Happy Thanksgiving

Halloween came and went. It's now late November and the snow is falling, a day before Thanksgiving, making holiday travel for many a royal pain. Luckily Uncle Grish and Grandma and Grandpa Spirn flew in for the holiday earlier in the week and they're here in Minneapolis, safe and sound, ready to celebrate with us.

Lena is taking her third nap of the day, while Daniel bakes pies in the kitchen for dinner tomorrow at the Pesky's house. With Thanksgiving around the corner there's so much to be thankful for.

We're thankful for our cozy home. It isn't selling as fast as we'd like, but it's not too bad a place to be stuck in for a while.

We're thankful for Dan's job, and his attainment of Tenure. Thank you University of Minnesota!

We're thankful that Deborah is happy and able to stay home with little Lenabel.

We're thankful for the long and beautiful Fall we were able to enjoy this year, before the snow started falling.

We're thankful for Minneapolis, a safe and peaceful, albeit cold, place where we are able to raise our family.

We're thankful for our good health and the good health of our loved ones.

We're thankful for our family and friends. We feel so much love and kindness and we're so thankful to have such wonderful people in our lives. Without you we'd be alone in the world, it would be much less fun and a whole lot more scary out there.

We're thankful to have a beautiful and healthy baby girl who continues to amaze us with her giggles and smiles. Lena you have brought a joy into our lives that we didn't know was possible, a love that is so big and strong it's hard to describe. Thank you for your presence in our lives.

My First Halloween

We celebrated Halloween yesterday with a costume party at our house. We had 13 babies, 3 toddlers, 1 big girl, and 15 adults in our living room. The more the merrier as we say here at the Spirn household.

Lena had a great time with her friends and we loved seeing all the kiddos in their costumes. Lena was a lamb, a hand me down from her friend Jasper. There were also a zebra, a pea pod, a hot dog, a pumpkin, a garden gnome, and two giraffes, two lions, and two dinosaurs. A true zoo!

Puppies!

Lena was smothered by puppies yesterday! On our way home from a walk we saw these puppies playing in the park, and we just had to stop and say hello. Mama dog was there, with her little kiddos, one of them sold and the other three looking for homes. These Swiss Mountain Dogs were adorable, and Dan's lucky we're trying to sell our house and don't have the time to take care of a puppy, or we certainly would have ended up taking one of these home! They were so sweet with Lenabel, and the Mama dog too.

Nighty Night

Lenabel went to sleep totally on her own today, for the first time in her life. We've been on a pretty decent schedule with the little one for the past couple of weeks, and today was the highlight. After feeding, a bath, and a couple of lullabies, we put her down in her crib awake, and she talked to herself for a while, let out a couple short little yelps, and after about fifteen minutes or so, fell asleep. It was by far the easiest bedtime we've had with her yet, and very satisfying to feel that she is slowly but surely learning how to get herself to sleep on her own. She still can't do this for naps, but at night she's been getting better and better, and earned an A++ tonight!

Little Fish!

We took Lenabel to the pool at the YWCA today for her first swim and she did awesome! She was pretty much a natural!! All that practice in the bath tub sure paid off... not to mention all that swimming we did together when I was pregnant!

Today she went into the water without any crying, except when we tried to get her upper half wet. The water was at 84 degrees, so not too cold, but probably not as warm as she would have liked. Still, she seemed to really enjoy herself in the pool and we had a great time watching and swimming with her. We can't wait to cheer her on from the bleachers in her first 100 meter freestyle race!

Mystified by Sleep

"Whoever came up with the saying 'sleep like a baby' obviously never had one." I read this quote the other day and couldn't help but laugh. How incredibly true. We've been dealing with some crazy sleep patterns for the past two weeks, and I must admit it is getting kind of tiring. Lena seems to have two or three good nights a week, where she sleeps 6 hours at a time, feeds around 3 a.m., and then sleeps another good chunk. But these good nights are inevitably followed by several very bad nights where she decides to wake up every hour on the hour to eat and fuss and poop and pee, and do whatever else babies do when everybody else in the house just wants to sleep. It's hard when Lena doesn't sleep well, partly because Dan and I don't get any sleep and become cranky and unhappy, but also because we know she can do better than wake up every hour, and we just can't seem to understand why she's reverting back to bad sleep habits.

Tonight it's just mom and Lenabel for the first time ever. The dog-sitter taking care of Gus and Charly while Grandma's on vacation had a family emergency and had to go out of town, so Daniel is sleeping over at Grandma's house and taking care of the dogs until she gets home tomorrow. Lucky daddy gets to sleep uninterrupted all night long, and he definitely deserves the break. Let's hope Lena sleeps well tonight and gives mama a much needed break too!

Lena's Naming Ceremony

Today we celebrated Lena's birth with a traditional Jewish naming ceremony, performed by Rabbi Barry Citron. With this ceremony we wanted to take the opportunity to explain why we chose the name Lena.

We named Lena after Daniel's father's mother, Lena Spirn, who was born in 1904 in New York City. Lena was a beloved mother of three sons and grandmother to seven grandchildren. Without a doubt her husband, sons, and her grandchildren were the most important part of her life. Though she didn't have more than a high school education, she had a sharp and insightful mind, something that she certainly transferred to her sons. She died last year at the age of 105. Lena's Hebrew name was Leah.

So we hope that Lena shares with her great grandmother a love of family, a quick and thoughtful mind, and a long healthy life.

Lena's Naming Ceremony and party were a huge success due to help from so many family members and friends. Thank you Grandma Marion and Grandpa Irwin for letting us use the party room in your beautiful new condo building. Thanks also for the many food runs to Costco! Thanks Naomi, Talia, and Levi for helping set up the party room! Thanks to Baba Delia for the delicious empanadas, and to Zeide Ben for the yummy bagels and coffee. A big thanks to Baba Dorita for her exquisite Torta de Chocolinas! And thanks Christina, Elise, and Holly for dressing Lena this morning, and picking out such a lovely outfit for her big day. Thank you everybody for joining us on such a happy day.