Melissa’s 2*th Birthday

On Friday morning Melissa woke up not just one day older, but an entire year older. She really doesn’t like when I tell people how old she is so I’ll just say last year she turned 27 and next year she turns 29.

On this birthday we had a lot of things to celebrate. Obviously this is her first birthday being a mother, but it is also her first birthday as my wife too. What a year! Just a couple weeks ago I had the best birthday ever while spending all day with Melissa in the hospital having Landon. Three weeks and one day later it’s now Melissa’s birthday and Landon and I had to make sure we let her know how much we love her.

braceletSo a couple days before Melissa’s birthday I went to the jewelry store to pick out a bracelet for her. I ended up picking out a really nice charm bracelet because I wanted to be able to personalize it with some charms to represent some of the amazing things we have been through this year. One of the charms is a tag with Landon’s name on the front and the time and date he was born on the back. The other charm is a baby shoe with Landon’s birth weight and length on the bottom.

Landon’s gift for Melissa was supposed to be fairly simple, but as you are about to find out it turned into anything but that. The gift itself was a nice picture frame with Melissa’s favorite picture of Landon and her in it. frameTo go along with the picture frame I wanted to get a really cute card that Landon could sign. The only problem is Landon’s signature really isn’t something recognizable yet. So in thinking what I could do I decided to try and get something that I could transfer his hand print to the card. After trying 3 different stores with no luck, I decided to try the hospital since I knew they had the transfer sheets that they use to get the footprints of newborn babies. Using my charming sense of humor and good looks I was able to sweet talk the nurse at the hospital into letting me have one of those ink transfer sheets. Whew… the hard part was now done right? umm…. not exactly…

So later that night Melissa went to bed and it was my turn to watch Landon downstairs so she could catch up on some sleep. Once Landon fell asleep I tried to open his hand so I could try to transfer his hand to the card. I thought once he was sleeping it would be easier to control his muscles… man was I naive!

So I placed the card down on a coffee table and held Landon above it with one arm trying to get him to relax his kung fu grip enough for me use my other hand to transfer his prints. This was not an easy task by any means. Eventually after about 15 minutes I was finally able to get him to open his hand enough for me to transfer it without letting him face plant into the table. I pulled his hand away from the transfer sheet and the hand print came out great… NICE! One down, one to go…

I resumed my stance and held Landon over the table but once again I had a lot of trouble getting him to relax. Eventually I was able to get his hand open so I quickly grabbed the transfers sheet… threw it down on the card… pushed his hand down… picked it up… and as I raised his hand the transfer sheet came up with it…

<earmuffs> OH SHIT! </earmuffs>

Yes, I successfully inked my son’s hand with black ink! My 3 week old that has extremely dry skin who loves to suck on his hands and rub his face. Needless to say I started to panic. Do I wake up Melissa? Do I call 9-1-1? What the hell should I do? All I could think about is my poor child getting ink poisoning and dieing right before his Mom’s birthday. Some birthday present Mike… WAY TO GO!

So I brought him upstairs trying to keep his hands away from his face and grabbed as many wipes as I could in the room where Melissa was sleeping without waking her. I then placed him down on our WHITE carpet and started to frantically wipe him down. It took about 8 sheets, but finally I was able to get him pretty clean. At least enough where I could start to breathe again, but as any stubborn, persistent, perfectionist dad would do. I brought him right back downstairs to finish the job!!!!

Unfortunately most of the ink was now removed from the transfer sheet so once i finally got him to throw down is right hand it came out like crap. I was disappointed, but I convinced myself that this mistake actually added character and a story to this gift that she will never forget.

In the end Melissa loved her gifts and had a really good laugh at my effort to make her card extra special… Next year I think I will just take a picture of his hand and staple it to the card!

cardFrontcardInsidecardClose


That seems like enough drama for one post! Take care everyone and we hope to see you real soon.

Love you all,
Mike, Melissa and Landon.

Landon’s Weekend With the Girls

It has become somewhat of a tradition for me to update the blog on Thursday’s since it was the day Landon was born. I don’t know how long this tradition will last, but I don’t see any good reason for it to stop now.

