Bedtime Activities

The only established routine we have right now is Evie's bedtime. We use the term "bedtime" loosely because it can actually take over 3 to 4 hours to get her to sleep for the night after beginning the bedtime routine.

First, she gets a warm bath. She LOVES the bath, especially when we wash her hair. However, she doesn't seem to like it when we take pictures of her spiked hair.




Then, she gets diapered, massaged and dressed. Here, she is looking at Snoopy and thinking his nose is a breast. Sorry little girl, there is no food in Snoopy's nose!


Afterwards, she listens to her favorite CD of lullabies while Tim reads to her or just plays with her.


"I love you daddy" Evie says. It makes us forgive the fact that we will be up past 1 a.m. trying to lull her to sleep for the night. Sweet girl, she is worth all the effort.

Light Sleep Resistance Fighter

Evie has officially declared her status as a card-carrying member of the Light Sleep Resistance Movement. This movement is joined by newborn babies every day, who have declared that they will not go to sleep easily and will fight sleep for hours on end, determined that the ex-utero world is much more fascinating than anything they could encounter in their sleep. Evie, our household Light Sleep Resistance Fighter, has a specialty move that she likes to employ after her mommy and daddy have invested at least an hour of active rocking, walking, nursing and singing. After she has been placed in the bassinet and wrapped up like a burrito, she has the ability to return from the edge of deep sleep in the time it takes for us to walk to the other side of the room. Ahhh, her powers are astounding...

Here are some pictures of mommy and daddy in action, trying to convince their little Light Sleep Resistance Fighter to succumb to dreamland...



She "looks" asleep, but do not be fooled!

Notice the look of exhaustion on daddy's face. This is a direct result of fruitless hours of fighting the Light Sleep Resistance Movement.

Kung Feet

Little Evangeline has the legendary Kung feet, i.e. big feet with the finger toes. It is a persistent trait of the Kung women, and now we are passing it down to our children (Ella Reese, her cousin, has them too). She is headed for a future of many hours of digging around in sale racks in the shoe store looking for fashionable size 10 wide shoes to little avail. Witness the feet and begin preparing your compassionate responses when she comes to you with complaints of how hard it is to find decent shoes.

Pregnancy Empathy

We have started putting Evie in the sling whenever she is getting sleepy but doesn't want to be detached from our bodies. Tim loves wearing her in the sling--he says it makes him feel like he is pregnant. :)

Random Pictures

Here are some other pictures. Evie has got some super lungs, and when she wails you can literally feel your inner core of peace and happiness being physically compromised. One way to solve this is to cork her with a thumb, as Tim demonstrates below.

Chipmunk cheeks! With the way she eats, I keep telling her she is trying to store up food for winter in her cheeks, which isn't necessary.

This is playtime, yesterday. She has started to focus in on the hanging star and the string of beads above her bassinet.

This picture is also from yesterday. Hasn't her face started to change?!

Pictures of Her Sleeping

She eats, cries and then sleeps. That is the pattern of her life right now. We seem to have tons of pictures of her sleeping. Perhaps this is because we are more apt to find her adorable when she is sleeping rather than crying. I think it is also because we are calmer and more likely to think about taking pictures.


You may notice socks on her hands from time to time. They are doubling as her mittens so she won't scratch her very round face.


Don't you just feel peaceful looking at her sleeping?

Daddy's Little Girl

Yeah, we played that game of "who does she look like?" and in my opinion, Tim is winning. Here is a picture of our little family--can you see any resemblances?

Okay, now look at Tim and Evie. She has his chin and mouth and his forehead. The eyes and hair are definitely mine, the jury is still out on the nose. And of course, she has the Kung feet with finger-like toes. I have several pics of that, I'll post them later.
Look, they even sleep the same way! (I couldn't figure out how to upload it as a rotated pic, the computer is stubborn--just turn your head.) She's daddy's little girl. This means Trouble For Tim!!

By the way, if you can see it, the time on Tim's watch says "1:20". That's a.m., folks. I was taking pictures of sleeping people at 1a.m. because I had just put her to sleep (in our bed of course, but at 1 a.m. you are desperate).

Grandparents!

So sorry we haven't been keeping up with the blog and posting pics, but if you have ever been a parent of a newborn infant, you will understand that Tim and I have been using every spare moment to sleep or eat (and there haven't been many of those!). So, because she is finally sleeping 4 hours during the night -- God answers prayers, folks -- I am more coherent to finally pay attention to activities other than feeding the baby, changing the baby, comforting a crying baby, putting a fussy baby to sleep, etc.

Here are some pics of Evie's grandparents. My mom, and Tim's parents came in town when Evie was born to help out and to coo over their new granddaughter. They made endless delicious meals, cleaned the house, held the baby so Tim and I could catch a few hours of sleep here and there, and were founts of wonderful wisdom concerning baby care.

Evie and Grammy. Do you see Evie's face? That's her "newborn" face--all chipmunk cheeks. As soon as I find the cord that syncs the camera to the computer, I will post more recent photos--her face has already changed! Her cheeks aren't as chubby, for one thing.
Evie and Granddaddy. Actually, Ray said he wanted Evie to pick out the name she would use to call him. He may have to wait for awhile. In the meantime, should we refer to him as "Ray Dalton, otherwise known as your Grandfather"?
Evie with PawPaw -- Chinese name for maternal grandmother. She's modeling another of Ami's creations. I love the hat on her because she looks like she's wearing a colorful flower arrangement. Hilarious!
Yeah for Grandparents!

Evangeline is here!!

She is finally here! Evangeline En-mei Dalton came into this world on Thursday, January 25th at 6:51 PM. She came in weighing 8 and a half pounds and 20 inches long. She has got a full head of dark hair and adorable, chubby cheeks!

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These matching winter hats were made by my sister, Ami. Evie is a lot of fun to play with and show her around (the house). It was such a strange feeling when I saw her for the first time: How can I be responsible for her?

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Well, obviously we have more pictures and stories to tell, but I just wanted to get this "mini-post" out there so everyone can see our pride and joy! Peace!