The Kindness of Friends

After we had Gretchen, we took a few days to be on our own, and then jumped right back into life. We brought her out to dinner when she was 12 days old, we went to the park when she was a mere 7 days old, and in general, life was pretty much back to normal (with the new inclusion of an infant) almost right away.

Things have been different this time around, and I'm blaming the c-section. Holy recovery time! I had no clue how good I had it the first time around! Between that ad the fact that there are now two little ones to entertain/feed/enjoy all day long (and into the night...) we are taking much longer to get back on our feet.  Needless to say, we are thrilled to be expecting grandparents to start arriving next week.

Luckily, our kids are great. Alex is sleeping and eating like a champ, Gretchen has embraced her role as a big sister - and kept the hilarious and often frustrating role as a 2 year old - virtually without incident. Potty training is still going great and life in general is pretty good. The tough part is having these great, fun little ones, and parents that are tired and recovering. It makes for a few "movie afternoons" and "french toast for dinner" nights. We are also lucky in the sense that Gretchen loves all of those things.

It's times like these that make living far from family hard. We would love to have everyone less than a 12 hour flight away - it's just not in the cards for us at the moment. So, I would like to express my thanks to our friends and local support folks that have helped us (more specifically, me) through these early days as a family of four.

So many offers to help, so many visitors that stay just the right amount of time, it has been heartwarming to have so many people reach out to us!

These beautiful flowers that were delivered (I don't even know how you do that here...) to our door, sent by my friend Miyoung:

The lovely ladies at SACS who brought flowers and the killer chocolates from Vasalissa - my favorite! Every night when I was going to eat just one, I ended up with a row of empty wrappers.

And this basket from our friends Jake and Becky that arrived on the morning after Alex and I left the hospital. How thoughtful is this?! Homemade goodies in their own labeled bags - complete with the recipes for said goodies. She even wrote notes about substitutions and omissions that she made. These treats were gobbled down very quickly, and the Homemade Granola (complete with yogurt that didn't make the picture, I had already eaten it...) is a recipe I have already made 2 times on my own. If you are interested in making the best granola ever, visit the 100 Days of Real Food recipe. Becky even left out the coconut, which I was happy to do without!

We are so happy to have these little reminders that even though we're far from home, people are looking out for us. And when the grandparents do arrive, we will greet them with our best 10-point smiles!

Hokie Twinsies!

Little smiles from our little boy!