It’s been a little over a month since my last post. And in just a few days I’ll have a baby girl that is one month old. Hard to believe is an understatement. People always say the time goes so quickly when you have children, boy is that ever true. It seems like both yesterday and a lifetime ago that I was making lactation cookies and wondering if I’d be pregnant forever.

As my OB told me many times, no one is pregnant forever. Amelia Grace came right on her due date, my friends laughed that she was so punctual, unlike her mother who habitually runs a few minutes (or more than a few) late. I won’t bore you with a birth story but we arrived at the hospital around 8:30 and at 8:03 that evening, there was our baby girl.

She is pretty perfect, although I am definitely biased.

And if you asked me that during one of her inconsolable, rough periods (luckily we only have about one of these a day) I might change my tune just slightly.

These photos were taken by Cassie Clayshultz, the hospital photographer about 14 hours after she was born. I also had pictures taken of her birth, something I never in a million years thought I’d do, but am very glad I did.

A friend of mine who is a photographer and wants to get into birth shoots asked if she could document mine for practice. Somewhat reluctantly, I agreed and it turned out to be such a wonderful decision. The photos are absolutely beautiful. I don’t consider myself an overly emotional person and I couldn’t help but cry the first time I looked through them. They capture so much love and emotion. I’ll consider sharing a few of the not graphic ones 🙂

So this is what I’ve been up to over the last month. Loving on a newborn, which basically consists of nursing, changing, snuggling, shushing, rocking, swaddling rinse and repeat. If you’ve never done it, it is definitely a lot more exhausting and time consuming than it sounds, although very worth it of course. We don’t yet have anything resembling a schedule and I’ve been fortunate enough to receive lots of meals from friends and family as cooking has been impossible/least of my worries.

One of these days I’m sure life will be a little more normal. Or at least a new normal. And hopefully I can cook something. And go somewhere (baby girl will get her first passport sooner rather than later!). And write more than one blog post a month.

But for now, it’s nursing, changing, snuggling, shushing, rocking and swaddling. Rinse and Repeat ❤