On Saturday, December 6th, 2008, Amos Nicholas Albert Heber was born after 28 or so hours of labor. He was 20 inches long and weighed 7 lbs, 9 ounces. Since then, our lives have refocused naturally on him. He sure can keep us busy! All in all, Amos has been a great baby so far. We've had a little trouble with eating, but mostly he seems to be very content. If we let him, he would most likely sleep through the night already. His first week, he ate like a pig, regaining all the weight he'd lost (only 6 ounces) in the hospital in no time. In the past couple days he's been a bit fussier about eating, but we're working that out.

The animals are doing great with him, and he with them. Boo has calmed down a lot, which is great. She's realizing that we still love her and will still give her attention- she just has to be patient sometimes. And giving her jobs to do really seems to help her out. She now only has trouble when he has a dirty diaper (she loves to sniff it) or when he's crying for too long (she wants to help out). Zug has been good with him from the start, mostly because he started out ignoring Amos and continues to do that for the most part. Occasionally he'll get up the gumption to sniff him curiously. Then yesterday, Boo was laying down on the chaise facing Amos (who was also laying on the chaise with Sean) and she was very carefully licking his ear and his fingers. He completely by accident responded by petting her muzzle! He reached up and put his hand on the side of her muzzle, and stroked back toward her face, while she stayed completely still.

So things are going great here, and all of us wish all of you a very Merry Christmas. We hope your holidays are full of good times with family. Our best Christmas present arrived early, leaving us with all we want for Christmas is to spend time with our family and friends. Because really, how do you top the gift of a beautiful baby boy?