Against All Odds

August has been a weird month.

I have celebrated my 20 year high school class reunion, the birth of my daughter, my 38th birthday and my 10th year anniversary. Who would have thought.

I had never made any real plans to get this old. Not that I thought I would die young, but my plans only went out to college, career, house, wife and kids. I'm not really sure where to go from here, or if I should go anywhere at all (except to a bigger house, I just read B'Andra's mind in the future as she reads this ;) ).

I'm lucky to have such a intelligent, cute, funny, fun wife who is such a good mom. I had forgotten the work that goes into a newborn. Wow. Just: WOW. Not even mentioning the trauma that her body has gone through (I took video for her) and is still going through (turns out little Jiagie thinks that if she is awake, she should be nursing), but she is tired beyond belief and when a baby nurses ever 1-3 hours, it pretty much takes up your day. Doesn't sound too bad, right? But you forget (as I did) that it takes nearly an hour to DO the nursing. I'm grateful for her willingness to bring another baby into the world and into our family.

My job is becoming more and more consuming the more responsibilities I take on. B'Andra is so supportive of my job, everyone in the office is jealous of me. She is very patient with the little to no help at home. She gets frustrated and gives me a wake up call occasionally, which I need, but it makes it nice that she realizes how important it is to be able to not only earn a salary, but progress.

The thing that stands out in my mind at the moment that I owe her for is for sticking with me "in sickness or in health" (which was not part of our wedding vows). 3 years ago I was getting sick every 6 weeks. Very sick and she always nursed me back to health and didn't push me when I was feeling weak. It was she and she alone that finally grabbed a doctor by the proverbial ears and said, "Figure this out NOW!"

The finally took me seriously enough to stop the strep culture tests and actually do some real blood work. 3 years later, my thyroid medicine is ramped up to 125 micrograms and a daily regimen of 4 other pills, I am free from my affliction. Gone are the days that missing single nights sleep would put me into a high fever for 4 days. Gone are the days that my sick leave are used up in the first 3 months of the year. Gone are rummaging through the cabinets for old painkillers from dental work so I could drink some water and get to sleep.

Thanks, baby. You are the best!

For our 10 year, B'Andra gave me my dream: another child
I gave her an engraved paver stone in the Disneyland Entrance Plaza that reads our names and our wedding date (August 22, 1998) and an invitation to Club 33.

We beat the odds, baby. Here's to 10 more!
I love you!

What's in a name

So, we started with B'Andra making it very clear that she alone was calling the shots on the name for our little girl. She claims that I was able to pick Gidian, a name she was not crazy about, and that it was her turn.

Hard to argue with someone actually forming the child in her belly and suffering all the discomfort associated with the task.

So B' set a few rules:
1) the name could NOT be made up. it had to exist in a name book, genealogy chart or something.
2) it could not be so common that it was a trend name (i.e. we had chosen Ella a few years ago, but in the meantime, it has become very popular)
3) it had to be classy and hopefully something that would work for a child AND an adult.

I should get a copy of the list of names that were in the running. Some pretty cool names.

The reason we went with Elspeth:
1. It is unique
2. It sounds pretty
3. It is the Scottish version of Elizabeth (B'Andra has a Scottish heritage as her maiden name is McAffee), another name in the top 5 and my mom's favorite name of all time.
4. It has great nicknames: Elsie, Elsa, Elise, Betty (just kidding, Betty is off limits)
5. Elsa (a diminutive of Elspeth) is the Danish version Elizabeth: Consecrated to God.

The reason we went with D'Lene:
1. Madelene was at the top of the name list
2. Dalene was in the baby name book shown as a diminutive form of Madelene.
3. Dalene sounds like B'Andra's parents Dallen and Shirlene combined without being made up.
4. We decided to change the spelling to D'Lene as a memorial to B'Andra's dad and his history of cool spelling protocol as shown by the following list of B'Andra's siblings:

Gragn Ethn
Shamby Cryl
B'Andra Rhondi
DeLys Aryann
Zont'l Phylesh

So we added the apostrophe, the capital letter in the middle of the name and the seemingly obvious shortage of vowells.

Nick names:

Jiagie:

Jiagie came around when B' was pregnant last summer. we were in Disneyland (I can see you are surprised by that) and we would talk about the baby, but B'Andra thought we needed a name. At the time, Gidian had "Pirates on the Brain" and we were going laps through Pirates of the Carribean. At the time, Gidian pronounced Jolly Roger (the priate flag with skull of bones) Jiagie Roggah (jaw-gee raw-gah). So we just started call the baby Jiagie.

As most of you know, Jiagie I never happened and everytime Gidian asked "Mommy, where is Jiagie?" She would cry. So when she got pregnant last november and told Gidian, he said "Jiagie is back???? ". So cute.

So he has been calling Mom's belly Jiagie since day 1 and before we knew if it were a boy or girl. We will try to keep that nick name in the family, but I'm afriad it is here to stay.

Other nicknames that have surfaced already:

Els Bells. Cute for two reasons: Elle is 'girl' in French and "Belle" is beautiful in French. So Els Bells = Beautiful Girl. And it is also a kick-ass AC/DC song!

Bug-a-boo. Or just Bug. This one just crept up on accident, like Bubba for Gidian. Nothing you would ever plan or athorize, but just feels right.

In the life of Baby Elspeth

Elspeth
Consecrated to God.

Each sentence has a hot-linked word, in case you can't see it. If not, just click on all the words, you'll find it eventually! :)

She has a case of chronic hiccups.

Here is her first bath.

Here is the first bath at home.

Here is Gidian with a handy song to remember her name.

First diaper change in the hospital.

Here is Jiagie three minutes in the real world and already grabbing daddy's hand for comfort.