the adventures of super nova babe

the following pictures show what we did last sunday after we came home from church. sometimes the afternoons get kind of long, so we act kind of like 3 year olds. perhaps we need to get out more......poor, poor nova.....


nova is a baby by day



















but being a baby ALL the time is boring......



















so she is super nova babe by night.














during the day she likes to wear dresses and look super cute.















but at night she saves dad from the evil mommy (who wears nova's underwear on her head.....)



















super nova babe to the rescue!

super nova babe

i have nothing to blog about at this time.....i do actually, but nova hasn't pooped for 3 days and i am currently saving my energy for the blow-out of her life-time. it probably won't happen until i sit down at church tommorrow......all the more reason to send her to priesthood with dan......plus i know how much dan loves toting my bright diaper bag around. most people look at blogs for the pics anyway, so here are some that we took this morning.


nova looking cute
nova still looking cute nova laughing and smiling
nova looking like a slightly balding babe and is wondering why we have been taking pictures of her for the last 20 minutes. we have been scrubbing her head a little too hard apparently....i'm sure it will grow back though, or i guess she'll just look like grandpa hall! :)

24

so i am a little embarrassed to admit what i have done for the past week. my reasons for not blogging are not strictly due to nova and my frequent naps, diaper changes and feedings. no, no my friends, i have become caught up, obsessed, and sucked into a television series. captivated really---its a little sick. let me explain.

our landlords brought down the first season of 24 for me to watch. i had heard it was pretty good, so i watched an episode thinking that it would be decent and would give me something to watch while i fed nova. little did i know what i was getting into. i became hooked. i watched yet another and then another. dan realized that i was in a 24 frenzy and wanted to jump on the boat----the couch actually, we don't really watch tv in a boat---its just an expression......anyway, he also became caught up in the mania---a jack bower bonanza you could say. but he came up with this idea we should watch it together. which is great, but i had to wait all day till he came home to watch it. this was a struggle---plus i had to re-watch the episodes that i already had seen. well, i could blog for 24 hours about the first season of 24, but all i will say is this. what is up with the end? dan and i finished it and i have been beside myself ever since. nova was asleep and we stayed up to finish it----i lost 2 1/2 hours of precious sleep to finish it to only be so worked up by the end that i couldn't sleep anyway! AHHHHH!!!!

ok, so i feel a little better, and i really would blog about something else, but 24 really has taken up my free time lately as pathetic as that is. in other news, i went running for the first time since the baby--instead of ranting and raving about that experience i will sum it up in 3 words: pain and suffering. ok, get real, like i know how to be brief when i blog. the run felt awesome for the first 10 steps. after that, i seriously considered stopping to use a pay phone to call an ambulance to come pick me up. the only problem with that plan is that i didn't have enough wind to speak into the phone. the other problem was that they don't have pay phones on country roads.....go figure. my second plan was to throw myself in front of oncoming traffic to put myself out of my misery, but i have a child to feed. seeing that plan A and plan B wouldn't work out i had no choice but to finish my run. it was really embarrassing though when our 85 year old neighbor melba passed me while she was walking her dog. ok, so i really wasn't going that slow, but it sure was the longest 20 minutes of my life....especially since i knew i could be home watching 24.......yeah i know, i'm pathetic.

alright, enough rambling already---here are some recent pics of the nova-nater. nova chill'n on the couch
nova liked watching 24 too.......just kidding, we were playing musical chairs---j/k again.....


dan sporting the 'euro-rider'---very sexy......he insisted on wearing it when we went for a walk the other day. it was hilarious! (don't ask me why he is pulling that face.....maybe he has a gas bubble.....)
nova looking ADORABLE!

firsts

i can only imagine what it is like to be a baby. i think it must be very exciting because everything is a first. your first bath, your first eye booger, your first sneeze, your first blow-out, ect. this blog is about firsts. something that i didn't blog about was nova and i's (is that correct english?) first day at home together. we woke up just like any other day and we ate. i then had a good old heart to heart with my daughter explaining that today was the beginning of alot of days together and that we wanted to start it off on the right foot. well, it didn't exactly work out that way. you could say it was a little backwards.

you see, after our heart to heart i went in to get nova dressed. dressing a week and a half old baby isn't the easiest thing in the world. you have a tiny piece of material that you have to manuver onto a tiny body. seems simple enough, but it is a little tricky now and then. after a few cries and several minutes and suzanne wondering if it would be best to join a nudist colony to avoid this trauma in the future----we finally were all dressed from head to toe---success! hair done, socks on, and onesie snapped. something didn't seem right though.....oh, that would be because i had her onesie on backwards......after all of that! (maybe that was why it was so hard to get on......hmmm) maybe i'm a bad mom, but i just left it---i didn't feel like it was worth the fight. but to make it a little better, i put my shirt on backwards thinking that we would just have a themed backwards day......so it was nova's first day with mom home alone, and the first time she wore her onesie backwards, and her first themed day--i think she was a little worn out......dan came home and was a little confused as to why the women in his life were dressed abnormally. i think he is secretly wondering if our kids will turn out a little backwards---its quite possible i suppose.......all i have to say is that i really hope i can manage to dress her better for her first day of kindergarten!

anyway, another first was last sunday---it was her first week at church. it was pretty fun to show her off. here are some pics from sunday.
like i said---i hope nova survives us as parents! nova says, "somebody help me!!!!" :)

the "S" cwirl

dan has been in desparate need----and i mean desperate need----of a hair cut. it has been INSANELY long. i have been asking, and well, begging really, to give him a hair cut for the last 3 1/2 weeks. why has it taken so long? one word. trust. you see, i am no hair stylist. nor am i a beautician by any stretch of the imagination. i have only cut his hair a maximum of 3 times and it has been under beautician supervision---my little sister. basically i have a strategy. i start cutting it, and then natalie (my little sister) thinks its so painful to watch me do it, that she ends up doing it herself. (brilliance, i know) the problem with this strategy is that natalie is no longer around and dan knows it----so it is just dan, me and a set of clippers. it frightens him to say the least. it frightens me frankly---tho i would never admit it. basically cutting hair to me is as painful as chewing on tin foil. i dislike it for several reasons--let me give you the top 5.

