End of an Era and Beginning of a New...

End of an Era...

Our first baby, Fred the dog, passed away one week ago. He had suffered for several years from a crippling arthritus of which we were mostly helpless to do very much for him besides many different vitamen supplements and pain medications. Fred will be remembered for being more than just a pet, but as a friend and loyal family member. He first became part of our family, one month after we were married when Josh brought him home as a surprise to me. He was so small at 5 weeks old, that he was able to sit inside Josh's shoe or baseball cap. Fred lived in Arkansas with us for a brief time, until "circumstances" warrented him moving back to Baltimore with my parents until we relocated there. (Namely don't attack the maintenance man of the building where dogs are really not permitted!) Fred loved playing with balls and learned how to stop them with his paw and roll them across the floor - namely making us play fetch with him and not the other way around. He also loved McDonald's cheeseburgers and every Wednesday night, Josh, Fred and me would load ourselves in the family car for the fabulous double cheeseburger. Fred's limited vocabulary included "Cheeseburger" and "McDonalds", in addition to "Grandpa", "Santa" (his favorite toy) and all the names of everyone in the family. Fred was very sweet and loved all people. He also loved Christmas trees. We now own a fake tree, since Fred did not necessarily understand that you decorate and admire a tree from a distance and not, well eat it. We will miss Fred dearly. It has been a quiet house as we have had to adjust to not hearing him flap his ears and bark at the wind blowing the trash cans outside.

Fred's last meal - two double cheeseburgers,

on a bed of french fries garnished with chicken mcnuggets.

One happy dog!

The Beginning of a New Era...

On November 28th, at 8:25 p.m., our sweet baby boy was born. We named him James Grayson, James a name that Josh choose after his dad and Grayson was a name that I had loved when reading one of my millions of baby name books (and not the one for science fiction character names!). Labor, although insanely painful, was very brief and by the time I even knew I was having contractions, they were two minutes apart and we were rushing to the hospital. The staff at Saint Jo's was amazing, and they did everything to make me comfortable including pushing the epidurel a little ahead of schedule since James was flying along at a pretty fast clip. Five hours after being admitted to St. Jo's, James was born. On hand were plenty of supporting family and friends, including Emily Joy who skillfully videotaped the birth and provided lots of amazing pictures of James first meeting with Josh and me. Erin of course brought Dutch Blitz and entertained the troops in the waiting area. My parents and brother Kevin and wife, Abby, were able to come and visit which helped keep my mind off what kind of pain was coming when actual birth took place. Surprisingly, the epidurel was worth it's weight in gold and birth proved to be one of the most amazing experiences Josh and I have gone through together. Forget the natural birth and take the drugs!! James Grayson was 7.1 pounds and 20 inches long.

Josh passing out chocolate
cigars (of which I ate most of them.)