Sunday, March 27, 2011

Baby Benson

Finally, here's post 102! I've been waiting around for Trevor to write this one, since he wrote the post when Cassie was born. Well, it's been two weeks (I can't believe it's been that long!) and he's not showing any interest in blogging, so I guess I better do it.

Here's the birth story first. It's not too graphic, but it's certainly not interesting to everyone out there. So feel free to skip to the pictures.

I was scheduled to be induced on Friday, March 11th. My doctor told me to call Labor and Delivery first thing in the morning, and they would tell me what time to come in. We had planned to get some shopping and cleaning done that morning since we knew I wouldn't be their first priority as an elective induction. My mom was ready to come babysit Cassie as soon as the hospital was ready for us. When I called, the nurse asked me to call back in a few hours, and they would tell me when to come in. Perfect! We got ready for the day and started some cleaning and laundry. When I called again, they told me they were too busy right then but would call me back within the next hour. Awesome. More cleaning, folded the laundry, and Trevor ran out to do some last-minute shopping. It had been almost two hours, so I decided to call the hospital. (Does anyone else see where this is going?) Fast forward to 1 pm, when our apartment was immaculate (I had even spot-cleaned the carpet!), everything was organized and ready for the baby, and we were starting to get bored. The charge nurse in Labor and Delivery called: "How do you feel about Sunday?" There was no way to fit us in that day, and my doctor wasn't available on Saturday. Talk about a let-down. I was so frustrated. I guess the good news is that my frustration centered around the fact that I had nothing to do for the next day-and-a-half of my life, and not that I was incredibly uncomfortable or worried about the health of my baby. I just hate feeling lazy and unproductive, and of course we had cleared our schedules for the weekend. And there's nothing worse than getting your hopes up and making exciting plans, only to have them cancelled! (Well, postponed. Let's not get too dramatic.) Anyway, I called my Mom and she calmed me down (aren't mothers wonderful?) and helped us figure out what to do next. So, on to plan B: Trevor, Cassie, and I spent Saturday morning at our place (it was actually kind of nice to just relax), then we headed to my parents' house in the afternoon. We helped with some yard work, listened to the BYU basketball game, ate dinner, then left Cassie at my parents' for a sleepover and went to my high school's production of The Scarlet Pimpernel before heading home. (A sidenote: I have always wanted to see The Scarlet Pimpernel. I think finding out that it was playing at my high school and that I would be able to go see it was the main factor in pulling me out of my slump on Friday afternoon.) We got home late and went straight to bed, then woke up super early (it felt earlier because it was daylight savings) and got to the hospital at 7:30. After all the admitting procedures, my nurse was about to get my IV in and start the pitocin, when another nurse ran in and told my nurse that she was needed right away. 45 minutes later, my nurse came back: a woman had just given birth in her car right outside the hospital. Her husband had run inside to grab a wheelchair, and when he came back, she was holding the baby. And their other three children were in the backseat while all this happened. So I was grateful to be in my situation. Anyway, my doctor came in and broke my water just before 9:00, and they started my pitocin just after 9:00. I wanted to go for as long as I could stand the pain before getting an epidural, in the hopes that I would progress a little more quickly than I did with Cassie (with her, as soon as I got the epidural, my body slowed WAY down). I just read some books until about 2:00 pm, when the contractions were too painful and too frequent for my taste. I was at a 4 when I got the epidural. My doctor came in less than two hours later and I was at a 10! I guess this time, the epidural helped my body relax. Baby Benson was born at 4:45 after pushing through 3 or 4 contractions. Birth is such a miracle! I just cried and cried for joy when I first saw him and held him. There is nothing like being a mother.

Benson Trevor
Born March 13, 2011 at 4:45 pm
8 lbs 10 oz
20.5 inches

Proud parents
Big sister waving hello! She had a bad cold with a cough, so she got to wear a mask.
Family of four! Cassie got a "big sister" present at the hospital- a backpack with some toys, a book, and a big sister shirt, which she is wearing.
What a nice daddy.
Happy St. Patrick's Day!
Aw. Notice, he has hair! This is exciting for us.
Benson is a great sleeper and eater, and that's pretty much all he's done for the last two weeks, which has made my life so much easier! He is just starting to be awake more often and cry a little more. So far, having a second baby has been much easier than having a first, mostly because I knew what to expect and how to prepare. I also think Benson cries less and sleeps more than Cassie did. He is, however, a champion spitter-upper. I've done a load of laundry almost every day since we came home from the hospital. Even so, I am so happy that I get to hold him in my arms now instead of having him kick my ribs from the inside! We're so happy to have him in our family.