5--i dislike the clipper control---yes, some may enjoy the power to cut and trim if you are well trained in the art of trimming and clipping. some describe it as invigorating. i don't. you see, if you can't channel the power of clipper control, you end up with random bald spots that look anything but natural. and that is a bad thing. which brings me to reason #4.

4--fear--i would love to take the responsibility for a good hair cut, but don't want to take responsibility for a bad one. plus i don't want to attend social events with someone who looks like their barber is a weed whacker or a 4 year old. so because i am scared, i am timid which brings me to reason #3.

3--the critique--don't get me wrong, i LOVE dan---i am absolutely c to the razy about him, but when it comes to cutting his luscious locks, he is a particular and picky. i work and work, and then he analyzes and scrutinizes. then he speculates. and finally he articulates how it needs to be a little shorter here, a little longer there (uh...too late for that....) and how it needs to be a little more blended here and a little thinner there and so on and so forth.......which brings me to reason #2.

2--the time----what would take a barber probably 15 minutes and 15 bucks takes me an hour and a half, and i am not any richer after the event is over. just exhausted, and hairy, which brings me to the top reason why i dislike cutting hair and will never EVER become a beautician.

1--hair phobia---i'll admit it, i have a hair phobia. little hairs all over me, and little hairs all over my bathroom AND the little hairs that are microbial and are all over EVERYTHING totally gross me out. you walk in it, you breath it, it gets in your underwear----BLAH!!!! it makes me itchy and scratchy! call me a pansy, call me a hair-a-phob, i don't care. i even wrote a poem about it---i call it, "An Ode to the Hair-a-Phob" it is only a verse of the 5 verses that i have composed.

hair, hair everywhere,
over here, over there,
itchy in my underwear,
why do i have to cut this hair,
it isn't fair, to cut the hair,
why don't you go and buy some nair?
or go to the barber who's name is blair?
then i would not have to wear your hair
on my very favorite pair.....of jeans.

anyway..... this weekend, i finally convinced dan that we needed to cut it since my mom was here visiting and she could watch nova so i could completely focus on his head. what would be worse than cutting dan's hair would be cutting his hair while nova was crying, or cutting it while dan was holding nova. hairy bathroom, and hairy nova-----itch-a-licious, and not an option for me. SO, after much persuasion, we were in the bathroom with the clippers and an old sheet on the floor to catch the majority of the little hairy fly-aways that infiltrate the atmosphere......insert shudder here.......

needless to say, its done and over with and i don't have to do it for another 4-6 weeks. however, i made a discover that is hair related, and since this blog is all about hair, i thought i would add this little tidbit of information. dan has given nova a gift. it is the gift of the "S" curl/swirl---i call it a cwirl. when dan's hair gets longer, his sideburns have a magical trick. his sideburns start writing my name. they make the letter "S"---ok, not really but the cwirl looks sort of like an S or a backwards S. anyway, its a little bizarre. i think i could go on and on about the "S" cwirl, but this blog is already entirely too long. but i will just show some pictures to show how nova has inherited the "S" cwirl from dan. its like an eye-spy----can you find the cwirl?

an un-timely blog

one might ask why i am blogging at nearly 10 pm at night with a newborn. well, frankly, i don't know. perhaps its insanity, or maybe you reach a point where sleep is like a used kleenex---you just don't need it anymore. ok, bad analogy, but dan and nova are currently sleeping on the couch and although i am looking longingly at them from the computer, i decided i would take a moment and blog since i haven't done so in a while. but mark my words----i will be joining them momentarily.

things in the hope household are going excellente. what have we been up to lately? well, we don't really sleep, we change ALOT of diapers, and nova isn't the only one drooling around here. dan and i do our fair share of drooling over the absolutely adorable offspring that we have managed to produce. its a little ridiculous. it makes you wonder what goes through a newborn's mind as her parents are 6 inches from her face (which in the middle of the night can't be that pleasant with my morning breath----maybe thats why she cries.........anyway........) and are constantly kissing and singing to her and touching her head, feet, arms, legs and toes----she probably feels more like a kitten than a child. but then again, she doesn't really know what a kitten is at this point in her life, so i guess it doesn't matter. i have decided that is why nova sleeps so much, when she sleeps, we have a tendency to leave her alone. but man when those eyes pop open----mom and dad hope start oo-ing and ah-ing like its the 4th of july.

in other news, we have some pet ducks. yes, pet ducks. we have a small stream that runs by our house and we have 2 ducks who like to stare into our window----which is why i close the blinds----its a little creepy! i haven't named them yet, but nova and i have had extensive discussions on what they should be. she hasn't given me too much imput however.......go figure.

other than that, nothing else is going on. here is a picture we took a few days ago as nova is getting ready to go to bed----very typical of bedtime---she is wide awake---but nova and i like the night life, what can we say? i told dan to take some pictures, and he got insanely close---i guess now we know how nova feels when we are all up in her face! and i am off to join the rest of my family! i am going to bed.