching him get used to driving in the US again. We arrived in Lompoc, called everyone we knew, didn’t get through to anyone, so we stayed in a hotel. It was nice to just relax and decompress from the long trip by ourselves. On Saturday (the real Saturday, not the Saturday in my confused head) we met up with Wayne and Rena, the wonderful couple from church that took us in as their “kids” (theirs had all moved out) and led the Bible study we attended for 2 years. It was nice to spend the weekend with them, have a little group reunion with some other church people, and show Rhino off. We also met up with our friends Denna, Adam & Ty. We went out to for an Italian dinner to catch up and gab. They ordered a plate of pasta for Tyler (2), but we discovered Rhino is nuts for pasta, and pretty much ate Ty’s whole plate! That was the first we saw of Rhino vehemently demanding table food and it was quite amusing, though slightly embarrassing to be out in a restaurant with a baby who yelled for food as if we hadn’t given him any for months! After church on Sunday we went over to Jody and Roy‘s to see their sweet baby girls, have some lunch, and catch up. The weekend was so short and we were fighting to stay awake during the day, so we didn’t end up doing all that I had planned. I couldn’t get a hold of Danielle and would have loved to stop by work (it was drill weekend), but it just didn’t happen. We drove back down to LA on Sunday night, got another hotel (oh my, another whole big terrible story, too!) and caught a flight to Dallas the next morning.

These descriptions will probably get shorter, now, as there’s still plenty more. Texas was nice. Papa was the only one to have met Rhino, back in March, so it was wonderful that all my uncles, aunt, grandparents, etc. got to meet him! Unfortunately, Rhino hadn’t gotten used to the time zones yet and had just started teething again, so he was pretty grumpy a lot of the week. We kept busy, though. We had a nice Mexican lunch out at the Tupinamba, a restaurant that my family always goes to when I come to visit! We got to see my brother, Matthew, who also lives in Dallas and finally meet his girlfriend, Adria. The five of us went to Ripley’s Believe it or Not, had lunch at Chili’s, and went over to their apartment for dinner and board games. Over the week we got plenty of gaming in — Sequence, Clue, Phase 10, Scattergories — and watched a couple of movies (Eagle Eye, The Other Boleyn Girl, As Good As It Gets). I also went with Grandmother and Aunt Pattie to a quarterly ladies’ luncheon at their church, which was really great! We had a delicious lunch, browsed through second-hand goodies to buy to support their Friendship House, and listened to a wonderful pianist and singer perform Christmas songs. Then on Friday, Papa took us out to the Granada, sort of his second home, with Matthew and Adria to see Bruce Robison & Kelly Willis. It wasn’t exactly our style of music, but it was nice to get out and see the theater and hang out with my dad and brother. We couldn’t bring Rhino, so it was his first time with a babysitter, Papa’s friend Kay. I was really worried that I’d get him to sleep at her house, leave, then he’d wake up and cry and never go back down for her. He did wake up a couple hours after we had left, and he cried for a little bit, then fell back asleep — I was quite impressed! Rhino got a few cute gifts from the Texas family. Papa got him some clothes, including a cute Dallas Cowboys onesie. Rhino also got a Bible stories book and a 2008 coin set. It was a nice time visiting with all the family and I’m glad they finally got to meet Rhino! We left Sunday morning for the next leg of our trip: New York!