Thursday, March 10, 2011

Drumroll, please....

This, ladies and gentlemen, is the 101st post on our blog. And I have officially caught up with everything that has happened in the last 6 months (or at least everything we took pictures of). And what good timing, since tomorrow at this time, it is very likely that we will be holding a brand new baby boy in our arms! We will call the hospital first thing in the morning to find out what time to arrive for my induction. Post #102 will be much more momentous than this one, I assure you!

Birthday Party!

Anyone remember Cassie's best friend from Provo? Well, even though we don't see her very often any more, Cassie still talks about Lily (if you ask her who her friends are, her first answer is always Lily, then she starts naming her friends from playgroup). So when Lily's mom called to invite us to a little birthday celebration, Cassie was pretty ecstatic. I had fun catching up with a few of the moms from our old ward, and Cassie loved playing with Lily and seeing the presents. Then Lily was nice enough to share her tricycle with Cassie and she even let Cassie go for a ride on her new birthday present- a bike!
Can you guess what Cassie wants for her birthday now?

Snow!

All right, so we've had snow all winter. But we hadn't taken Cassie out to play in it yet this winter, and we were feeling like bad parents. So after a nice snow storm near the end of February, Cassie and Trevor got all bundled up and ventured out by the playground outside our apartment. They built an awesome snowman (look at the pictures and take a wild guess on who did all the work) that was knocked over hours later by some teenage hoodlum, no doubt. When we have our own lawn we won't have to worry about our snowmen getting attacked, right? (Can you tell I'm getting house hungry?) They had lots of fun and I got to take a hot shower while they played. :) That's my kind of Saturday.

Toy shelves

After Christmas, I decided it was definitely time to re-think Cassie's toy storage system (read: too many toys to fit in the two bins we had been using, resulting in a constant mess). Trevor used his manly shelf-building skills and made these awesome shelves for some new toy bins (bought at Ikea), and now the mess is all organized in her closet! Hooray! (Does anyone else love a clean, organized house?)

Wednesday, March 9, 2011

OxiClean works


And our carpet is super dingy. See those light spots? They were dark spots, and I decided to try getting them out with OxiClean. And it worked! A little too well. So then I had to clean the whole area (sigh), and it's looking better. When we buy a house, remind me to get high-quality carpet. That doesn't show dirt.

Go Cougars!

We're pretty happy to be BYU basketball fans this year. I'm proud to say that we were faithfully following their games from the beginning of the season, before any Jimmermania happened. So yeah, no fair weather fans here. (Especially Trevor. He loves basketball.) I got tickets to the UNLV game for all three of us as a Christmas gift to Trevor. We decided to make a day of it, so we headed to Provo in the morning. Trevor and Cassie explored the Bean Museum while I got my hair cut (I sent the camera with him, but I guess it's pretty obvious from the lack of pictures of me that I take all the pictures around here...), then we ate at Pizza Pie Cafe. Oh boy, I really need better self-control when it comes to their dessert pizzas.
Then to the game! Go Cougs! (We won. Did I really need to mention that?)
After the game, we visited my "little" brother Robert at his apartment. And luckily for Cassie, his roommate has a drum set. She's a natural!
P.S. Cassie loves doing the end of the fight song: "Rah rah, rah rah rah! Goooo Cougars!"

Tuesday, March 8, 2011

Road Trips

We headed to Idaho Falls for a weekend in January to visit Trevor's brother and his wife, who had a baby boy in December. We stopped in Logan and spent Friday night with Trevor's youngest brother and his wife, then we all hopped in the car and headed to IF together on Saturday morning. On the way back to Logan that evening to drop Rialey and Kim off at their apartment, it started to snow. A lot. We were planning on driving all the way home, but it was getting late and we were worried about making it through Sardine Canyon alive. So Rialey and Kim were uber generous and let us stay with them another night. They were such good hosts!

