4 Months

They might be a little fuzzy but I think I have one of the best photo subjects ever.  I can't believe Caleb has only been a part of our lives for 4 months.  He is such a joy to have around.  My favorite days of the week are Saturday and Sunday because I get to spend the entire day with my handsome little boy.  It is hard for me to get pictures of him smiling because he gets confused by the camera, so it was exciting that I got a couple this time.  Caleb's smiles warm my heart especially when I am waking him up in the morning it makes it not quite so hard to take him to the babysitter.  He forgives me so quickly when I have made him wait just a little too long for a bottle.  I tell everyone that Caleb is a champion smiler and sleeper.  He loves to smile at everyone, especially if they will take a little time to talk to him. He sleeps through the night, which is such a blessing.  I really believe I won the baby lottery, he definitely has his cranky moments but on the whole it a smiling bundle of happy baby.

There have definitely been changes since Caleb joined the family.  It takes longer to get out the door, and I eat cold meals sometimes because dinner is ready just about the time he is hungry.  The biggest change though has been how soft my heart has become where children are concerned.  I tear up at news stories about babies who have been hurt or neglected, I get choked up telling Brad about a heart warming story I saw on facebook.

I don't know who this little boy is going to grow up to be, but I feel blessed that Heavenly Father has entrusted him to my care.  I can only hope I do a good job (cue the tears).

Putting up Christmas lights.

Because of my significantly less demanding work schedule this holiday season I was actually around to help Brad put up the Christmas lights, so we turned it into a family affair.  I don't know how much help we actually were but Caleb and I were there for the whole process.  Caleb wore his bear suit for the first time, don't know if he liked it but he sure looked cute.  You can tell by the t shirt Brad is wearing that the weather Thanksgiving weekend was really nice.  We probably didn't need to worry about Caleb being too cold but we will attribute it to new mom syndrome.  Brad did most of the scampering up and down the ladder I mostly untangled lights, handed him light clips, entertained Caleb, and took pictures.  Needless to say I think I got the better end of the deal, but at the end of the day the lights were up and no one fell off the roof or the ladder.

Caleb's new trick

Bet you can't guess what my little boy is learning to do.  Needless to say the binkie isn't nearly as interesting as it used to be.  My little boy has discovered his thumb, sigh.  Other than that isn't he the cutest thing ever with his little crinkled ear.  He has been talking to us all day long.  Brad just informed me that he sucked his thumb as a child so I am blaming this development on him.

Like Father Like Son

Brad is happy to report that at only 16 weeks old Caleb is already a complete football fan.  I try telling Brad that Caleb just likes to watch the moving colors on the TV but he is adamant that Caleb makes comments at the right times and loses interests during the commercials.  Who am I to argue with a proud father.  Regardless of what the exact situation is I get a kick out of watching my boys watch football.

Now, in case you were wondering who we cheer for at our house, check out the football jersey my mom found in the basement and sent to us.  Brad commented that my mom is a very smart and discerning lady.

Food for thought

I don't know who people voted for in the recent presidential election, and don't care.  I do know that there are quite a few people that were disappointed by the outcome, for a variety of reasons.  I also know that I am many of my friends are getting worried about raising our children in a world that feels like it is going farther and farther away from  the values we believe in.  Because of this I am reposting what a friend of mine wrote on her blog the morning after the elections.  I am looking at this more from a whole life and world perspective and less of an election won or lost perspective, but it was a nice reminder when it is so easy to get caught up in the ups and downs of life.

This is for all of my wonderful friends who are having a rough day today after last night's kick in the gut. After climbing out of my funk, re-evaluating and re-committing all morning I had a thought. I would like to share it with you all and I hope you will take it to heart.
On Saturdays KBYU used to replay BYU football games from time to time. The great thing about this is that they would ...only replay games where BYU won. This was a fantastic thing because you never had to get upset, never had to yell at the refs, never any heartbreaking final scores. You KNEW who was going to win in the end. It didn’t matter if BYU was down by 2 touchdowns with 3 minutes left in the 4th quarter. There was ALWAYS a comeback. Our team ALWAYS won. You could relax and enjoy the game. Such is life. We are in the 4th quarter. Just got a big kick in the gut. We may feel as if we are behind by a couple of touchdowns. But you know what? The results of this game are already in. It was played in the beginning of time. We KNOW who is going to win. It has been written thousands of years ago by the One who started the game in the first place. God and His righteous followers WILL win at the last day. Those who stand for truth and righteousness will win. The game is not over yet and some people may even switch teams. But the outcome will remain the same. We know the final score so there is no need to yell at the refs, or eat a bottle of TUMS, or curse the opposing side. Regardless of what happens, we know the final score. The righteous will win. “Be still, and know that I am God”. – Psalms 46:10
I say, bring on this 4th quarter. My family is ready. It is easy to fight when you know you’ve already won. PRESS FORWARD SAINTS

