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Yesterday Amy left for Colorado after spending the first three weeks of Ava’s life with us. She was beyond helpful in getting us going as a family. We were sad to see her go but look forward to her next visit in a month, then our trip to Colorado in March. Last night we went to my company’s holiday party at George’s in La Jolla. Ava wore her holiday dress and slept through the entire event. She was quite popular amongst my co–workers. We had a great night and were even able to enjoy a full nights sleep due to Ava not waking up for over 5 hours. Ava’s third week is complete.

Heading to the company holiday party

My Mom flew home to Vegas today after spending three days with us in San Diego. Having her here is always great but seeing her with Ava for the first time was awesome. Tom was here until Sunday as well so we were all able to have a nice dinner at home on Saturday night. Ava’s birth has already made this the best holiday season of my life, but having all this family time has made it even better. Amy is here with us for a couple more days, then we have Rick and Chris coming out at the end of the month. We couldn’t be more fortunate this year!

Two weeks ago today Ava was born, and part of me thinks "wow I can’t believe she’s already two weeks old." Then the other part thinks "she’s only been here two weeks?" We’ve had a good week, especially since it was Amy’s birthday on Wednesday and Tom flew into town. The five of us went out to a nice dinner at El Agave that night and had a great time. Tonight we’re heading out to dinner at The Melting Pot, which is something I always enjoy, then tomorrow my Mom returns from the Mexico cruise and will be able to stay with us for a few days. Should be a great weekend.

Today was Ava’s official due date, but instead we’ve had the last 11 days with her. Honestly it feels like much longer and we can’t imagine life without her. Friday was the one week anniversary of her birth and so far she’s been perfect. She sleeps up to 5 uninterupted hours per night, which is very uncommon for babies her age. Friday night my Mom was able to come and see her for the first time but didn’t get to stay long because of work. Luckily she’ll be staying with us next week for a few days and will get some much needed quality time with Ava.

Jessica is doing really well and has recovered nicely from the delivery. Having her Mom here with us has been such a big help… We’re not looking forward to her leaving on the 15th. The dogs seem to have adjusted nicely to having a baby in the house and have even surprised Jessica at how well they’re doing. Guess that’s all for now, besides the new pics. Please enjoy!

Ava at 24 hours old – still in the hospital

Grandma Amy and Ava

My Mom holding Ava for the first time

Jessica, Ava, Mom, and me

Family pic from the hospital when she was 24 hours old

Well this has easily been the most exciting holiday weekend of my life, but now it’s time to get back to work tomorrow morning. Here are a couple more pics from yesterday and today.

Home after a day full of errands

Ava and I on our first football Sunday together

Yesterday our baby girl Ava Simone Pellegrini was born at the Sharp Mary Birch hospital in San Diego. It was ‘Black Friday’ and she wasn’t due for another 11 days, but as predicted by that man at Jessica’s restaurant, she came about two weeks early. She was born at 12:18pm, weighed in at 6 pounds 13 ounces, and measured 19 inches. Obviously words cannot describe the instant joy and purpose she brings to our lives. Today she and Jessica were discharged from the hospital and allowed to come home. Amy is staying with us while we get Ava all settled in and helping in every way possible. Expect many, many photos to come on our site and in our galleries, but for now, here’s a few from Ava’s first 28 hours of life.

Jessica holding Ava immediately after giving birth

Swaddled for the first time

Ava being held by Grandma for the first time

First family photo of the three of us

Holding my baby girl for the first time

Ready to come home

I haven’t had any spare time lately to post updates on our site but all is going well. Today is my first day off in over a month and I’m excited to be spending it at home with Jessica and the dogs, watching football and eating lots of food! The new job is going great, just keeping me extremely busy. I finished my first iPad app for G.E. in only two weeks, which brought positive attention from several executives at the company, and got me the position as lead developer on the Fall 2012 Nike Running App, which is the biggest project we have going on in our office. This means I’ve been working 7 days / 70 hours a week. No complaints though; I really like the company and the people I work with, and I’m learning a ton.

