2 months

Ruby is no longer a teeny little newborn.

She weighs 10 lbs 15 oz, which is in the 51st percentile.
She is 24 inches long, which is in the 95th percentile. (Tall and skinny!)

She doesn't have the newborn cry anymore--she sounds like an infant.  She sucks on her fist more than her binky. She sleeps through the night more often than not, which we really appreciate.  She smiles at us all the time, which continues to be my favorite part of life!  And she has finally started to play with toys!  It is really cute. Her favorite so far (probably just the easiest) is a monkey that chimes when you hit it.  We're teaching her all about how great it is to hit things, apparently.  She also loves watching tv.  (We're great parents, huh?) So far she has shown the most interest in Zac Efron.  That's our girl!

Ruby's Aunt Katy is staying with us for about 3 weeks.  This means All Fun, All The Time for little Ruby.  Instead of a boring mom who has to put her down while she does the dishes and laundry, she gets to be held and play with a way more fun aunt.  It's also fun for me!



Ruby is just getting funnier and cuter every day.  I can't imagine how awesome she is going to be when she's 3 months...and then 4 months...etc.

Thanksgiving

We had a great Thanksgiving this year.  We watched Poltergeist and Far & Away, made an awesome meal with Katy and Ashley, watched a lot of Cake Boss (well, everyone else did--I took a 2 hour nap instead), walked to see the baby donkey (who I am in LOVE with), ate amazing pumpkin cheesecake and chocolate pie, decorated for Christmas, and watched my favorite X-Files Christmas special.

I am grateful for my baby Ruby.  She is a terrifically good baby who sleeps and eats well, and I try to remember that every day so I don't start taking it for granted and freak out when my next baby isn't as easy.  I'm grateful she was born safely--doctors and hospitals are awesome, because she would have died without them.  I'm grateful she is developing right on track and learning new things every day. It's exciting to watch her achieve milestones and figure things out.

I'm grateful for laundry stain remover, Ho Hos,  my cool Palm Pre, my Vera Bradley diaper bag, and the nice new sheets my mom gave me for my birthday.
I'm grateful that Katy is living with us for 3 weeks.
I'm grateful that Christy is pregnant with twins and Danny is fully recovered from cancer.
I'm grateful that Lucy loves Ruby so much and is excited to see us at Christmas.
I'm grateful that all my Christmas shopping is done.
I'm grateful for Mom and Dad, who have shown me so much love in my life, and now love Kyle and Ruby just as much.
I'm grateful for my friends who I get to hang out with--they cheer me up on hard days and have fun with me on great ones.
I'm grateful that my refrigerator and pantry are full of food (thanks to Mom's visit and subsequent Costco trip).
I'm grateful for my safe and awesome car.
I'm grateful that I can stream Netflix from my Wii.

I'm NOT grateful that there isn't a new episode of Supernatural tonight.  That is lame. I'll get over it though.

A very important day

Ruby's first trip to Ikea!

We introduced her to the wonder of  Ikea at Christmastime.  Unfortunately, it made me impatient for Thanksgiving to be over so I can decorate for Christmas and start listening to my Frank, Nat, and Bing Christmas albums.  Only a couple more days!

Christmas Cards

Growing up, and even now, one of my favorite things about the holiday season is getting Christmas cards.  Kyle and I don't get many at our house, but going home to California is so fun because I get to check out all the cards Mom got.  She keeps all the pictures on the fridge and all the letters on a table in the living room for us to read.  Christy usually writes the card for our family because Mom is so busy.  The Anderson family only sends out cards when we have an especially good family picture from that year. So we haven't sent one out since my wedding :)

Now that we have a baby, Kyle and I feel like a real family.  What do real families do?  Send out Christmas cards of course!  It seems so adult and stable and awesome.  We've never sent them out before because it's awkward with just the two of us.  Shutterfly is doing a promo where bloggers get 50 free Christmas cards!  I am going to let it double as a birth announcement too.  They have approximately ONE MILLION cute card options, so it is going to be fun to find my favorite and pick a picture and whatnot.  Designing it might take forever...I better get on that.

(Also, I have never once thought about sending out a Valentines Day card, but these are so cute! I'm tempted.)

(Oh man, I just saw that they actually have Christmas birth announcements...perfect.)