We drove down again on the first Sunday in February when our new nephew was blessed, and even though we were all sick that day, I was so glad we made the drive- we got to see Trevor's oldest brother Kallan and his family. They live in Montana and we missed seeing them at Christmas. While Trevor and Kallan were in school, we lived in the same apartment building for two years, so we got to spend a lot of time together and we have really missed them since they moved. Cassie loved playing with so many of her cousins, and I wish I took some pictures of them all together. Anyway, some of these pictures are from our first visit in January, and some are from the blessing day in February.

Cassie has a talent for wearing people out.
cuddling cousins
The baby. Aw. Check out that hair!
Whoa! Watch out.
Two little monkeys jumping on the bed

Monday, March 7, 2011

Playgroup!

I am so glad that a friend in our ward decided to organize a playgroup for 2-3 year olds this fall! Cassie and her little friends have had so much fun playing together, doing crafts, and learning a little each week. It has really helped Cassie overcome her shy/clingy phase and make some great new friends. I think the organized lesson portion of it has helped all of the kids learn some basic concepts and learn how to sit and focus for a while. I think I speak for all the other moms when I say that the 2-hour break each week has been pretty nice for us, too!

One week they all insisted on wearing hats. I really had to document it.
This was the same week that the girls spent the whole time "shopping" with their "purses" and the boys spent the whole time pushing a car back and forth. :)

One week we had our short lesson on daytime and nighttime, so we had a pajama party, made a fort, and had a 30-second sleepover in the fort. Then I woke them up from their "sleep" and they ate cereal for "breakfast" at snack time. They had a lot of fun that day playing in the fort.

Cassie decided to have playgroup with her dolls and stuffed animals one day, so she got out all of their playgroup mats (aka kitchen towels and hot pads) and set things up in the hallway.

Instead of keeping all of Cassie's little art projects from playgroup, we decided to take pictures of them:

Happy Holidays

"Happy Holidays" really is an accurate phrase for me- I look forward to Thanksgiving and Christmas every year. I get excited about spending time with family and relaxing and eating yummy food and making memories. For me, they wouldn't feel like the holidays if we stayed home- I feel like I can only fully relax and get away from the daily grind at our parents' houses. (When does that change? Eventually we'll stay at our house on holidays, and hopefully they will still feel like holidays to me...) Nothing super eventful happened this year, but I want to document it anyway in pictures.

We spent Thanksgiving with my family. Basically, I took no good pictures. So this is what you get.

[Classy tourist shirt courtesy of Wells Fargo, modeled by my brother Vaughn. It was a freebie my dad got at work. He couldn't pass it up. Obviously.]
Adorable Lexi, who is getting so big SO fast!

And a better-documented Christmas trip spent with Trevor's family:


Cassie and cousin Eliza were super helpful (ha!) and kept getting out the brooms to sweep the floor.
She looks innocent enough, but every time someone sat down to play the piano, Cassie sat next to them and eventually pushed them out of the way- "I want to play the whole piano!" (P.S. Another reason I love the holidays is the music. I love love love Christmas music!)
Happy Birthday to Trevor! He is such a good sport about having his birthday on Christmas Eve.
Cassie and her adorable cousin Paul on Christmas morning

Cassie's gifts: a doll house and a set of blocks (both were big hits- Eliza and Cassie sat and played with the doll house and wouldn't open presents for about 15 minutes. And I can't decide who likes playing with the blocks more- Cassie or Trevor.)

I obviously did a horrible job of taking pictures of any other members of Trevor's family. I'm grateful his mom is so good about taking lots of pictures of everyone!

After Christmas, we had a little celebration with my family. We drew names and filled up stockings for each other. New camera! Can you tell?


Tuesday, March 1, 2011

Career-oriented

We have a budding fashion designer/model on our hands.

Here are her "exercise clothes."

She knows it's really the shoes and accessories that make any ensemble work.

And when it comes to poses, form like this just can't be taught.

(Belly shot! One of very few since I'm always the one behind the camera. This is the beginning of December, so about 27 weeks)

And if the fashion industry doesn't work out, she might go the author/librarian route.


Either way, she certainly has a bright future.

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