Oh the places we will go...

Things have been crazy these past few months. Not crazy like I’m insane but crazy busy. Our internet connection in our apartment isn’t that great so when I try to download or upload anything it takes a few extra hours to get it on the blog so I usually give up and try to find something else to do.
Braydon’s very needy when I come home from work so if I’m not paying attention to him or holding him he gets upset. However, I think he likes to trick me into thinking he’s upset because as soon as I sit down with him on my lap he sometimes turns around and goes after any electronics he can get his hands on. He started crawling back in September and he got 4 of his teeth, he won’t let me get close enough to see if anymore are coming in. He’s also been standing against the furniture for quite a while. In October, we went searching through a pumpkin patch and found the perfect pumpkin. Then we dressed him up as a monkey and took him to “Boo at the Zoo”, I didn’t want to take him around for the candy it was just so that he could see the animals. I don’t think he really cared about them too much though. November, he stood by himself without holding on to anything. It usually lasts about 20 seconds before I get excited and start clapping for him and he can’t clap and stand at the same time. He’s taken a few steps to get to a toy that he really wants or to get to Jason or I. Every night when we bless the food Jason and I will kiss each other and then we’ll go over and give him a kiss. He’s gotten used to it so no matter what he is doing he will crawl over to the corner of the couch and wait for us to finish praying so he can get his kiss from mommy and daddy. In November, we went to California for Thanksgiving to be with Jason’s family and Braydon opened his first Christmas presents. He’s been playing around with them ever since. He got a ride or walk truck, at first when Jason put it together he was afraid of it but now that he’s gotten used to it he loves it. He likes to ride it and even more if you can push him really fast. If no one will push him he’ll sit on it and move his feet so he’s going in a forward direction. He’s started to stand up behind it and push it along with a stuffed animal behind the wheel. He’s a great clapper and gives high-5’s. He giggles at the most random things, he’s also started watching tv which sometimes makes him giggle. He also started waving when I’m leaving in the morning or when I’m going back to work after lunch. He hasn’t started blowing kisses yet but that’s alright. He’s a super smart boy, he’ll start stacking things on the floor so he can stand on them in order to reach a remote or the laptop. We bought a fence to keep him in the living room which has been helpful. When Jason is sitting on the floor, Braydon will try to crawl behind him or underneath his legs so we’re thinking that we will get him a tunnel for his birthday. As far as food goes he still doesn’t like anything with puffed rice, so he hasn’t started using finger foods yet. He’s also hesitant when it comes to anything with texture or beef. He’s so cute!
Jason had 2 classes he was taking this semester that he needed in order to get his associates degree. And we found out last week that he passed both of them. Woo-hoo! He wants to go to Utah Valley University to get his Bachelor’s degree but won’t be able to start attending until Fall 2012 semester. He’s been watching Braydon during the day and then drops him off at my work when he’s headed to work or class and then I watch him for the rest of the night. I like to think that we have a good system going. Jason’s been excited since the NBA lockout ended, so now he can watch the Utah Jazz play again.
And me, I’ve just been working nothing too exciting. I love watching Braydon play around and just learn new things. I also love watching Braydon and Jason interact with one another. I’ve been called to be a Relief Society teacher in our ward but I only have to teach every 2 months so I have to prepare for January 8th.
We had a great Christmas, and since we’ve already bought so many things we needed this year we weren’t going to give each other gifts. So I made Jason some gifts and ornaments for the tree and he surprised me by getting me a Kindle. He said that he already got his Christmas present when he upgraded his memory for his playstation 3. Braydon got a stuffed Perry the Platypus and Phineas and measuring cups and spoons and I think he’s enjoyed the kitchen supplies more than anything else. It’s been a crazy busy year and we’ve enjoyed every minute of it. Here’s to a great 2012!

Braydon on the swings in California


Playing on his new toy


I was folding laundry last week and he did this to himself, I thought it was funny


Thanksgiving in California

Playing with his measuring spoons, if I would have known he'd enjoy these the most I would have skipped the other presents.

He's Crawling....Everywhere

I know, I know. It's been a while and I haven't had much of an opportunity to update you on what has been going on in our lives since the end of July. We moved out of our old apartment at the end of July and couldn't move into the new one until August 5th. So with the help of my Brittany and Clay we were able to stay at their home for a week so we didn't have to pay for another month of rent. I got to see what it would be like if I had ever had a long commute to work, and I'd prefer not to have to leave an hour before to make it on time. That Friday we got to move it and did the walk through and started moving things in. I was going to take a picture before we started moving everything in but I forgot because I was just so excited. Our apartment is quite spacious 1000 sq ft. There isn't a storage shed or anything so we have some stuff stored behind the couch, under the bed and on the back porch which so far seems to be working out fine.