 

I am grateful to live in a country where I can vote for my local and national leaders, and while I may complain about policy I don't agree with I will always respect the office they have been elected to and the fact that the people of this nation elected them.  If there is something in the world you don't like or would like to change I like the words of Ghandi "You must be the change you want to see in the world."  If you want to see kindness, be kind.  If you want to see love, be loving.  If you want to see respect for differences, respect those differences.  The list goes on and on.  There just a few words to think about.

 

 

3 Months old

It is hard to believe that just over 3 months ago Caleb wasn't a member of our family.  He is getting bigger everyday, and talking up a storm.  Well I am sure only a mom or a grandma would refer to his cooing and gurgling as talking, but it is fun to hear all the same.  He is such an alert little boy, he loves to sit up so that he can see what is going on.  He frequently spends his evenings in his bouncy chair on the kitchen counter watching mom cook dinner.  He was incredibly patient this last week when mom and dad were both sick with a nasty flu bug.  Needless to say I am completely in love with my little boy and don't know how I got through 37 years of life without him.

2 months already??

I can't believe it was just two months ago that we brought this little guy home from the hospital.  I am still amazed that the nurses let us leave with him. He was 7lbs 9oz and 21 inches long when we brought him home.  Now he is practically rotund weighing in at 10lbs 10oz, but he carries his weight well on his 24 inch long frame.  He hasn't really lost any of his hair so now that he is filling out he is really looking like a little boy, sometimes with a very adorable part in his hair.  

Everyone kept telling me to just enjoy holding my baby and I didn't really believe them until we got home and I had the chance to just sit and hold my little guy.  Suddenly it all made sense, how incredibly  wonderful it is to have the miracle of a baby in your life.  Brad remarked to me one evening as he was holding Caleb, "I didn't think I would enjoy this as much as I do."  I just smiled because I had known that he would.  People ask me all the time what is your favorite part about being a mom.  The best part is watching my husband be a dad.  

It has been 2 months since we brought Caleb home, I go back to work on Monday, I really can not believe it has gone by that quickly.  They say time flies when you are having fun, well if this is any indicator, we are having a blast.

 July 29, 2012. 1 day old, coming home from the hospital

September 28, 2012. 2 months old, getting ready for first Logan High Football game.

Caleb's Arrival

Caleb was due on July 26th,  but I didn't really start having contractions until 2:30am on July 27th, by about 8am I decided it was time to go to the hospital, so we got packed up and ready to go only to have  the contractions slow back down to about 15 minutes apart.  So we spent the day doing laundry, working on projects, watching tv, and having contractions.  By about 5pm things had started to progress so we headed to the hospital.  It was definitely a good idea because I had 2 contractions in the 15 minutes it took to get to the hospital.  My friend Erica called while we were on our way to the hospital,  it was fun hear her reaction when I told her that I would have to get off the phone soon because we were on our way to the hospital.  The following pictures are our documentation of the events of the day.

 Arriving at the hospital still on the phone talking to Erica.  I need to add that the dress I am sporting was purchased way back when I was a student at BYU.  I have kept it all these years in anticipation of being pregnant some day.  The oversized baggy look went out of style years ago but it works great as a maternity dress.  See sometimes you do use those things you hang on to.

I had the sweetest labor and delivery nurses ever.  They were amazingly patient and very kind.  The funniest part about being in the hospital was that every shift of nurses who were assigned to us had one who was pregnant on it.  Let me just say this, nurses who are nice enough to let you sleep when you have been awake for over 24 hours are worth their weight in gold.  

