Tommy

At the end of May, we finally got to meet the newest member of our family.

It has been so sweet.

We are all big fans of Tommy.

We love the funny faces he makes. He's just soft and precious and wonderful. 

Sofia and Annika were brave enough to be in the delivery room, so they got to hold their newest brother before everyone else. Sofia likes to scare us by saying things like, "three more years and I get to have one of my own!" I told her five more years sounded better to me. She and Annika have also been arguing about which one of them will have ten kids first. It will be interesting to see what comes of all of those plans. I'm just glad they weren't scared out of ever procreating (by witnessing childbirth). I want grandkids some day!

Anthony has always, always loved babies. However, he isn't the lullabying snuggler that the girls are.  As I think is pretty typical of men, he loves it once he can make the babies laugh and smile. Tommy starts smiling as soon as he sees his big brother coming toward him, cause he just knows what a fun party it's going to be.

Cozy was really hoping for a little sister.

Although she still thinks it would be fun to dress up a little sister, she adores Tommy.

"I didn't know how cute he would be....cause I didn't know boys could be cute...I guess

 when they're babies."

Sofia is very protective of her tiny brother. She was always concerned that I am not holding him right or being careful enough. Seriously? I'm pretty sure I have a handle on being careful with newborns.

When baby brother came home, we had an "instructional talk" with the little children about how careful you have to be with babies. Their necks are not very strong, so you must always be gentle and can never shake them. 

They obviously took it to heart. 

Cozy had nightmares about shaking the baby and having his head fall off. 

James told us that we should never get a doll that looks like the baby....and that if we do, we must be very careful with the doll, so as not to hurt Tommy. 

Funny, cause we didn't even have the "voodoo doll talk".

Before Tommy was born, James anticipated the baby being nearly as cute as our cat.

(Cozy has been granted to have this same "almost as cute as Matt the cat" cuteness status. She's cried about it. Some people are used to being considered the cutest things ever. I'd be pretty happy to be half as cute as Matt.)

In James' estimation, Tommy has now surpassed Matt in cuteness. The baby is officially the cutest.

My wonderful mother was invaluable during the new-baby-transition. Driving kids around, snuggling baby, cooking, and all of those other things you wouldn't even think to ask - she did them.

(Grandma even took the kids to the aquarium in Baltimore!)

It has been a happy, baby-snuggling time.