Last weekend Grandma Marcia and Aunt Debi (Marcia’s best friend since they were as old as Landon) came to visit us and help take care of Landon. They were originally coming in to babysit so Melissa and I could go to our friends wedding, but Landon became a little too dependent on mom and her constant on-demand beverage supply, so I ended up going to the wedding alone. I have to say that Melissa was definitely missed at the wedding, but as many of my friends on Facebook have discovered by now… I still found a way to have a great time! ;-) In fact I had so much fun that I ended up sleeping on the floor of our friends hotel room wearing a pair of borrowed shorts and 2 bathroom towels laid over me to try and keep warm. It wasn’t until I was shivering at 4am that I wished I was changing diapers, giving Landon a bath, or even trying to settle him down in the middle of the night because he couldn’t sleep. Actually, that last one I can’t really say I have too much experience with since Melissa has been taking on most (if not all) of the weekday night duty. I love you hun!!! I must get that from my dad since my mom told me the story about how he used to tell people I was sleeping through the night very early on, and my mom would correct him saying “No hun, it’s you sleeping through the night.” ;-)

OK, enough about me. I should know by now that most of you only come to sterncast to read about Landon. So let’s see he’s been up to lately. Like I said earlier Grandma Marcia and Aunt Debi came out to visit for the weekend. I have to say they were an incredible help!!!! Melissa and I absolutely love holding the little guy, but it was so nice for us to be able to relax for a little bit. Among the many weekend festivities Landon encountered included his first trip to the Mall of America, Babys ‘R Us, The Owatonna Farmers Market, and a couple other small stores in Owatonna. Needless to say they were a very busy group. As you will see in some of the pictures below Landon is growing up so fast and really starting to show off some of his adorable personality that we love so much.

This brings me to my next discovery of the weekend. As you guys are well aware, I am a little bit of a tech junky. If it requires batteries, has a screen, looks cool, and most importantly costs a lot of money, then I want it. These types of discoveries usually happen right after I try something that a friend just purchased. That’s how I ended up with the big plasma, the Wii Console, the iPhone and most recently the HD Video camera (Thanks Jac and Chris). Well this weekend was no exception to this behavior because much to Melissa’s displeasure Debi brought a really nice Nikon Digital SLR camera to take pictures of Landon. As you can see from the pictures below, her camera was amazing and made my POS point and shoot look like, well a POS. So needless to say ever since last weekend I have been looking all over the place trying to find a good deal so I can get one. The way I look at it is this… Landon is my first born and I owe it to him to get the best quality pictures of him. To be honest that is the same way I was able to get Melissa to allow me to buy the “HD” video camera instead of the regular cheap(er) standard def one. We live in an age of big screen TV’s and high definition and who wants to waste there time looking at something just slightly better then average.

So I am still working on Melissa, but if you could reply to this post commenting on how beautiful the pictures are to help me convince her that we NEED a new camera I would really appreciate it. Comments about how previous camera’s of mine have been broken in my backpack or dropped in a glass of beer will not help my cause so please try your best to forget that ever happened!

Alright, I think that is enough for this post. I will probably be back tomorrow to tell you all about how great Melissa’s first birthday went being a mommy. Tomorrow is Melissa’s Birthday, and she is turning a very young 28 years old!

We Love You All,
Mike, Melissa and Landon

Week 2 in the books…

Today marks the two week milestone of Landon’s arrival and he is doing AWESOME!!! Today Melissa took him to the doctor and he weighted in at 7lbs 3oz (20th percentile) and stands tall at 20.5″ (45th percentile). Needless to say this kid will probably grow up to be as tall as Shaquille O’Neal but only as heavy as Spud Webb…. Just kidding, but he is doing great!

I don’t have a list of accomplishments for this week, but I do have some random videos that we took while we were hanging out with the little peanut.

We hope you are all doing well. We love and miss you all so much!