Okay, so these aren’t getting much shorter! Well, not to New York. We flew into Buffalo and Matt’s parent’s were there to take us down to Obi. Matt’s sister, Jen, was waiting at home for us and everyone was so excited to see Rhino (and us, I guess!) We got in pretty late, so we pretty much went straight to bed. The rest of the week was filled with a lot of family (Matt has a lot of family close by!) visiting and staring at, taking pictures of Rhino! We went over to Mom-mom and Pop-pop’s one night to meet up with lots of aunts, uncles, cousins, etc.! Rhino got to meet Mitchell, a little boy just 3 weeks older than him. They were so cute together! Another night the church pastor and his family came over one night for dinner and games. Jen and I got a “sisters only” afternoon one day to go get lunch and tea and browse Jo-Ann’s. Jen, Mom and I had a cookie-decorating day! Matt’s brother Jason and his fiancée came over so they could meet Rhino and we could meet her! Later that week, they were married!! I got really sick the night before and couldn’t go to their wedding, though! It was tough, I spent about 36 hours curled up on the sofa or huddled in the bathroom. Rhino pretty much had a full day without Mommy, but he did really well with Grandma and Aunt substitutes! I was bummed to not be able to attend the wedding, but at least I recovered before our flight out. We also watched some movies (The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian, Wall-E, and lots of MST3K.) We also had an early Christmas on the 17th. Matt got more MST3K, some anime, books, cross-stitching stuff; I got some great knitting books and some others; and Rhino received so many cute clothes and toys! They’re all wonderful, but the thing he definitely loved the most was Jen’s gift: a very cute little baby piano! Rhino had recently started really enjoying music and dancing anytime any song started: a commercial jingle, someone singing, 3 notes on a piano, someone whistling, etc.! So he would stand up at the piano, bang out a few notes, dance to his music, play a few more, dance, and on and on! Everyone loved watching him play! It was a fun early Christmas! We did it again a few days later at Aunt Ginny’s with Aunt Connie & Grandpa, too. Rhino got more wonderful outfits, toys, and books. Thankfully, Mom and Dad shipped everything to our home so we didn’t have to pack all the gifts out! We left for the airport Saturday afternoon, but our flight out of Buffalo had been canceled. We made the long drive back home to sleep, and got on an early flight Sunday morning for Colorado.