Bunny

Ever since we found out that we were having a girl, we've been on the lookout for the perfect lovey (I think that's what they're called). I really wanted one for our baby, mostly because Lucy has loved her Lamby so much. Lamby is a VERY big deal in the Leininger household.  BUT every one I have found is ugly and/or has a rattle in it! It has been very frustrating to not be able to find what I've been looking for.

UNTIL this weekend.  Mom and I found a darling bunny, rattle-free, at the Dillards in the South Towne mall.  What a relief!

This bunny is so soft and has the sweetest face!  Now I just need to force Ruby to love him and use him as her security blanky.

Happy Girl

Ruby is hilarious to me lately!  We are having so much fun. 

She gets in moods where she is entertained by everything-- she can't laugh yet but you can tell she is just on the verge.  I blow on her face and she beams at me, Kyle pokes her cheeks and she loves it.  I think her smiles are out of this world.  I can't wait until we get some giggles!

November 11th

Last Armistice Day I wrote all about why Katy and I are obsessed with WWI poetry/poets, and therefore WWI.  SO, here we are again, having a happy Armistice Day.  Katy recited some great poems to me over the phone today, and I spent some time reading some of my favorites to Ruby.  We are definitely raising her right.

Every year, Katy wears a poppy, but I never get around to making/buying one.  WELL this year I finally did.

She and I have been matching all day with our poppies and white shirts.

Ruby's Blessing

Ruby was blessed on Sunday and it was awesome.  Kyle was nervous but perfect, of course.  Ruby was also perfect--she slept the whole time.  I was proud of both of them.  Ruby wore the dress that my sisters and Lucy and I were all blessed in.  My mom bought it on her mission in Spain, so it's very Catholic-looking and pretty.  Our parents were able to be here for the weekend, which was great, because these grandmas needed a Ruby fix.  

I sometimes/usually feel kind of stranded here in Utah, but so many people came to see Ruby blessed.  We had 9 men in the circle, which I totally didn't expect!  All of my aunts and uncles in the state came, which was really great. It made me feel a lot better, knowing that I do have people here who care about me and my little family.

We had a little hangout afterwards--which meant that Ruby needed a new party dress.  (Really, she is just still too small for any of the dresses she already has.)  I fell in love with this velvet dress at Gymboree:

She was so cute in it!  It was the first time we really dressed her up. SO FUN to put her in tights and ballet flats and a headband.  What a doll.

It was an eventful day.  It's pretty neat that it was Ruby's first time in church, first time getting a blessing from her dad.  I'm grateful that Kyle holds the Priesthood and can perform this ordinance.  I'm glad I married him.

Ruby continues to be adorable.  As far as babies go, she is pretty dang good.

oh man

Ruby hit the 6 week mark yesterday. That means I am officially out of the "postpartum" period, I'm pretty sure.  To mark the occasion, I wore a pair of my pre-pregnancy jeans.  I hadn't tried them on yet (too scared) but they fit, so I'm relieved.  Actually, I weigh less now than I did when I got pregnant, so I guess most or all of my old clothes should fit--I should get them out of hibernation.  BUT my wedding ring still does not fit!  What the heck? My fingers don't even look bigger...did my ring shrink??

I feel like now that it's been 6 weeks, I have to be completely healed, feel like my old self, and get back to real life and responsibilities.  But see, the trouble is, I'm not ready to not be postpartum.  My abdomen still hurts from surgery. I don't sleep enough or eat normally.  And taking care of this baby takes up all of my day, it feels like!  Before, I had the postpartum excuse.  It's overwhelming to all of the sudden have to also clean and cook and work out and be normal.  I don't know why or when I got the idea into my head that 6 weeks was the time when I had to get back to life, but I wish I hadn't.  Now, if I don't do the things I think I should, I'll feel guilty. DANG IT.

I have this girl to make me smile though:

So I know I'll be fine.

Zombie Love

SOMETHING ABOUT ME: I love zombie movies.

Not all zombie movies.  Some are gory for the sake of gore, which I don't like.  Some are (obviously) stupid.  And I'm not a hardcore fan who watches really old "classic" zombie movies, or B horror films (ok sometimes I do, but not usually).  But the ones I love, I really and truly LOVE.