Love,
Mike, Melissa and Landon




1 Whole Week And Counting…

Dear Landon,

Wow it’s hard to believe you are already 1 week old. Happy 1 Week Birthday man!!! Even though it’s only been 1 week your mommy and I can’t even begin to think about what our lives would be like without you here with us. On Tuesday I went back to work and I am so jealous because mommy gets to stay home with you all day. On the flip side coming home from a long day at work and being able to walk in the door and give you a huge hug and kiss is probably just as gratifying. I just can’t wait each day to get home and hold you, play with you, burp you, change you, or just do anything with you. You are just that cute… sorry in a couple years you might think that is pretty uncool, but right now you can’t read or understand English so we will worry about it then.

So on the 1 week anniversary of your birth we thought it would be fun to put together a list of some of the things we learned about you this week since you are probably too young and won’t be able to remember them years from now.

Things we learned about you so far (in no particular order):
1.) You are so popular and people LOVE to read about you! I think I could start a tabloid on your life and sell out of grocery stores across the globe. I even heard Angelina and Brad are now trying to adopt 6 more kids just to win back some of their lost ratings.
2.) You love to sleep in the recliner downstairs with your dad.
3.) If we don’t change you fast enough, you WILL pee on your head…. Sorry man! (FYI, that was your mothers fault!)
4.) You sometimes have an adorable smile when you sleep.
5.) You love to sleep in a carseat. I think your record is close to 4 hours.
6.) You absolutely love to be swaddled and held!
7.) We were originally trying to avoid the pacifier… BIG MISTAKE, it’s the only thing keeping mommy’s nipples from falling off!
8.) You love sunsets and long walks on the beach street.
9.) You love to video chat with friends and family. (So for all of you who don’t have a webcam, you should probably get one soon!)
10.) You absolutely hate baths, but you have the cleanest belly button on the block!

Here are some of your greatest week 1 accomplishments (again in no particular order):
1.) 53 dirty diapers, including 38 poopy ones. We know because the hospital gave us a chart to keep track.
2.) You gained 10 ounces since we took you home on Saturday.
3.) You have gotten out of the house 3 times so far, not bad for a kid that can’t even roll over yet.
4.) Your poopy diapers have changed color from black to green.
5.) Your breastfeeding form is perfect and babies all over the world are now trying to mimic it. If breastfeeding were an Olympic sport you would have been on the cover of Sports Illustrated and nobody would know who Michael Phelps is.
6.) You can wake up mommy and daddy and get them out of bed in 1.6 seconds. (Your mom represents the .6 seconds. She is a little slow and having minor problems with her first step, but don’t worry because I have hired a trainer to work with her 3 times a day and she should be fine by the All Star break!)
7.) You met some great new little friends at the New Born Clinic in Owatonna on Tuesday. I happened to notice this one cute 11 day old chick checking you out from across the room. Let me take this opportunity to warn you about older women. They might have more experience, but all they are after is a long term commitment. Don’t fall into that trap and marry young like your father. If you happen to be as lucky as me your future wife will be born sometime next summer. Just stay patient man, I am telling you its worth it!)
8.) You have peed through several outfits so far. (Some might question this as an accomplishment, but if they saw what you had to go through they would have to agree).
9.) You are turning into one awesome, handsome looking dude. Just be grateful you get your good looks from your mother. ;-)
10.) You have the ability to make people fall in love with you at first sight. You are one very special kid and we are so thankful you are ours!

Well that is all for now. We can’t wait to see what you have in store for us over the next several days, weeks, months, years and so on. We love you very much. Happy 1 week birthday again!

Love,
Mom and Dad

Landon’s “Home Sweet Home” Video…

Even though Landon was not born in time to watch the 8th season of American Idol with him Mom and Dad we feel he was born with a strong connection to the show.

I won’t list all the connections between Landon and the show, but here are a few.

1.) We watched it religiously during the entire pregnancy.
2.) The finale was being aired on the last night of our baby class.
3.) When Landon is really hungry he sounds a lot like Adam Lambert.
4.) If you take the time to listen to him, he makes more sense then Paula.
5.) Landon’s favorite contestant was Bikini Girl.

The list goes on and on…

To complete the connection we would like to share with you Landon’s “Going Home” video just like they did on Idol when a contestant was sent home. We hope you have as much fun watching the video as we did being a part of it.