 The nurses kept telling me that I was being entirely too calm about the whole thing.  Needless to say about 3 hours later when the contractions got really intense I did everything I could to prove them wrong in that assessment.

To pass the time we brought the DVD collection of MASH with us.  It actually did a great job of distracting me, funny enough but without a serious plot line that I had to pay attention to.

 Here is our boy getting cleaned up and weighed, needless to say he didn't like that experience too much.  But once they got a diaper on him, calmed right down.  During this whole process Brad was assessing if he looked like a Caleb or Brandon, (those were our boy name choices).  After about 15 minutes he looked over at me and said "He's a Caleb".  It was also at this point that I asked the nurse for the camera because I had to try and capture the look on Brad's face as he held his son for the first time.

 Here we are welcoming our boy to the family, needless to say we decided pretty quickly that we were going to keep him.  In fact I am still pretty amazed that the nurses let us take him home from the hospital.

Waiting......

So I have managed to finally get the quote up on the wall in the baby's room.  So now it would be nice if the contractions would progress enough to make a trip to the hospital worth it.  Brad has also proven to be the nicest husband ever.  He pulled together some extra cash and surprised me with a glider for the nursery.  I guess the baby can arrive now, we are as ready as we will ever be.

Nesting?

I don't know if this would be considered nesting but I am pretty excited about all the stuff we have accomplished in the last few weeks.  Brad got rolling shelves built in the basement, so now our canned goods have a home and get automatically rotated.  So proud of him, especially because he finished them before the cut off date which was the baby being born.

With the shelves finished that allowed me to move some things around in the store room so now it is all organized and tidy, even the floor got swept.

We have the baby's room painted, and I getting some custom vinyl quotes cut this week to finish things off.  So that is on the home stretch.

The biggest accomplishment is I finished the  crib bedding, it is beyond adorable.  I am so glad I stuck with it even when I wanted to throw in the towel.  For any would be crafty people out there, unless you are a seamstress, just stay away from vogue patterns, I spent more time trying to figure out the directions then I did actually sewing.  But as you will see below the end result is super cute.

The teachers quorum in our ward marked on thing off my list, they did a fund raiser and washed windows, so now all I have to do is wash the inside of the windows and we are good to go.

Anyway I don't know if it would be considered nesting but it is nice to get some things done and cleaned around the house so that I know I won't have to worry so much about them when the baby comes.  Next up the Garage... duh duh duh... (maniacal laughter in the background).

We finally got our shutters painted and up on the house, it gives the house a lot more personality.  It breaks up all the blah beige.  It is hard to see it in the picture but we painted the front door the same color. Next up painting the baby's room.  We are just Do It Yourself fools.

I think the best sound in the world is the sound of Brad laughing whenever the baby kicks him.  I don't have any amazing thoughts about this new little one who will be joining our family, but it makes me so happy that Brad is excited and happy about the baby.  Of course it makes me giggle when I mention that on his days off Brad gets to watch the baby, and I get to see the look on his face.

I do have to say that I feel I truly won the husband lottery. This is the man who made it possible for me to not only survive the holidays in retail, while living through the first trimester of pregnancy.  I can honestly say that the only reason we had clean clothes to wear or clean dishes to eat off of is because Brad took care of it.  He is always doing wonderful things like that.  He heard me telling a friend about the Stampin'Up party I am hosting tomorrow, so today he took it up on himself to clean up the house so I wouldn't have to worry about it this evening.  The cherry on top was when he informed me that he thinks I am more beautiful now then when we got married.

I guess what I am trying to say is that I am so grateful that I can give our child such a thoughtful and caring parent.

Feeling very accomplished today!

I have finished one of my sewing projects that I decided to take on before the baby arrives. I realized this winter that I desperately needed to replace my bath robe that I made for myself about 11 years ago. It is literally falling apart. Well today I finished the replacement. Yeehaww! Once it gets washed a couple of times is should be sufficiently soft that I can get ride of the old one. Now on to the big project making the babies crib bedding. I have picked out the cutest fabric ever. Once I get the quilt top put together I will post a picture so you can all see. We have also picked out a color for our new shutters that we are putting up on the house. Next weekend will be painting day and then our house will not be so beige anymore.