Now onto more important stuff… Jessica is now full–term in her pregnancy and could go into labor at any time. We actually thought she was going into labor on Monday night. She was having contractions about 8 minutes apart so we decided to go to bed and see how she was doing in the morning. Unfortunately the contractions were gone when we woke up. The funny thing was that, had she actually gone into labor that night, the prediction made by one of her customers several weeks ago would have come true. She ended up going to her doctor appointment that day and the doc said that she would be very surprised if Jessica made it to her appointment next week without having this baby. At this point we’re on high alert and ready to go at any time.

Recently some of Jessica’s girl friends from work threw her a baby shower and luckily my Mom was able to go with her because she was in town for work. Below are a few pics from that day, or you can click here to see the whole album. Guess that’s all for now but I’ll be sure to post updates once our baby Ava has arrived. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!!!

Tonight was my last night working at the Tractor Room, and ultimately my last night in the restaurant industry. It’s hard to believe that it’s been thirteen years since I first started bussing tables at El Gaucho in Seattle. Johnny, the owner of the Tractor Room, was so gracious in seeing me go. He gave me a nice bottle of champagne for Jessica and I to enjoy once Ava is born, and even ordered pizza for everyone after we got through the rush. It was a fun final night, and coincidentally, turned out to be Joe Paterno’s final day as the head coach of Penn State University. What a mess that whole situation has turned into! Anyway, I feel very fortunate to have had the career I’ve had, but am beyond excited about the new chapter in our lives. I can’t believe Jessica is due in just over three weeks!

Yesterday was the end of my first week working at ScrollMotion and it went extremely well. On Monday, my first day, I was assigned as the lead developer on an iPad application for G.E. and I was able to jump right into it with only a few hours of training. I’ve never done this type of work before but it’s very similar to web development and came naturally. The project is almost complete which means I’ll be starting something new next week. I heard from one of the project managers that I will likely be working on a project for Nike next, but we’ll have to wait and see.

Since I really like my new job and can definitely see myself there for the long term, I decided to put in my notice at the Tractor Room on Thursday night. This wasn’t easy to do, mostly because I have a lot of respect for Johnny (the owner) and hated to let him down. He’s not only been good to me as an employee, he’s been extremely generous whenever my family has been into the restaurant. We had a really nice talk on Thursday that left me feeling much better than I was going into it. He was also nice enough to tell me that if things didn’t work out I would always have a job working for him.

My last night at the Tractor Room will be Thursday Nov 10th, meaning that my first day out of the restaurant industry is 11/11/11. Kinda symbolic. Today will be my 11th day in a row at work, and I don’t have a day off until Saturday Nov 12th, so it’s tough right now but at least I’ll be through with all this before Ava is born. Only one more month to go…

The night before last Jessica was serving a couple from New York at her restaurant in La Jolla. When she initially approached the table to greet them, the man immediately said "Oh, so you’re having a baby girl in about six weeks huh?" Jessica was a bit taken back and said "Yeah, who have you been talking to?" The man replied "No one, but am I right?" She said "Yes, you’re exactly right. How did you know that?" He proceeded to explain to her that he has a strange ability to predict this kind of stuff and that he is almost always right. He then told her, "You’d better get ready because your daughter is going to be born two weeks early." Jessica looked at the man’s wife and asked "Should I be taking this seriously?" She said that her husband has an uncanny ability to predict things like this and that he definitely wasn’t kidding. He may not be right, but he’s not joking or making anything up. The man later said that Ava was already fully grown and ready to be born. He also made a point to say that he was looking forward to checking back later to see if his prediction was correct. It was a strange encounter but Jess could tell that he wasn’t fooling with her, so we’re both staying on our toes in case his prediction comes true. I can’t wait to see if it does…