Originally we had planned to arrive in Colorado two days early, rent a car, stay in Mama’s condo in Denver, and visit with friends in Fort Collins and Denver. By the time we got to Colorado, we were running out of money, car rentals were really high, I was lazy and hadn’t recently been in touch with any friends, we’d lost a day due to our canceled flight, and we were feeling pretty run down. Mama and Ron just picked us up from the airport and took us down to the Springs. I feel like a terrible friend, but it was nice to just relax at “home.” Plus, my sister, her husband and daughter were flying in just a few hours later so I’m glad that we were around to spend more time with them. We had planned to spend time with our friends Carol and Derik, who live in Omaha (and we used to work together. Matt went to tech school with both of them.) They drove down to the Springs for the weekend to see us, but it only turned into an hour that they came over and chatted after dinner on Monday. It was so nice to see them and of course I would have liked more time, things just didn’t quite work out. I’m so glad we at least got to visit for a little bit. Hopefully we’ll have another opportunity before too long! So with my sister in town, I finally got to meet my niece, Amelia! She’s 8 days younger than Rhino and I was so excited to see the two of them together. It was so interesting, they are such different babies! Rhino is a lot more vocal, interested in music and crazy about food. Amelia is all ready running around!! She likes to do her own thing a lot. They both play so differently, sleep differently, eat differently, cry differently — it was quite an experience! She is so beautiful and such a sweetheart. At 10 months, the babies weren’t really interested in playing with each other, but they did play next to each other! We joke that Amelia is sort of a “bully” — they would both be playing with toys, but she would always want to take whatever Rhino had instead! Rhino was very laid back about the whole thing and never really seemed to mind, haha! I wish we could have spent more time with Andrea and her family, but hopefully we will get to see them next year (when the babies won’t be babies anymore — waah!) Aside from watching babies in Colorado, we did actually spend time with Mama and Ron, too! Their dogs, Jack and Tilley, are very high-strung little wild dogs (but so sweet!) and we were nervous about how they’d act around the babies. We were all very surprised though, they were SO good! Whenever a dog would come up to Rhino, we’d say “dog” a lot and eventually Rhino would look at the dog and say “dauh” — he just wouldn’t say the ‘g’. I’m not counting it as a first word, but it was really close and he would do it everytime he’d see a dog! One night we were there, we went out to the Golden Bee, an English pub at the Broadmoor hotel. It’s sort of a Christmastime tradition that my Grandpa started years ago. The babies were really well behaved and loved eating crackers. We drove around afterward and looked at the light displays. We spent a lot of time at home, just relaxing, chatting, hanging out in the kitchen, watching TV, etc. Mama made some great meals that Andrea and I tried to help out with! Andrea made a delicious spinach tofu lasagna one night and Mama and I made a copy of the Olive Garden’s Zuppa Tuscana soup (my favorite!) Andrea and I made multiple visits to the Whole Foods — it was like Grocery Heaven for us! I wish we had more than our crummy commissary selection and expensive Japanese produce out here. Andrea found a Buddha’s Hand and was so excited, she bought it as decoration (I thought it was more appropriate as a Halloween decoration!) We never did use it for anything, but in the future she wants to make candied peels out of one. I found a kiwano that I had wanted to try since I found this sorbet recipe on one of my favorite foodie blogs. Well, we didn’t make a sorbet, just ate spoonfuls from it — and it was less than enjoyable! Matthew and Adria flew in on the 23rd, so now all us siblings were together with our significant others! It was quite a full house, but tons of fun. We had a great, salmon Christmas Eve dinner and filled up on Christmas cookies (Mama went overboard with the date rolls, oatmeal chocolate chip, pinwheels, hazelnut cookies, ricotta cheese sugar cookies, etc, etc.!!) before heading off to the candlelight service at First Pres. It was a beautiful service and I was so glad Matthew and Adria joined us as well. When we got home we opened all of the “grown-up presents”. Mama and Ron got each couple an awesome digital frame, which I love! We did stockings and “baby presents” Christmas morning, which was lots of fun! The babies got some adorable clothes, wonderful books, and some very cute Little People toys! Andrea, Michael and Amelia flew out the next day, so we got some time with Matthew and Adria. We all went to Cave of the Winds, which was amazing! With all the time we lived in Colorado, none of us had ever been and it’s just a few minutes from home. We left from Denver early Sunday morning for our long flight back to Japan.

The whole month was filled with such nice visits with family. I’m still getting all the photos from each location together, then I will post them to the gallery and include links in this post. I didn’t really take many pictures at all, though! I guess I was too busy with Rhino and visiting that I just didn’t think much about photos. Thankfully, other people got a few! The whole trip was very tiring and expensive (see Matt’s post!), but was definitely worthwhile! Unfortunately, it very well may be our only trip back to the States while we’re stationed in Japan. Mama and Ron, Jen, and Matt’s parents are all planning trips out to see us within the next 18 months, though!! I can’t wait to show them all the wonderful things out here!

Edit: Here are links to the vacation photos from California, Texas, New York, and Colorado!

* If you're reading this, you likely all ready know I love brown (… and green.) This can be seen various places throughout our home, but here is one example: Rhino in bed. (Rhino sleeps on his own mattress right next to our mattress-on-the-floor. I love his beautiful organic sheet and he doesn't use a pillow/blankets at night, they're just there for his daytime relaxing while I'm doing laundry. Doesn't he look happy?!)

We have a mei tai, a ring sling, a pouch sling, and now we have a wrap. Andrea recommended the Moby Wrap, and I had read plenty of good things about it, so we went ahead and got one. It’s nice to have a variety of different ways to carry him. The wrap will take a little bit of getting used to, and so far we’ve only used one hold. So here’s me with Rhino in the Moby.

I think we’re also pretty much decided on names now, too. If it’s a girl, it’ll be Maia Joy (if we ever have a second girl, then she’ll be Madeline!). If it’s a boy, it’ll be Ryan Lowell. Yes, Lowell just kind of came up out of nowhere recently, and it surprised me that we both liked it. It happens to mean “little wolf” in Old French, and Matt loves wolves, so that’s just perfect. (Here are other names we had been considering.)

