First Bath

So this happened a week or so ago, but here is a cute picture!

This little guy loves his baths!  He screams when he's getting undressed but is instantly quiet when he gets in that tub.

Outings

Having a baby in the Summer has been so much different than the Winter.  When I had Michael I didn't go anywhere for weeks.  I remember seeing people at Thanksgiving and Christmas, that's it.  With Elli I remember going out a little bit more, but I still felt shut-in.  With Ethan I can go places!  It shouldn't make me that happy, but it does.  I need the vitamin D.

We've gone shopping quite a bit and out to eat a couple of times.  We went to the zoo and the temple

We've been swimming in our pool, gone to the splash pad, and gone to 7 peaks.

We had a day of running errands which included getting Elli and Ethan's birth certificate.  Michael handed me this little beauty after coloring on it.

This week I ventured out on a play date at the splash pad, I've taken the kids to the park, gone to Costco and Walmart, and went out to lunch with my mom.

It really has been so great to get out!

I spy with my little eye.....

....a very small purple shoe

I only spent 20 minutes searching the house and car top-to-bottom to find it 4 hours later when I went to grab the broom.  Don't you love how kids hide everything?

That awkward moment...

...when you spill your water in a way that makes you look like you peed your pants

But she found it hilarious

Go play dirt

Michael loves to play in the dirt.  So much so that he asks to do it every day.  Every time Josh goes outside I hear a "mommy, Michael go play dirt?"

He always has to have his trusty stick to help him dig.  The fact that he hasn't broken a bone climbing around window wells and trenches is a miracle.  I guess boys will always love dirt right?

Why so serious?

My little Joker in the making.  On second thought, maybe I shouldn't have watched so much batman when she was little.

Family Photo

This was taken Monday, the first picture of all of us!

Being Little #2

I wrote a post about being little about Michael.  I honestly didn't think I'd have a baby smaller than Michael.  Well here I am with a tiny little guy who is ridiculously tiny and adorable.  My feet are average size, look at how tiny he is

Things were a little rough the first 24 hours.  We had to make sure he was eating enough to not have blood sugar issues.  We ended up giving him two bottles, both of which he drank maybe 1/4 of an ounce.  After that he did a really good job of waking up to eat every 2 hours.  Unfortunately he's had a few nights waking up every hour, but I'll take that!

After losing weight initially he's finally back over 5lbs and doing great!  Hopefully in two weeks he'll be out of preemie diapers and fit into newborn clothes without his pants falling off.  How I love this little guy!

You can thank my sweet sister for this hat :)

Adventures in coloring

Do you ever have those moments when you forget why you did or didn't let your older child do something?  I remember I let Michael color at 15 months, but then I rarely let him do it again for a few more months.  I figured Elli is 16 months, why not let her?  Well she did awesome!

Then I remembered why I waited so long to let Michael do it again.  I have to watch her like a hawk or she does this, and gets marker all over her shirt.

The Birth Story

By far Ethan's birth has been the most relaxing birth I've had.  A big part of that is due to having a home birth.  Another part is that this is the first baby I've had during the night, so I slept through part of labor, which makes everything go so much faster.

Well Friday night was the same as every other night.  Luckily my midwife came over earlier that day and dropped off all of the birth stuff.  I didn't eat anything special or go running, even though I told Josh I was going to run if the baby didn't get here soon.  We stayed up late watching TV and headed to bed at 11.  I was having contractions, but I've been having them for 2 months.

I tried to sleep for a few hours but found myself waking up to have a contraction and then falling back asleep.  After this happened a few times I finally got up and got in the bath.  A couple more contractions later I knew I needed Josh to start timing them.  I called his name for a good 5 minutes, even though he was sleeping twenty feet away.  He very clumsily came into the bathroom and asked if I had been calling for him and told me it was 3am.  He timed my contractions for about twenty minutes and called my midwife.

When I first got into the tub I was having contractions about two minutes apart.  When Josh started timing them they had spread to roughly 5 minutes apart, then went back to three minutes apart.  While Josh talked to my midwife the actual contraction went from 30 to 60-90 seconds long.  My midwife had us time contractions for another ten minutes and call her back.  My contractions were now only two minutes apart.  When Josh called her back she could hear me in the background and knew I was in labor without a doubt.

Josh started blowing up the tub and I attempted to put my contacts back in.  I ended up sitting on the bathroom floor for a good half hour waiting for the tub to be blown up and filled with water.  Josh had me time my own contractions and they were a minute apart and at least a minute long.  At some point during this we had to sit down and decide what we were going to name this baby if it was a boy.  We had a girls name, but hadn't decided on a boys name.

My midwife showed up when the tub was almost full of water.  She checked me really fast and said I was already 8cm dilated.  I got in the tub and started to really want this baby out!  My midwife told me to try and break my water, which was a really cool, but weird experience.  I tried but could not break it, she tried and couldn't, so we ended up using a little hook that got it right out.

During the next few contractions I would take a breath and then push, and I repeated that throughout the whole contraction.  I had a lot of back pressure and knew I was almost done.  After about ten minutes of this there was a baby head out.  Josh describes this as the really weird part.  The baby head was out and he moved it around a little.  After thirty seconds my midwife told me baby had turned its body and I could push the rest out.  One little push and I had a baby.

At this point we still didn't know if we had a little girl or boy.  My midwife grabbed the baby and put it in my arms.  Baby had made a couple of small noises but wasn't breathing that great.  After five minutes and a few puffs of oxygen everything was just fine, and we found out we had a little boy!

The rest is what normally happens.  A placenta, cutting the cord, breastfeeding, both of us getting checked out, a shower, a diaper, and getting peed on.  You know you have a little boy when you get peed on.

Everything has been great so far!  We're doing okay with little sleep for now.  Poor Josh started his new job today and hasn't had much sleep.  We've worried a little bit about him (Ethan, not Josh) eating enough and pooping enough, but things are working themselves out almost perfectly.  If we're not functioning well for a few weeks you know why!