If you are ever in cache valley and in need of a pedicure I can tell you the place to go. Serendipity is the best. But then again anywhere that will pamper my feet for a hour is pretty high on my list of awesome places. One of the perks of being pregnant is that my fingernails and toenails have taken on an amazing toughness. I have the best fingernails I have ever had in my life, the hormone swings may make for some interesting emotional states but they certainly provide some nice benefits.

Introducing Pepsi

Since I am 20 weeks pregnant I guess it is time to introduce the world to the new addition to our family. Since the doctor says the baby is approximately the size of a can of soda we have chosen the name Pepsi. So far everything is progressing normally, but I am glad those ultrasound techs can tell what is going on because for the most part it just looked like a whole bunch of light and dark blurs. We are so excited to welcome this munchkin to our family. My due date is July 26. So far I don't look pregnant I just look like I am getting chubby around the waist. I promise to post pictures as my waist band expands.

Final East Coast Trip update

On the last day of our East Coast trip Brad and I were able to spend a day in NYC. It was amazing, people everywhere, shops, restaurants, etc beyond imagining. We decided that since we were only going to be there for one night that we would go to see a Broadway show. We ended up getting tickets to "Phantom of the Opera". It was amazing of course, but the best part was when Brad commented to me as we were walking out of the theater "If we had more performances like that in Logan I would be willing to go to more musicals."
This is the view from our hotel room. We stayed in this nice hotel just a few blocks from Times Square. You can't see much detail but this is a design studio of some kind, our hotel was on the edge of the fashion district. They were still going strong at 1am when Brad and I got back from our broadway show, and the lights were all still off when we left the hotel at 11am. Definitely what you have always pictured as the late night NYC life.
Can't go to Times Square and not take a picture of the naked cowboy. Needless to say there was much rolling of eyes on Brad's part.
This is also from our hotel room window. The parking structure on the right has car elevators so that long term cars can be lifted up to take up less space. Evidently necessity is the mother of invention.
This parking garage is the same concept where the cars are up on lifts to create more space.
All ready for our big night out on the town. After the play we just wandered around downtown, it is true NYC never really sleeps, it was midnight and everything was still going strong. We had fun wandering around picking out pastries from different shops. We took it all back to the hotel room and had a feast. Definitely the city for amazing eats, I would be poor and weigh 1000 pounds if I lived there.

Fun little restaurant we stopped in for lunch. Needless to say we were a little unprepared for the prices. $20 for a BLT seemed a little ridiculous no matter how yummy it was.

Finally catching up on trip pictures

So one of the best parts of this trip back east was the chance to see long lost friends. Christi and I grew up together and even participated in show choir in high school together back in the day. We haven't seen each other for almost 10 years. She was kind enough to offer Brad and I a place to stay while we were in DC so we didn't have to worry about a hotel. She even took some time to go sight seeing with us.
Afton and I were roommates way back when I was in grad school. She was a very goofy and exuberant 19 years old. We had a lot of fun together she kept me from taking myself too seriously. We met here at a local shopping center and had a wonderful meal together.


It is amazing what a telephoto lens can accomplish. This was from across the mall, by the washington monument. I figured even though we didn't have the time to actually walk over to the White House I would get some fun pictures.
When we were touring the various war memorials there was a group of veteran's touring with active duty service men. I managed to get some pretty moving pictures. In fact when they all walked up as we were at the Korean Memorial I almost started crying it was such a moving sight.

You probably can't make it out but this is what their t-shirts say on the back, "If you can read this, Thank a teacher.... If you can read this in English, Thank a Veteran! Remembering the price of freedom... Honoring those who paid the price!"
The Smithsonian museums are by far the coolest, free activity ever. We spent hours there and only made it through a couple of the facilities. These are just a few of the pictures that I took.

This is a glass sculpture that is outside the hall where the Star Spangled Banner is displayed. It was absolutely beautiful shimmering in the afternoon light. That was definitely a cool display because they provided a digital rendering of the flag pointing out various imperfections and where they came from. It was very moving.
You can't really see it because I had the exposure set wrong on my camera but that is the captial building in the background. In my last post I managed to get the pictures from our day in Amish country posted. So now I am going to try to get things up to date.