We've gotten back into our regular routines which is good. Jason is enjoying being at home during the day with Braydon and then going to work at 5pm or school. We're glad that my work allows him to drop Braydon off with me at 4:30pm. Jason started school again at the end of August, his last semester at SLCC. He'll graduate with his associates and hopefully he'll remember that he needs to finish his application for UVU today. He just had 2 classes this semester but they are a little more time consuming than the past few semesters. From what I've gathered it's also more difficult to do homework when there is a baby in the house who seems to crave constant attention.

Braydon is doing fantastic, he's a very happy baby. He's been eating solids since we moved into the new apartment. He likes applesauce, peaches, pears, carrots and he wasn't a fan of the rice cereal, green beans, peas, squash or bananas. He's grown accustomed to some of them but he's still not eating as much of them as he does his favorites. He got his first tooth at the beginning of September which was accompanied by a cold. His second tooth came in about a week later. At the beginning of September he also started pulling himself up to stand next the couch or using us as his anchor. In church I noticed that he likes to pull himself using the chair in front of us, which is usually occupied by a sister in the ward and he'll touch their bottoms in order to get the grip that he needs. It's pretty funny but I always apologize to the sister only to come to find out that she is fine with it. Hopefully that doesn't teach him that just because he's cute that it's OK to grab girls butts. He also started crawling which caused us to go out and buy some electrical outlet covers and create a fence out of various things in the living room. We have to keep him out the fireplace and away from the entertainment center and in order to keep him contained in one place so we aren't running all over the house after him we just block that area off completely. I also went to Kid to Kid and bought him some pajamas since it's starting to get cooler at night.

We had a family reunion with my side of the family at the end of August which Braydon seemed to enjoy seeing all of his cousins, even dressing up in Noah's Jack Sparrow hat complete with hair. I think he really enjoyed seeing Ty who is only a few months younger than he is. We had fun playing around with the kids and playing on the playground. He enjoyed the swings which made me happy, he went down on a slide with Daddy and he seemed to like it. Our new apartment has a swimming pool and we went out and bought some Little Swimmers for him and an outfit to wear in the pool and we never got the chance to take him in the pool. Either Jason or I were working most of the time and rarely had time off together to take him in the pool, which is now closed for the winter. There is a hot tub still but I don't know if he can go in there. The week after my family left, Jason's parents came out to visit. Braydon liked showing off for Grandma and Grandpa P and enjoyed all of the attention.

Here are some pictures of our last month:

His first experience with Rice Cereal, he seemed more interested in the spoon than the food.

Cute smile!


Future BYU cougar fan!Sorry Dad I had to post it, I thought it was funny.

Braydon as Jack Sparrow

Take me out to the ballgame....

On Saturday my work had a party at the Salt Lake Bee's game. We had a suite and lots of treats and even got a visit by the mascot. He was in a hurry so we didn't get to have him hold Braydon but that's ok.

Our baby sucking on his fingers...his favorite.

I made certain that he was wearing this outfit for the game. I think it's so cute!

In the suite before the game began, Braydon getting ready to root for the team.

And one of Daddy being animated but Braydon not so much.

The baseball diamond, I'm always impressed with the way they cut their grass.

Braydon praticing his windup. I'm sorry that it's sideways.

This morning Braydon was very intense while playing in his toy, I thought I better take a video of it.

Summer

I think I do this every summer, I forget about the blog and just update when Jason goes back to school. I figured I would get a head start and just skip over one month rather than all three. Braydon is such an amazing baby, he's growing up so fast. He had his 4 month check up in June and the doctor said that he is very healthy. He is now 5 months and getting so heavy I have a hard time carrying him in his car seat, especially up three flights of stairs. He rolls everywhere and he is getting so fast at it now. Every time I lay him on the ground on his back he'll immediately roll over onto his stomach and then just keep going. I'll find him all over the living room floor so laying a blanket on the floor no longer works. He's been drooling a lot which makes us believe that he is teething. You can see his gums on the bottom that there are little white nubs there but they haven't broken through yet. He grabs onto everything with his hands and his toes, yes, his toes. He has little monkey toes that catch on everything. He also likes to yell, it's rather funny. Jason likes to call it his dinosaur roar as you can see below. We try taking regular picture of him, but as soon as we get him to smile we bring out the camera and he just stares at it looking a little confused. This is the best smile I've caught on camera.

We took Braydon to see the fireworks on the 4th of July and he was attentive, he looked in awe but he didn't really make any noise or anything. We strapped him to Jason's front and covered him in a blanket seeing that it was starting to drizzle. He looked like a Jedi.