Love you all,
Mike, Melissa & Landon

Landon’s Home!!!!

YAY!!!! Landon’s Home!!!!

Today at 6:15pm Landon made it safely home. Now the real fun begins. I am thinking tomorrow is “Yard Work Sunday”. Do you think I should have him pick the weeds or mow the lawn. ;-) J/K…

We are so thrilled to have him home!. Talk to you soon.

Love,
Mike, Melissa & Landon

Landon’s Going Home…

It’s been a really long couple of days in the hospital but today on Landon’s original due date we get to take him home. Yay!!!!

It’s amazing how well Melissa is recovering. She is moving around like she is part of the nursing staff. The Doctor’s keep on saying how great she looks. She woke up this morning and discovered the milk fairy found her last night. ;-) Needless to say Landon is very excited about that too. ;-)

Speaking of Landon, he is doing equally as well and is loving life now that the milk has arrived. :-) It is also helping him sleep much better now since he can relax with a full belly. He is also recovering great from the circ. he got yesterday. He has been having plenty of dirty diapers so that’s good news too.

We should be home by 6pm tonight and can’t wait to show Landon his new room and bed. We hope he loves it! I am sorry I haven’t been able to upload more pictures but I promise I will later tonight.

We love you all,
Mike, Melissa and Landon

The road to recovery begins…

Melissa and I can’t thank you enough for all of the kind words and blessings that you have sent us since yesterday. Like I said before Landon is so lucky to have such and amazing group of family and friends.

Melissa is recovering incredibly quick. You would honestly never know she had a C-Section earlier this morning. By 8:00am she was already out of bed on her feet. By 5:00pm she was walking around the room carrying Landon and dodging obstacles like she was working out with Tom Brady at Patriot camp. Let’s take it easy hun, you can’t win the Superbowl before mini camp starts. Anyway, she is an unbelievably strong individual and I can’t tell you how much I admire her bravery over the past 2 days.

Speaking of last two days… I just checked on the statistics for Sterncast and I can’t believe how many people were tuned in watching us from around the country. Since yesterday morning we have had 172 unique users and 1957 page views. That is unbelievable. (I kind of feel like Ryan Seacrest bragging about voter turnout).

Well I just wanted to give you all a quick update. I know some of you have asked about when you can come visit us. As of right now we are hoping that Melissa continues to feel better by tomorrow afternoon so we can start to see you guys by tomorrow evening threw the weekend. We just ask that you call us first because we don’t have a ton of space and we would like to try to schedule it around how Mom and Baby are feeling. At this point we are scheduled to go home Monday, but since Melissa is doing so well we might be able to leave by Sunday afternoon. We can’t wait for you all to meet him.

I promise to upload more pics tomorrow late morning/early afternoon.

We love you all,
Mike, Melissa and Landon

Happy Birthday Landon!

What an amazing day it has been already. The roller coaster of emotions have been unbelievable. I am so proud of Melissa and can’t thank her enough for all she did last night. It was by far the best birthday I have ever had. I can’t leave you with a long post because I had to go down the street to upload pictures for you all to see, but I couldn’t wait for you guys to see pics of this amazing kid.

He is a very healthy boy and we are trilled about the road ahead. I really can’t thank all you guys enough for all the emails and comments. We love you all so much and it is such a great feeling that we were able to share this experience with all of you. Landon is one lucky kid to have so many great friends!

Take care and enjoy the pics, hopefully I will be able to upload more each day.

Love,
Mike, Melissa and Landon

Landon Jay has finally arrived…

World, it’s my honor to introduce to you our amazing new baby boy Landon Jay Stern.

Landon was born at 1:21am on May 28th, 2009 by C Section. He came in weighing 7lbs even and measuring 20.5″ long.

Both mom and Landon are doing great, but very tired.

Thanks again for all of the emails, txts & voicemails. Reading them to Melissa during this process definitely gave us the strength to make it through the day.

We will definitely update everyone in the morning, but right now it’s time to try and get some rest.

We love you all,
Mike, Melissa & Landon

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