Happy Thanksgiving!

 We sure hope everyone's day was as swell as ours.  We had the traditional feast over at Gana and Grandad's place. 

Here Stephen tries his best to win the admiration of a 4 year old. 

Little Loreli was the belle of the ball, being passed from arm to arm. But since she is a snuggler she really didn't mind.  I don't think she has slept that much in one day yet.  Auntie Kristen has a way with sleeping babes.

We opened Loreli's Christmas present from Aunt Lane for her, a month early.

And here lies the true meaning of thanksgiving.  As you can see that table is full, so the rest of the pies were on a different table.  That is the best problem to have.

Fashion Show!

Baby Loreli has received quite a lot of clothes from admirers so she has been put through the tortures of being dressed and undressed repeatedly for the sakes of vanity and cuteness

  One of her "Grown in Idaho" onesies from Megan and Aaron

This saucey jacket and pants combo from Auntie Kristen.  Maybe she'll wear that one next year.

Her Christmas pj's she might not fit into come Christmas

Her Christmas Dress

But with all of these clothes, naked is still her favorite, and who can disagree? Naked sure does rock, as long as it's not too cold. 



 

She lives!

Finally some open eye pictures.

I think this was after bath time while she was lounging about. 

 She really seems to like this chair-a-majig thing and who wouldn't? It sings, bounces, vibrates, has monkeys,  throw in a drink holder and make it bigger and I'll take two.

Fatherhood and been both harder and easier that I thought it would be.   Easier Example: For all of you who so doubted my skills, I am still able to get in a nap a day if I so choose.  Maybe you just weren't committed enough. 

Harder Example:  I have much younger siblings, young enough even that they could be my own children if I were just a bit wayward, so I have had to change a few diapers.  But I had one out of a nightmare this morning.  I knew that they would be gross but I have never had to fight the gags back like this.  Seriously, it's been an hour since Loreli tried to kill me and my throat still is twitching.  If it were up to me the two blankets she contaminated would just be burnt, but Katy wants to wash them.  I think I can get over it but we'll see.  Hopefully it didn't weaken my defenses too much that I will puke next time, but that could possibly get me out of changing diapers for a year or two.

Pictures, pictures, pictures

I was trying to ration the pictures we had and give everyone a new taste of the little cutie each day.  But I guess I better just give everything we have before and angry mob comes after me with pitchforks and torches at 4 PM.  

So without further adieu or commentary, here you go. 

She sleeps a lot even by my reckoning

Hospital Visitors

Once the delivery was all over and Katy was checked out we were moved into the postpartum room where we received many visitors.

Katy's sister Amy stopped by a few times.

Grandpa came by and brought her some cute new outfits.

Kristen wasn't sick she was just being cautious.

Matt has a way of making babies look even smaller.  I wonder why that is. 

Katy was feeling pretty good by this point.

She had to be unwrapped for every visitor which she handled pretty well actually.

And then there were three

Katy started having contractions Thursday afternoon and by 6 they were regular, about 6 minutes apart.  By 8 they were 4 minutes apart and from what I was told they hurt a lot, so we went to the hospital.  First we went to a trauma room to make sure she actually was in labor. 

 See, she doesn't look too comfy.  The giant kidney jello mold is for spewing into, but luckily it wasn't needed.  That probably would have sent her husband out to the waiting room for a few hours.

When it was confirmed we went to a delivery room.  This was about 11.  Katy's first request was "epidural"! 

This is Katy's favorite person on the whole damn planet.  Who knew that someone who puts a 4 inch needle into your spine (and then charges you 2 grand for 20 minutes of work) could be so appreciated?

The whole night there were 2 or 3 nurses or interns or doctors that would stop in and check on Katy, but you know that real junk is really happening when 90 people come storming into the room. 

Here are a few of them: three nurses, a doctor, a resident, there was an intern in there you can't see, another doctor, a mother, a fan boy/ice feeder/photographer/husband, a couple other nurses that were in and out a bunch and this one guy named Lou.

And then they wheel out this cart that has a blanket on top of it so you think it is the big plastic tub they put the baby it. Nope! They whip of the towel to reveal their table of torturing implements.  Sweet Junk!  Maybe I have watched too many movies but I swear one of the nurses called that doctor Dr. Rudmila Krubutkin.  I didn't want to cause a fuss so I just kept waving my pillow at Katy.
I guess nothing can really prepare you for being in labor, or being in a  delivery room not in labor but just hanging out while a baby is born.  The first real noise of labor that came from Katy really took me by surprise.  She's a pretty soft spoken lady, except to Kade, but the sound that came out of her was something between the squawk of a Cockatoo and a circular saw.  Kind of a noise that really makes your bones hurt.  But that only lasted about 2 and a half hours.  Then there was a baby.

This crappy picture is with Anna, the nurse that was there the whole time and she even stayed 30 minutes after her shift to see what we the baby was.  We really liked her.

Understandably mom was tired, so they took the new baby girl to the nursery for a few hours.  

A picture just for Mysha

What it is I do

As you may know I am currently interning at a power plant on the Vanderbilt University campus.  For those of you who don't "habla e-power plant-o" here is a guided tour of what I do (or what I watch guys do would be a more correct description).

 This is the main control panel.  Between the board, the computer screens there and what is to the left out of the picture we can see the measurements of most of the plant's procedures. 

Here's the stuff to the left.  This is actually a very small control room compared to a full size industrial plant, but it's good to start on.

 This is the bottom floor.  The main building is four stories.  These upside-down pyramids are the hoppers that catch the ash from the boiler.  

 This is also the bottom floor.  These are the main feedwater pumps that supply the boilers with water.  They are 700 hp motors!

 This is the second floor looking down the line at the front of 3 of the 4 boilers. 

 This is the furnace in the boiler.  1200 degrees, burning through roughly 5 tons of coal an hour- depending on the load.  

Pretty.  When I get cold in the controls room I just go out and stand by the boiler for a bit.  Warms ya right up.  

 The coal silo.  This will hold 1100 tons of coal and running at full load would last about 5 days. 

But this bloke comes every morning and delivers 25 tons. 

This is one of the turbines.  This is the guy that takes 700 psi, 650 degree steam and turns it into electricity and 80 psi, 250 degree steam to send out onto the campus.  The steam is actually their main priority.  Generating electricity is just a nice byproduct.  

And this is a turtle.