Samantha's Helpers

Sean and I want to send out a huge "Thank You" to all the helpers that came to stay with us over the last couple of months. Sean and I made a pact before Sam was born that we would only allow people to come visit if they didn't expect to be waited on or entertained since we knew we'd have plenty of other new duties to keep us busy... and we got "visits" from some of the best helpers around. Look below for pictures and highlights of our "Supporting Cast"...

Papa & Nana Shepard came to Portland soon after Samantha was born. Nana was en route as Samantha was entering into the world... Papa flew in a few days later. This timing worked out wonderfully since it gave Lisa a few days in the hospital to try to get breastfeeding under control before she had to even attempt to be discrete! :)

Papa stayed for 4-5 days and Nana stayed for about 10 days total. We really took advantage of all the help!




When Samantha was 2 weeks old, Nana and Papa came up for a second visit. They came to play in the 21st annual PWC Children's Charity golf tournament with Sean and family friends, Russ and Robbie Roth. THEIR TEAM TOOK FIRST PLACE, so we got the pleasure of hearing Dad and Russ sing "We Are The Champions" for a day or two. Samantha and Lisa were able to go to the dinner after the tournament to show how proud we were of our family of golfers.


















Grandma Broman came to help at the end of June (Samantha was about 2 1/2 weeks old) and stayed for a week. Grandma Broman helped us with the cooking, laundry, and even managed to navigate around the area while doing errands! Even though we were 3 weeks into this new job of ours, we were still very much in need of plenty of help! This was a great transition week for us as we started to feel a little more confident in our parenting skills and started to get a little bit of a handle on how to accomplish things during Samantha's naps! :-)



















At the tail end of Grandma Broman's visit, The Mitson family drove into town for a couple of days. Channing and Charise were very excited to meet their first human cousin! Unfortunately, Samantha slept most of the time (when she wasn't eating or crying), so she wasn't quite as much fun to play with as her cousins had hoped. Channing and Charise were excellent helpers though, and went they weren't swimming/playing with our next door neighbor, Sarah, they helped out a lot with changing diapers and getting Aunt Lisa baby supplies while her hands were full.

Aunt Lorna (Lisa's sister) and Uncle Justin were instantly smitten with their niece... but who can blame them? In these pictures, they're holding her before we headed off to an Independence Day party and our next-door-neighbor's house. It was Samantha's first holiday celebration!!




















The very next weekend, Sean's cousin, Cristy came to help for about 5 days (Samantha was around 4-5 weeks old). Cristy showed up and started scooting around... running to the grocery store, tackling laundry, and cooking us yummy food. She even made a scrumptious appetizer for a party that we all went to. The running joke throughout her stay was that Cristy was Lisa's personal assistant since Lisa couldn't remember anything if it wasn't written on a note right in front of her. And we were only partially kidding... Lisa is really missing her assistant... why do you think these blog updates haven't been getting done?! :-)


A few days after Cristy left, Lisa and Sean's friend from Florida showed up for a 5 day "shift" with the Shepard family. Just like with Cristy, Vera showed up and started cruising around the house getting to work. She even came with a pre-planned menu for her stay here!!! Since Lisa had already deemed Cristy her personal assistant, Vera became known as our fabulous Asian chef and nanny! We really know how to find good help, don't we!! :-)




















Papa and Nana Shepard managed to visit a third time by coming to Portland at the end of a month-long road trip they went on. They arrived the last weekend in July and Papa stayed for a week before flying back to Las Vegas the next Sunday to get back to the real world (i.e. work!) and Nana is heading out tomorrow (Friday, Aug 8). During this visit, they watched Samantha grow from a tiny 6 week old to a big girl (8 weeks old!). Samantha is mastering the art of smiling and cooing... which has enabled her to start the process of getting Papa wrapped around her tiny little finger! :-)

As you can tell by the impressive list of people in this cast of characters, we had a lot of wonderful helpers during this transition into parenthood. We probably would have gotten by without all this help... but we would have been crazy to try! :-)

THANK YOU TO YOU ALL!!!!