In other news we are finally moving into another apartment. We have to be out by the end of the month but we can't move into our new place until August 5th. So our plans are that we will pack everything up and little by little drop stuff off at Daniel and Kali's who are nice enough to allow us to use their garage. And then we'll stay at my sister Brittany's in Provo for a few days until we are able to move in. It's so exciting to finally get rid of a lot of stuff and finally get organized and know that we only have a few more weeks left until the big day. Our new apartment is in a nicer area where it would be easy to actually take a walk and Jason is within walking distance to where he works so that's great. It's also a 2 bedroom 2 bathroom apartments 1,000 sq ft and washer and dryer hook ups. We went out on the 4th of July weekend to find one and after several hours we found some that were at a good price. I think that is one thing we are most excited about is having our own laundry. And now Braydon is ready to go to sleep so I better go put him to bed. I'll update soon...I hope.

3 months old...

I can’t believe how fast time flies. Our little boy is 3 months old and everyday he does something new that surprises us. He can hold his head up by himself for long periods of time. He smiles and laughs all the time. He is definitely showing his personality. He can entertain himself for a little bit while we try and get things done around the house. He still likes to be held when he is getting sleepy, which is ok with me. He’ll follow his rattle with eyes and turn to the sound of it. He likes to play patty-cake and peak-a-boo, also Godzilla (Jason likes to make Godzilla noises when Braydon stomps his feet). He likes to grab his feet, which comes in handy when we are trying to change his diaper. He’ll sleep through the night waking up at least once around 3am. His usual bed time is around 10:30pm, enough time to see Daddy come home from work and play with him a bit. He is in the stage where he likes to roll over any time he is on his back. It used to take him a while before he would roll but now he has become a pro. He likes to watch SportsCenter with Daddy too, he’s captivated by it. He’s so well behaved when we go out to Church or other events, he just sits there quietly and he’ll only fuss if he’s hungry, tired, or needs a change. He’s drooling quite a bit now which makes me think that teething will come and ruin his sleeping pattern but I guess that’s something we should prepare for.

I went back to work the day after Easter and it was a hard week. The first day I had a couple of break downs and couldn’t wait to be home to see him again. Since then I’ve gotten better, I still can’t wait to go home and see him but it’s getting easier to leave him with relatives who love him. Kali has been watching him whenever Jason was scheduled to work, on Thursdays I would take off early in the morning to bring him down to Brittany’s. So I feel lucky to have such great family who take good care of him while I am unable to do so. My biggest fear was that Braydon wouldn’t remember me, but it doesn’t seem to faze him at all. He still gives me the biggest smiles when I come home.

Braydon at 2.5 months

Braydon had his 2 month check up at the beginning of the month. He weighs 11.3 lbs and was 24.5 inches tall. He's just growing up so fast and adorable as ever. Jason has become a miracle worker getting him to sleep in his crib. He's very talkative and smiles a lot which makes my heart melt every time. We decided last week that I'll go back to work for a little while so that we can pay off our debts, I'll be sad to leave him. We're trying to make it work with schedules so we'll see how it goes. It doesn't look like Jason will be taking any classes this summer unless they decide to offer classes that he actually needs. He's on the hunt for another job that pays better and has more hours and would work with him on his school schedule. So far I'm just enjoying my last week of being a stay at home mom. I thought I'd post a few pictures to show Braydon off a little bit.

Smile - and the awesome onesie that our nephew, Noah, picked out for him.

Posing for the camera

Twins...sort of

He spit up all over his face - he's still cute!

Sleeping in his crib and it looks like he spit up here too...

Another posing for the camera picture - plus check out those blue eyes

Quick Story...

Unfortunately I don't have a picture for this but it was hilarious when it happened.

On Sunday night I had just fed Braydon and I could hear him working on something, trying to get it out. A few minutes later I heard the audible noise of him pooping. I waited about 5 minutes and Jason and I went into the room to tackle it together. Jason was holding his legs while I wiped. I had gotten him all cleaned up but I wanted to use one more diaper wipe to make sure I didn't miss anything. I reached into the drawer to grab another wipe when I saw something fly out of the corner of my eye and I heard Jason give a little yell. I thought maybe Braydon had peed but no, it was much worse than that. I looked at Jason and he had a poop spot on his leg, I looked at the floor and there were poop spots next to the door, and then I looked at the changing table and there was poop all over it, he also managed to get his sock. I looked at Braydon and he was smiling. Jason and I have never seen poop fly like that, but it is one of the joy's of parenting that we are discovering.

