My project with Punkin!

2010-01-04T22:14:09Z

Tomorrow Juliet will be officially two months old. It's been an awesome two months and I could not have expected a better infant. She's perfect in every way. We're getting enough sleep, she's healthy, I'm completing my goals of parenting already, and my baby is happy! She seriously smiles and laughs at us all of the time. When I wake up in the morning groggy as hell and see her grinning my way, my day is instantly great. There's so much to parenting that no one ever tells you... Most people when stating that statement refer to all of the challenges, but when I say it, I simply am referring to the amount of happiness a child can bring to you. I always knew she'd bring happiness this way and in a large form, but I never knew that she'd entirely direct me to a world of parental bliss. I'm becoming best friends with my child and at this point, the world without her is just a distant memory. I'd not step back into that world if you paid me a million bucks. It was a great, wonderful world, but this one is even better. This little one steals my heart.

But enough of that gushy stuff. She's two months and totally learning at a pace I never would have expected. I knew she'd be smart, but damn is she amazing me with her development each day. She's also losing her newborn look and turning into full on baby now. I used to only see Jon in her, but now I'm seeing tons of myself too. I think the coolest thing about her features, however, is the fact that Jon and I made this human being who took little characteristics of each of us and created unique parts of herself. For example, she has Jon's feet, but my little toe. She has my head shape, but Jon's head size. It's really incredible.

Anyway, enough rambling there. I wanted to talk a little bit about my project with the little one aside from the journal I kept up with my pregnancy and now her first year (not sure if I'll continue the journal after her first year... Any thoughts?). Anyway, as you all know, Jon and I are obsessed with taking photos of every aspect of our life to illustrate, well, our life. We take photos of our happenings nearly daily, so it only made sense to us to decide to take a photograph of Juliet every day of her life. It's a really neat way to watch her grow and I think it will be even neater for her when she's older and can look back. We're really good at keeping up with our photos, so we haven't missed a day yet and most likely won't. Just with the two months worth of photos looking back, I can already see so much change in my little one and I can hardly believe it. It will be really neat to sort through these photos year after year.

So I thought I'd share some of the photographs we've been taking... Don't worry, behind that cut there aren't 60 photographs! It won't kill your computer, I promise. I'll limit it to a photo per week of her life here. Check it out. Oh and if you do happen to want to see each daily photo of her life, they're posted on her facebook and I will actively try to keep up with adding to the album.
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Week 1
I think this will always be my favorite photograph in the whole entire world. This was literally her first photograph and Jon did an exceptional job fighting through his own tears and the moment to take this amazing picture. I could never even come up with a caption for it. It just is what it is... Beautiful.

Week 2
Every newborn I'd been around prior to Juliet was constantly a sleepy mess. My little one's always been wide eyed and full of expression.

Week 3
We were getting full nights of peaceful sleep with Juliet since the second week. She's always been an angel with sleep.

Week 4
She rocks awesome clothes, listens to awesome music, and has a best friend in Shiva already.

Week 5
All of us have had no trouble bonding. Breastfeeding, co-sleeping, and holding her with endless gazes, talking, and constant interaction has definitely aided in the process.

Week 6
My kid has a fanclub. Our friend from Australia sent her this lovely bird toy while another handmade gift from our friend's mom in Brazil is on its way. Our friends go on and on about Juliet endlessly and have accepted her into our group already. She has had nonstop visits and has been the first baby held by many in our group... No one leaves our house with bad thoughts of her. There is just so much love going around for this little girl.

Week 7
She's a tiny little one, but growing long fast!

Week 8
You know how they say parenting definitely takes the energy out of you? Not me. It just gives me reason to have more energy. Raising this little girl is the highest point of my life so far tied with tying the knot with my cute J-on.

As well as photographs, however, I'd also like to include a video. We have also been taking small videos of the many things she does. Again, I've already posted a series of these on Facebook, so if you want to see them all go to her facebook (you'll have to add her as it's friends only if she's not your friend already). Here's a video playing on her playmat from a couple weeks ago.

Kids grow too quickly and before we know it, they're adults and moved out. I want to enjoy every bit of her growth and development and by taking at least one photograph of her each day as well as videos of the highlights of her life, I feel like I'll at least have some way to preserve a lot of what people say flies by. And yes, we plan on doing this with all of our children. The camera is seriously one of the best inventions ever.

Enjoy the photos and video!

Live Through This Riot Act In Bloom

My project with Punkin!