My favorites:

Shaun of the Dead

Seriously hilarious.  

Zombieland

SO FUNNY.

28 Days Later

Really moving and interesting and emotional and, eventually, SO HAPPY and even uplifting.  Honestly, it's about people, not zombies.

And now, there are new zombies in my life: The Walking Dead.

It's a new show on AMC which I already blogged a bit about, but now I've finally seen an episode.  And for some reason, it is a far bigger deal than it should be.  Not only am I BLOGGING about it, but I'm also talking to people about it AND thinking about it way too much.  Like, it does not warrant this much excitement and interest, but for some reason, to me it does.  

First of all, it's a zombie SHOW.  Has that ever happened before?  It means that it has to be very different from zombie movies, which is going to take some getting used to.  The pacing is different, characters are going to need more growth and development and complexity, and the plot isn't going to just be "oh no let's run away from these zombies."  I expect a lot of character-driven issues and relationship conflicts and all that--which you don't really get in zombie movies.  The fact that they have a whole season to fill means that they can go into a lot more detail.  For example: the show starts almost the exact same as 28 Days Later.  The main character wakes up in a deserted hospital, totally alone, after being in a coma.  He has no idea what's going on and has to wander around alone until he comes upon his first zombie, and is then found by other survivors who explain things to him.  But it was really different to me in The Walking Dead because they had so much more time and could do some really cool things.  I appreciated that.  Kyle appreciated that this guy wakes up  less naked than Cillian Murphy in 28 Days Later.

Anyways, I'm getting embarrassed about geeking out about this zombie tv show.  I hope it makes it--it could definitely be tricky to keep a zombie show going.  I trust AMC to do it well though--their other shows do pretty well, right?  And Andrew Lincoln is SO GREAT.  Katy and I had a long and adoring discussion about the intricacies of his acting talent.  I think he is awesome.

Sometimes I can't tell if something sucks or not.  So this might suck, even though I am really enthusiastic about loving it.  It might totally fail after two episodes, everyone else in the world may hate it, but I am really looking forward to Sunday nights now.

(To read an incredibly awesome contest-winning essay about zombies, read Katy's post here.)

Ruby Baby

So, when I was a kid--and teenager--and heck, even now--I was sad that there weren't any "Becca" songs.  I don't know any songs that even mention my name, let alone have my name as the title. I do have the novel Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier, which is cool, except Rebecca isn't exactly the heroine of that story.  ANYWAYS, something cool for Ruby is that she has some awesome songs about her.  The lyrics aren't even dirty, which is a relief.

"Ruby Tuesday" is of course the #1 awesome song for Ruby.  It may even be the reason why I love the name, even though she isn't really named after the song. The best is of course the original Rolling Stones version, although I love the beautiful Franco Battiato cover that I first heard in Children of Men , played when one of my favorite men of all time DIES.  It is VERY EMOTIONAL for me.  Katy and I decided to play that version at Dad's funeral.  (Dad is the reason we love this song.  I guess he is indirectly the reason we named our daughter Ruby.)

Ken alerted us to the existence of the 50s song "Ruby Baby" by Dion.  And HELLO it's like perfect to sing to my baby.  I have a baby named Ruby. Come on.  It's a good "sing to your baby while hanging out and having fun" song.

"Ruby Sees All" is a Cake song. I don't have any particularly strong feelings about it, but it's a good song and I love Cake (and cake) and Ruby will think that's neat when she is older.

"Ruby, Don't Take Your Love To Town" is a pretty famous song.  I first heard it in A Life Less Ordinary, one of my favorite movies, so I'm a fan.  Sung by a ton of people, mostly famous because Kenny Rogers sings it.  My iTunes library just has the Killers version.

I recently discovered "Ruby" by the Kaiser Chiefs.  And I love it!  It is a REALLY fun song to sing and her name makes quite an appearance.  Fun and upbeat and dancey.

Ruby is lucky.  I feel like I did her a great service by providing her with such a great name.  Clearly, everyone else also recognizes that this name is awesome, because why else would they write songs about her? Man, this girl owes me.

(And ok, I just googled it and apparently there are a couple songs with my name in them, but they didn't exist when I googled it in high school and I've never heard them so basically, TOO LITTLE TOO LATE, music industry.)