The incredibly talented
Tara has done it again. At two weeks old, Milo had his pictures taken...and I LOVE the way they turned out!
Here are some that I took with my dslr...I thought I'd try to learn a thing or two from her:
I don't have photo shop to touch the pictures up the way she does,
but I think some of mine turned out pretty swell!
Tara also took some pictures of her little guy, and I wish she had them posted somewhere public for me to link to because they are absolutely breath-taking!!
I am very lucky to have a lot of friends in my life...I LOVE them all (hey you!). It's so nice to have a friend whose family fits your family, friend-wise. The adults are all friends, and the kids are all friends. That's how the Mansius family has been for us here in Oregon. Tara and I have so many things we love to do together from sewing and canning, to hiking and photography...and honestly the conversational therapy alone is golden.
Well, the most recent additions to our families happen to be born 1 day apart...so we can assume they will be besties too!
Milo is 10 days old here
it's all good and fine until someone decides to eat your head.
7.11.12
Just a little more than a week after Milo was born, we finally got to have a family beach day. It was beautiful, fun and relaxing. We love the beach!
Milo & I
an instagram self portrait
The kids played, we had a picnic, and I planted it on a blanket and watched it all.
Fun times were had by all!
It's kind of amazing to look at these pictures now and see how much Milo has already grown! I thought he was big then...wow! He looks tiny.
cutest little pudgy toddler foot EVER!
Someone took an accidental swim...and it wasn't too warm!
I love the bold, bright colors!
Our first pictures together with baby...how did we not get any earlier?
Indian Beach, Ecola State Park.
A new favorite...mostly because it is the absolute closest non-city beach.
And also because someone was playing the bagpipes up on a cliff above the beach one time.
I am very flattered that so many friends and family compliment our name choices, and are curious to know what our kids names mean to us. We take naming our children very seriously, and we search high and low for the perfect name.
We have often been asked how we go about finding the perfect name.
First we start with a large name book, and make a huge list of the names (and their meanings) we like. We add to that list during the pregnancy anytime we see a name we like. Pretty much anything goes on this big list. From the big list, we pick the ones that absolutely stand out to both of us and make a short list. The short list includes names we would consider as a first name or a middle name. Then we ponder. We search all references to these names: the scriptures, literature, potentially famous people, etc. The internet is HUGE. We love to type in a name we're considering and see what and who is out there...and decide if we want our child possibly associated with that person or meaning. We check out our favorite name websites, which primarily are babynamesworld.com, and babynamewizard.com.
Baby name wizard tells me that the popularity of the name Milo peaked in 2010 at 163 per 100,000,000 babies. That's good. That says it is not a made up name, but it is also not insanely popular...and there won't be 5 other kids in his kindergarten class with the same name. It also gives me a list of potential sibling names for Milo. We've got: Ari, August, Banjo, Ella, Enzo, Esme, Felix, Henry, Jack, Jasper, Leo, Liam, Lucy, Mason, Max, Meredith, Molly, Noah, Oliver, Oscar, Riley, Sophie, Violet and Zel. These are real Milos' siblings names. Cool, huh? Most of those names I really like (Banjo?? Really??). My other favorite thing about this site is that it tells me the popularity of the name in other countries, because I dig foreign names. Milo is #87 in Sweden, #222 in Scotland, #323 in Canada (British Columbia) and #449 in the United States. All cool.
I also really like alliteration in names...not necessarily the same first letters (as in Joshua J...), but I try to match a letter sound in the first or middle name to the last name. I really like the S sound with our last name, which ends in an S...so I was kind of rooting for the name Simon. Toby really liked Simon too. After Milo was born (we usually wait til baby is born to pick a name from our short list), we had pretty much all agreed on Simon (not that Toby gets a say in the matter, I just didn't want to pick a name he hates). But every time I went to say his name, Milo came out. He just seemed like a Milo...I couldn't help it. So Brent and I decided to name him Milo, but we kept Simon as a middle name. However, we had already decided on Absalom as his middle name...so oops! I guess Milo gets two middle names, since his parents have a pretty hard time making decisions.
Milo Simon Absalom
more pictures from Milo's newborn session to follow
Milo:
Every time I read the meaning of the name Milo on babynamesworld.com, it struck a deep spiritual chord with me. So much so, that I (we) almost chose the name more for the meaning than I (we) did for the name...though we also really like the name.
"Milo might come from the German 'mild' (mild, peaceful, calm), which is derived from the Old German root 'milan' (to mill, beat, crush, or rub until fine or tender). Alternatively, it might be from the Old Slavonic root 'milu' (merciful), the Old Slavic 'mil' (grace, favor)."
If you read this post, about my personal spiritual journey over the past three years...you'll hopefully understand that I (we) feel like God put me through a mill. I feel like I've been beat, crushed, and rubbed until fine and tender. And the result of that process is that I am mild, peaceful and calm. And I think it is very merciful for God to send us not one, but two beautiful babies so soon after we lost Elsa. AND, I think it is really merciful of Milo to choose to come to a mama who is still at times raw from the loss of her daughter. So as you can see, Milo really is the perfect name for our boy.
Milo is also the Greek word for apple, which we really love...since we have a love for all things nature, and prefer (if it works) to incorporate some kind of nature into the name.
Simon:
Simon means "listening," which who doesn't want a child who is listening. It is far better to listen than it is to talk. It is also a great biblical name, which we love.
Absalom:
Absalom means "father of peace." From the first time I put that name on our list, along with the meaning, I loved it. I tried to convince Brent that we should name Oliver Absalom, but he vetoed it. He is not anyone's father yet...but you need not be a father of a person to be a father, or a creator of peace. Between the time that we had Oliver and Milo, we lived for one glorious year in a wonderful historic pioneer neighborhood. This neighborhood was close to the river and the forest, and was very loved by us. It was originally platted by a settler named Absalom Hedges. Every day as we would walk through the neighborhood we would pass the street that bore his name. Now since we know next to nothing about this person, we did not pick this name after him. Instead we picked this name in commemoration of the neighborhood where I spent almost his entire pregnancy. It is a beautiful place.
I've been trying to get more practice with my dslr camera...practice, practice, practice! I think I've finally figured out how to adjust the aperture and iso. Next I need to experiment with shutter speeds. But what a great time to be able to experiment with a new camera ... a time with a new baby!
The first two sets of pictures are not taken with the dslr:
4 days old
Milo and Ollie...my two babies
You have to check out the adorable face Ollie is making at Milo here...
I zoomed in on Ollie because it is just too precious!
What a sweet brother.
6 days old, with the dslr
12 days old, with the dslr
And lets not forget the sweet images captured with the ipod, just because they're not as sharp!
3 days old
6 days old
one week!
8 days old...
what a cutie!
9 days
first watery bath in the sink
Okay...that's enough for now, but more later!
We had a lovely little fourth...a quiet day, with a two-day-old baby. My sisters brought a picnic dinner over to eat together in our backyard, we did sparklers and other small firecrackers in our front yard, and we gathered up the courage to trek over to the big park for the large firework display. It was a little grueling with a two-day postpartum mama...but it was SO worth it to watch little Oliver enjoy the fireworks. "Wow! Big lights in the sky!"
Love my sweet little Ollie. Love that he loves his kitty so much.
Almost 23 months here...getting so big!
Here they are, enjoying cousin time.
Happy Independence!
2-day old Milo.
