We headed out to meet Comfort and Adam for a walk on the path between our houses. Due to the recent rain part of it was flooded. They were kind enough to make walk over on the muddy grass and we walked on our half of the path back and forth for a bit.

On Friday I came into the office to a nice bag of baby books. A co-worker had brought them in from home since her daughter had outgrown them. 
So this evening I started to read one of the books that has different textures and fabrics in it. he was enjoying it so much he grabbed the book and held it for a little while, just staring at the pages.

I went to lunch with some co-workers and as we were about to head back it started to pour.

It was completely sunny when we left.

I guess the cat has found a new spot to lay...

I've always thought it was weird when a co-worker would have a really old photo of their kid in their cube. So when we had a few new pictures printed I took one and replaced the older ones at work.

I have a feeling I'm going to be doing this quite a bit until he hits one or so.

This evening we did a little FaceTime with grandma Karath and uncle Scot.

It's kinda wet out.

Made a double batch of cookies today, because COOOOKKKIIIIEEESSS!!!!

Ran around for a little bit in Elder Scrolls Online again this evening. It's such a pretty game. I forgot how good it looked.

I read a few comics in the Gronk Free Comic Book Day issue to Quinn. I think he liked it. Very colorful.

Now that I'm back to work I've gotten to really test the pump bag. It's tight, but it works. If for some reason I ever needed more space, I can just pull out the bottle bag and put it into one of the fridges at work.

I'm really glad I made it. It was good experience to mess with a zipper and see how that worked. Plus it's not a single purpose bag, so when I'm done breastfeeding I can reuse the it for something else.

Quinn is mostly sleeping through the night. That means the mornings are usually busy but happy times for everyone. Especially a well rested baby.

Someone is really good at planking and is enjoying airplane.

He's really enjoying standing, even if he doesn't have the balance for it.

I logged in and played a few minutes of Elder Scrolls Online this evening. A nice way to end the weekend before going back to work tomorrow.

I dont like a lot of the bottle racks they sell. Plus it seems like some of the pump parts wouldn't work well for some of them. So I ordered a stainless steel cooling rack. It arrived today and is working perfectly!

They were pretty cute together.

I brought in some photos to work. In 5 years these are the most photos I've ever had up. its kind of weird.

Today is my first day back to work since having Quinn. 12 weeks on the button. Since most employers don't offer maternity leave the best you can get is 12 weeks thanks to Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA) If you qualify and can afford to take it unpaid. Luckily I did and we could.

It was hard to leave this morning, but not as bad as the last several days leading up to going to work. Just knowing it was coming, looming over me, was hard.

Since work is very close to home, I'm able to come home at lunch, feed Quinn and spend a little time with him. 

It's also the first time in awhile I've been gone and Leki noticed. He came right up on the pillow, laid down and pushed Quinn out of his way slightly. That's the most he's ever touched the baby so far. He was even purring.

Progress!

He doesn't quite have the hang of bouncing with his own feet, but he does enjoy a little bit of swinging.

It's been a pretty good day.
It got even better when we tried out the door jumper we bought. He had fun in it and watching his stuffed animal swing in it.

 Comfort, Adam and Corinne came by this afternoon for lunch and a movie to celebrate my last few days of being off before my FMLA is exhausted.

We wayched a crazy movie called Summer Wars and had tasty KFC.

Quinn enjoyed being rocked to sleep by Corinne.
 Later in the evening I finished off one of the quilts my mom gave me. She dropped off several quilts she started that just needed to be suffer and quilted.

I don't have a walking foot, but the blankets are very small so I thought I'd risk it.
there was some slight puckering from the fabric moving faster on the bottom (where the feed dogs are pulling it) than the top (where there are no feed dogs), but By in large the machine quilting worked out. We now have a larger blanket for the little one to lay on.

As it turns out, there is quite a bit of stuff I may need to carry with me at one time in my pump bag. So I needed a way to close it.

Originally I was going to just sew in magnetic clasps, but once I bought a cooler for the breastmilk, I realized the bag wasn't going to close easily.

I decided to add a zipper. I cut the leg off of one of my old khaki pants since it matched the color of the bag pretty closely. I also reinforce the back of the zipper with fusible interfacing so it would be able to withstand the opening and closing.
I've never sewn a zipper before and while it was easier than I thought it would be, I mad the whole project a lot more complicated. Because I'd already added pockets earlier, the suggestions to create a zipper and sew it to a lining (which would then be sewn to the bag) wouldn't work.

I ended up sewing the zipper along the upper portion of the bag opening. I made the whole zipper top wider and longer than it needed to be so I'd be able to over-stuff the bag if need be and it would still close. But that meant that there's corners that are open that need to be sealed and some of the fabric bunched in places.

The stitching is also messed up on the side of the bag because I had the tension wrong. I'm having a hard time figuring out tension still. I really need to sit down and experiment with different fabrics and make sure I have the right needle. Luckily it's hard to see on this project. I'll definitely need more practice to add a zipper to things as well.

Floor time is super fun!

We headed out this morning for a trip to the Karath grandparents. The first stop was grandpa Karath.

Quinn had a good time playing on the ground, laughing his little silent laugh and watching everything.
Later in the afternoon we stopped at grandma Karath's house for an early Mother's Day celebration.

Quinn had a fun time there too, watching her jewelry and looking at all the new things.

Leki is slowly getting more curious. It helps if we put Quinn in interesting places.

Yes, we are having fun this week With Star Wars.

...be with you.

It's pretty warm out, so we decided to go down to Palmer Park, which is better shaded than Oriole Park. It's been awhile since I've wandered around there and it looks like there is a newer paved path area. Or I just never noticed it before. Either way it's stroller friendly, which I like!

It's Free Comic Book Day today! We dressed up the little one as Captain America, in honor of the Avengers movie that opened yesterday, and went downtown to the comic shop.

We got there 15 minutes after Vault of Midnight opened and the line was down the block and around the corner. We didn't think it would work out to well for anyone if we stood in line for an hour, so we enjoyed the costumes and headed back home for a bit.

I ended up ordering the comics I wanted online, as usual, to get the nice hardcover from Archaia with Mouse Guard on it. There's a decent comic shop in Chicago (g-mart) that I've been getting them from the last several years when I can't find comics locally. Really all I ever want is that hardcover comic. They are such nice books!

Avengers Age of Ultron opens this weekend. we both want to see the movie, but obviously you can't take a 10 week old to an action movie and expect them to stay calm the whole time.

Plus we watch Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., which ties into the movie. In order to keep watching the show we wanted to see the movie. Otherwise we'd have to stop (to avoid spoilers) until we got out to see the film.
So we decided to tag team it. I would see the earliest showing they had for the day while Chris stayed home. Then when I got home he'd go out and meet up with Adam, Comfort, and Dan to watch it mid-afternoon. Then everyone would come back to our place to talk about it.

While doing it this way made it an all day affair, everything worked out pretty good. We can definitely do this again for Ant-Man in July. Aside from that there probably isn't anything else we will see in theaters until December for Star Wars that is.