Our little green Olive is here!

Olive May Radford was born on June 5, 2008, at 7:12 a.m. at St. John's Pleasant Valley Hospital in Camarillo, CA. She weighed 6 lbs 11 oz and measured 20 in long. Her hobbies include keeping her parents up at all hours, boobs, staring at people, boobs, peeing and pooing on her changing table, boobs, crying when gassy, and finally, boobs.

Olive 0-2 Weeks

Olive's Family and Friends

Drunken Olive Video - 1 Week Old

Hi there!

Dear Family & Friends,

Apologies for the long delay between posts. Procrastination is a sign of intelligence, right? Lots to update you on and thanks for your patience. Well, some of you have been patient....

Wanted to first give a special shout-out to all of our current globetrotting friends. They include:

• Jen, who just headed off for a year-long post doing trade negotiation work in Ethiopia
• Kyle, who was in Israel visiting family before heading to Indonesia for "culture classes"
• John, in Mexico for language study and R&R
• Kristine, just moved to England with her new hubby
• Sara, on a new post doing development work in India
• Rebecca, on a 6-month post in Iraq (almost done, yes?)
• Nidia, doing development work in multiple locations in Central and South America - can't keep track of this girl
• Heather and Ani, at environmental meetings in Europe recently or soon (?)
• Yves and Jessica, doing environmental work and perfecting their Italian in Rome
• Casson, another hard one to track, giving multiple environmental lectures in Africa and Asia
• Travis and Miki, still kickin ass and takin names in balmy Toronto. How's that dollar doing?

Hope you all are doing well, enjoying yourselves, and soaking up lots of culture and good food. If Ryan and I can swing it, we'll pack up the new little one and head off to visit you all!

So hello and big hugs from home to all you travelers and drop a quick comment if you can. Sorry if I missed anyone currently abroad and if so, where are you and what are you doing?! We'd all love to know!

Now on to the feature shows........"Ryan and Mary Actually Get Married" and "Radford Spawn Snatches Small Woman's Body."

Love, m

April 13 Baby Shower Pool Party

In our typical fashion, we've changed our minds about trying to plan a marriage/baby party during the summer. We decided that a baby shower pool party a month before baby's due date would be a better fit. So please save the date of Sun, April 13, to join us at our place in Camarillo for an informal get-together (men, women, kids, dogs invited!). We'd love to see all of you but realize most of you are a plane trip (or two or three) away. If it doesn't work for you to join us, we hope you'll plan another time soon to come visit!

I will be sending an Evite to your emails with all of the details shortly.

-m

29 weeks, Robyn and Dana visit

That's about 6.5 months (don't do the math from the weeks, it doesn't work like that!). I'm closer to 7 months this week.... Anyway, despite getting big and uncomfortable and feeling like this baby has snatched my body from me, I am overall feeling well and looking forward to meeting the little conquistador. Ryan was able to feel the first kicks through my belly last night, that was pretty cute. (I've been feeling movement for a few weeks now but they weren't strong enough yet to feel from the outside.) Suzanne and Shanna have gotten us motivated to plan our baby shower, more details in another post.

I want to give another big thanks to my Aunt Jenny and my Aunt Carol for sending me maternity shirts - they're currently make up most of my wardrobe that fits so I wear them a lot!

We just had a wonderful weekend with my sister Robyn and her girlfriend Dana. They came mostly to see my big tum and play with the dogs, right girls? We had a lovely dinner party with them and Suzanne, Shanna, and Jarred and they soaked up as much sun and pool time as they could get before heading back to the Minnesota tundra. It was so great to spend time with them and I can't wait to see them again when they come out to help with baby and doggie duties in May. Below are some pictures from our weekend. [Had trouble posting the pics for this one so no captions - Robyn's in the Twinkies hat, Dana's the Bogey cuddler.]

-m