Bejus and Eldie

Louis has stopped referring to himself as Widdie, but has now adopted the equally confusing Bejus. At least he has gotten closer with Elsie.

About a month ago, Louis stopped trying to kill Elsie and decided that he might actually kind of like her. She's the first person he wants to see in the morning, loads lots of kisses on her and is starting to take a general interest in what she is up to. He is also concerned when he hears her crying. I'm starting to think they may end up friends after all......
P.S. I have no idea why Louis looks drugged in both of these pictures.

Elsie

I've been terrible at posting pictures for the grandparents and family of Elsie, so here are a few of her from just this afternoon. Her curly hair is just growing and growing!

Long Time

No pictures in a while, we know. We've just been busy vacationing in Alaska, playing on the New England beaches, genearlly enjoying the summer and learning to juggle two kids. Elsie is an awesome baby and just lets us drag her anywhere and sleeps when / where she can.
Elsie didn't look so great in that last picture, so here's a few right before Church last Sunday.

Widdie and Algae

Its been a little over a month since Elsie was born and we have had lots of visitors and have enjoyed having James off of work for a full month! Elsie is a great baby- she sleeps wonderfully at night and eats like a champ (hence the double chin and fat rolls at 4 weeks old in these pics). Louis has dubbed her Algae. We think she's pretty cute.


Louis has started referring to himself as Widdie this last week. We are confused by this because his pronuciation of other words is remarkably coherent. He has a hard time with the S sound, but has no problem with L, so we're stumped at where he came up with Widdie. He even proudly pats his chest with one hand and solemnley declares "Widdie" when we ask him what his name is.
Louis has had the hardest time out of all of us adjusting to the new baby. He vasilates between intense love and extreme jealousy. Unfortunately, both emotions are extremely physical and must be demonstrated by intense hugging and kissing or slapping and poking. I know it will just take some time for him to adjust, so after trying lots of different methods to curb his behaviors, I'm opting for patience. Luckily, we've noticed a difference the last couple of days. Instead of trying to cover her face with his hand while riding in the double stroller today, he lovingly put his hand on her cheek and left it there for almost the whole ride.

To help Louis we tried to do a lot of activities he might enjoy this month. One of them was the zoo so that Louis could see all of his favorite animals. He loves bear, lions (roars), monkeys, birds and goats. He thought he was so bad checking out this bear.
Also at the zoo James decided to show him this monkey mask. At first Louis was just a little confused by his Dad in a monkey mask.

Then he was a little worried.......

Then he was outright terrified.

Of course we didn't stop after the first time he freaked out, I had to dig the camera out of the bag to take some pictures. The reaction the second time around was the same. Ahhhh the joys of torturing your young children.

Emma, these are for you....

Since we stole them from your box set, we thought you should at least see the results.

Baby Elsie

On June 5th we welcomed baby number two into our family. Melissa had a very fast (making up for all of extra waiting we had to endure) and pretty easy labor (her words, not mine) that literally lasted less than two and a half hours. We barely made it into the birth center before the baby was born! Melissa was amazing. Some people call her tough and "Pioneer Womanish" and I would have to agree. True to form, when our midwife asked how she was feeling after the baby was born she answered, "Without all those contractions, I feel great." In response to this the midwife asked are you ok to move, to which Melissa replied, "Oh yeah I could walk home with my baby." Don't ask me why she would choose to say that but I can say that I've heard some of the best quotes from her right after labor. After laboring with Louis it was the same. That time she said after having Louis "Whew, that was it...(cracking a smile), that wasn't so bad." Both times she had the nurses and midwife rolling.

At 6:22AM we were pleasantly surprised to welcome a beautiful little girl into our family (we hadn't found out before hand what the gender would be). We named her Elsie June Tehani Faustino. Elsie meaning God is my Oath, June after June Oberg Melissa's amazing grandmother aka Grannie and Tehani meaning caress or scent of a flower. To our surprise she was more tan, a whole pound and six ounces heavier, and had more hair than Louis if you can believe that. Lets just hope her thick beautiful wavy hair doesn't thin and fall out like Louis' did after a couple of months when he had the sparse and mangy old man comb over hairdo going. We'll have the sense to cut it this time if it happens to Elsie, instead of parading around a little brown Benjamin Button look alike as we did with poor little Louis.

Elsie has come home to a lot of love - her older brother just cannot keep her hands off of her, and Mom and Dad are of course thrilled with her too. She is a good eater, sleeper and generally content baby. For any of you who were around us when Louis was a newborn, you know this is a big deal and we appreciate it fully!

I attached some pics for your viewing enjoyment. I don't have too many uploaded so sorry for posting the two baby announcements.

James, Melissa, Louis and Elsie Faustino

At long last......

Elsie June Tehani Faustino

June 5, 2009, 6:22am

8lbs, 12 oz 21 inches long

Details and better pics hopefully to follow soon, but most importantly she shares a birthday with my wonderful cousin Heather, Kenny G and Marky Mark - sweet action Elsie.