He Says. She Says.

I was looking over our blog and realized that I haven’t written anything of too much substance recently.  There certainly have been so many changes in my/our lives, the foremost being that our baby pooter is now only 9 weeks away.

That’s right folks…Nine. Weeks. Away. (more…)

Once I had the realization that I was a mere two months away from being a father, I think my reaction was something similar to this:

(Seriously, though… I think I’m okay. Or as okay one would have to be to show you that.) 🙂

Oops, I’m a day late.

I wanted to wish my Daddy Dave the best Father’s Day ever! And Happy Father’s Day to all of mommy and daddy’s dad friends out there!

Love, Baby Max

Our friend Anni posted this on her blog, so we can’t take any credit for discovering such a lovely little gem.

Dave sent me the link earlier today with the comment that he was basically bawling when he read it.  After I read it, I too shed several tears.  I just hope and pray that our little Max is being watched over by his angel as he is growing in my tum.

We’re planning on getting a paper copy so that we can pass it on to Baby Max one day.

Thanks again to Anni for sharing!

For those that like making fire the hard way — try this — making fire with only chocolate and a coke can (okay, and some tinder too)…

Today is the 40th Anniversary of the Loving US Supreme Court decision…had Valerie and I been born earlier and met as recently as 1967 elsewhere in the United States, we wouldn’t have been able to have been legally married then.  That revelation was somewhat sobering to me.

(California gave folks the right to do so in 1948…so at least us Californians were ahead of the curve, even then.)

In any event, after reviewing the website, I then selected the “Real Couples” section…

I read the stories and thought – Hey, I should write a little something about Val and I.  So I did and was going to post it.

Sadly, they are “changing the system and couldn’t take new submissions” or somesuch.  Bummer.

But I thought I’d share what I would’ve posted…

(more…)

Valerie and I were looking forward to June 2^nd for a while, probably moreso than our Sedona vacation (which yes, we still owe a blog post for, we haven’t forgotten)…

June 2^nd was the day that we got our first peek at Maxwell via a 4-D Ultrasound!

Or as Grandpa Steele calls it – “cheating”!  🙂

Seriously, it did have the feel of peeking into a Christmas present before opening it, but I’m sure there will still be plenty of surprises and revelations about little Max when he arrives (currently due for late August) despite the “early preview”.

We crammed both friends and family around to see him for the first time into a small conference room with a couple of monitors, along with a Dell Projector that projected a home-theater sized image onto a wall of what the ultrasound was seeing.  We had a nice fella by the name of Thomas who ran the system and was very calming and reassuring to both of us.

I could go on and on about the technology involved, but heck with that – let’s see the pictures!

(We also have some video, but I’m hoping to change the music up a bit.  Our little dude needs something a bit more hip than a repeating “Rock-a-bye-baby” MIDI audio …)

In this picture – Max is just hanging out.  The mass to the left of the image that obscures it a little is the placenta.  He decided to hang out behind it for about ½ the session, just to mess with his folks a bit.

The next picture is the same picture as before, but I wanted to point out the things you can make out with the 4-D ultrasound. 

Near as we could tell…

• He’s got the Villaraza nose…
• We think he’s got the Steele eye shape
• There’s a possible dimple near his mouth that Val thinks is a Dave feature (I’ve never noticed it, but I’ll take Val’s word for it)
• Not shown here:  He’s got his father’s bum.

Other notable pictures:

He’s already pacifying himself with his thumb.

I think his eyes are actually open in this shot and with the 4-D ultrasound imaging, it’s kind of a creepy effect… but at least he no longer looks like Ghost Rider…

And here he is doing his stretching exercises, touching both his hand and his FOOT to his head.  I really didn’t know babies were that flexible…!

And, of course, here’s one where he’s channeling his inner rebellious teenager…

“NO PICTURES!”

Seriously, though – it was a great day.  Valerie and I are very happy with our little Maxwell, and we’re even more excited to meet him in August when he’s ready to come out!

We love you, our little son!  Keep growing and we’ll see you soon!!

Love,

Mommy and Daddy