We had our 9th Bradley class tonight. We talked about cesarean sections (and watched a video – ick!) and advanced first stage labor and a few other things. We also chatted with the instructor after class about doulas. Andrea asked me about whether or not I think she should hire a doula for her birth and it never really occurred to me. I figured, if you have a husband coach, why would you need one? I brought that up to our instructor, since she is a doula, and she explained the role and the importance of her job. I’m thinking it might actually be a good option for our situation. Since I’m a little worried about whether our doctor is going to bully us around or try and convince us that we need certain interventions which we aren’t interested in, it would be nice to have someone else to sort of stand up for us. She has a lot more knowledge and confidence and would also serve as an assistant coach. Matt will be the main coach, but he will need support, or possibly rest, or she can run errands, etc. We also get a 50% discount because we are Bradley students, which puts the service within a what I think is a very reasonable range for what we’d get. Matt and I are going to talk about it a little more and research some other doulas in the area. And I know our doctor sort of rejected talking to me about a birth plan the first appointment or discussing medication and other options, so I really haven’t brought anything up about what we want and don’t want. He knows that we’re doing Bradley classes, so if he knows anything about that, then maybe he can make some assumptions about what we don’t want. Our instructor mentioned a home birth with a midwife, which has been something on my mind since my second appointment back in August. We’ve switched doctors all ready and really like the hospital in Goleta, so I’m thinking I’d rather not do a home birth anyway. It’s something I’d be interested in possibly for the next birth, but I feel like it’s too late to change now. I still like the idea of a water birth, and I can’t do that in the hospital here, so if I did a home birth later on that would be an option. Anyhow, it’s something I never really considered, but we’re going to be talking about having a doula present at the hospital after all. I think it could make the whole thing with the doctor less stressful. So we’ll see what happens with that.

We munched and played some fun games. First everyone wrote some fun baby advice on a note card for Matt and I to hold on to. We were also all given 3 clips to place somewhere on our clothes and were prohibited from saying the word “baby” for the entire evening. If we messed up, we’d have to give up one of our clips to the person who heard us (or encouraged us to) say the forbidden word. Jen slipped within the first two minutes when Matt took a look at our cake and sneakily asked her “what does that say” as if he couldn’t read it. Everyone thought it would be pretty easy to just replace “baby” with plenty of other words, but when you get into conversation, you forget all about it and we all had a good laugh at each others mistakes. Matt won the evening with 6 clips. We played another game where we had to list names of baby animals. Jen had a huge list (ostrich, eel, camel, eagle … there were maybe 40 animals) and we’d have to give the names(s) of the animal’s baby. We got a point for each correct one, or if Jen was feeling generous, would give half a point for creativity or effort. It was pretty tough! We were all impressed that Jody knows a baby female zebra is a filly and who knew that a baby eel is a fry? I won the game with 18 points, but most of them were just guesses. It was fun and educational!

Then we got to the gifts! Andrea and Mama had sent some to the us in advance to bring to the shower. Mama sent some cute things that I had as a baby, which is really sweet (Peter Rabbit piggy bank, ceramic clown head to hang on the wall, etc)! She also sent us bath supplies like hooded towels and some really cute onesies! Andrea sent us the bathtub we wanted, bath supplies, and an adorable Nightmare Before Christmas onesie/hat! (Matt loves the movie and she periodically sends him things like t-shirts and rubber masks and this was just perfect!) We also got a nice card from Danielle, some diapers from Katherine, a pretty baby footprint frame and really soft blanket and gift card from Jody, and a Pack’n Play (to match our stroller!) from Jen, Mom, Aunt Ginny, Aunt Connie, and Mom-Mom. It was a great time and was really sweet of Jen and Danielle to set up.