Of all the births this week, Tess is the cutest!

Oh my is she ever cute! She is 8lbs. 7oz of super sweet cuteness. We are all just crazy about her. She has been good and sleepy and smiley and not crying-for-no-apparent-reason. So much fun! Patrick is totally smitten with her and says the cutest things like "that baby of yours' is really cute," and "she's so cute I can't take my eyes of her." Here is a picture of him not able to take his eyes off her. This is not posed, he just truly couldn't take his eyes off her long enough to have his picture taken.

I think it is such a special gift to bring a new baby into the world and into our family. Patrick and Maria won't remember when Betsy was a baby, but I think they will remember how exciting it was to have Tess as a baby.

In other exciting birth news, the cicadas have come. EEEEWWW! We've got it really bad in our yard and it is gross to go outside. Probably millions in our yard alone. This is not an exaggeration and our yard is standard suburban size.
The spots on the trees are the cicadas. The density of them on this tree is typical of every surface in our yard. All the trees, plants, bushes, car wheels, fences, lawn furniture everything is covered like this. They also fly very poorly, fast and with no control. So were not spending too much time outside right now, it's just too freaky.

Jim's home helping with the kids and everything for a couple of weeks and it is so great. I think by the time he goes back to work we will be in a nice routine with Tess and it won't be too crazy to be by myself. Hopefully the cicadas will be in back in the ground for another 17 years by that time and we can play outside again.