1 Month - 2 month

It's been a month since Braydon came into our lives and even though it's been tough it's all worth it. He is so adorable, I can't help but kiss his chubby cheeks (on his face) every chance I get. His sleeping habits are getting better, he's sleeping longer through the night but the issue is he won't fall asleep until about 3am and then he'll be out until 8am or so. And then he'll wake up to be changed and fed and he'll fall asleep for another hour or so. I have been surprised at how many diapers we go through. We seem to go through about 10 a day which is just amazing to me, our diaper pail gets filled up so quickly but luckily it doesn't stink up our bedroom. He started to smile and laugh around the 12th which has been fun, and he really seems to enjoy his tummy time. He is so strong and he's able to lift his head for quite a long time. Jason even has him walking (with some help of course).We are excited for family to come out and be there for his blessing at the end of this week. We want to thank family and friends for their help with everything.

Ok, so the paragraph was written at the beginning of the month and I never had a chance to complete it. Everytime I got onto the computer to update it Braydon would want to be fed so I had to wait until another day. He's adorable though. We had family down this past weekend for Braydon's baby blessing, it was amazing. Jason and I got to show off a little bit, we had to give the opening and closing prayer in sacrament meeting and teach Sunday School so it was a lot of fun. I can't believe that he will be 2 months at the end of the week, time really does fly. Well he just woke up from his nap so I better go feed him. Here are some photos:

St. Patricks day we got a big smile - he's my lucky charm, it says so on the shirt

Look how tiny Braydon looks

He liked me reading The Hobbit

Family photo

Jason playing with our nephew Noah

This is what he originally was going to be blessed in but he wet through it right before Sacrament meeting.

Our bundle of joy...

I know it’s been a couple of weeks since we’ve had Braydon and I thought that I would have time to sit down and write out our whole experience but so far that hasn’t happened. He’s the most adorable baby I’ve ever seen but then again I could be biased. He’s sleeping right now but who knows how long that will last. We had an appointment set up for February 4th to go in and have me induced at 8:30pm. They told me to eat a big dinner and then call in an hour before our appointment to make sure that they have a bed for me. We went to Texas Roadhouse for dinner and then we went home and prepared our overnight bag and Jason gave me a blessing before we made the phone call. And when we did call they told me to come in at 9pm instead. So we arrived at the hospital and checked in, they took me to my room and had me change before hooking me up to the IV, Blood Pressure cuff, Pitocin, and the heart monitors on my stomach. I don’t think that they got me fully set up until 11pm and then they told me to get some rest…not that easy. Every time Braydon moved out of the way of the heart monitor an alarm would go off and wouldn’t stop until the nurse came back in to readjust it. The blood pressure cuff went off every 15 minutes, and every couple of hours I had to get up to go to the bathroom but I had to have Jason come over to the bed and unhook me from everything and then I had to roll the IV into the bathroom with me. I sat awake the entire night listening to Jason snoring away in the corner and thinking about everything that was about to happen. I think I finally fell asleep around 5:30am and was startled out of sleep at 6am by a woman screaming her head off in another delivery room. At that point I was scared out of my mind and wanted to back out, but it was too late. When the nurse came in she explained that the woman that was screaming came in too late to have her epidural but I shouldn’t worry because I’ll get mine in time. I certainly hoped so.
Dr. Langer showed up at 7:45am to check to see where I was at and to break my water…that was a weird sensation. She said that I had dilated to a 4 over night and they decided that they would continue to increase the dosage of pitocin until I was fully dilated and effaced. All during my pregnancy I couldn’t really tell the difference between contractions and the baby moving but once they broke my water those contractions came on heavily. The nurse told me that the anesthesiologist was with someone but was heading to my room next. Jason came over and held my hand as I tried to breathe through the contractions and I could watch them on the monitor. Luckily I only had to go about half an hour without the epidural. I was worried that when they put in the epidural that it would be painful but it wasn’t I just felt pressure. My right side from the stomach down went tingly and they told me to roll over on to my left to make sure that the epidural would spread evenly. Jason and I watched despicable me while we were waiting for the epidural to take full effect and it actually made me sleepy so we turnd off the movie and I tried to take a nap. The nurse kept coming in every half hour to check on me and to see how I’ve progressed. At about noon I was 7 cm dilated and almost there. At 2pm she came back and checked again and she told me that I’m ready to push this baby out, I was completely dilated and effaced. Then the nerves really set in, this is the part I had dreaded all along. Jason hurried up and changed his clothes and put on his shoes while the nurse and doctor got everything ready. I pushed for about 15-20 minutes and then I felt nauseated. I thought I could handle it since I never throw up but I’m sorry to say that in this instance I couldn’t keep it down. They let me pause for a bit while I tried to compose myself and the nurse ran off to get a medicine that would help with the nausea. Then we were ready to push again, after another 10-15 minutes Braydon was finally here. The doctor was surprised at how big he was, she was thinking that he was only going to be about 6.5 to 7 pounds. He was and is beautiful weighing 8 lbs 9 oz, 20 inches long. They washed him off and gave him to Jason to hold and bring to me. Jason was beaming from ear to ear so proud of his new little boy. Jason and one of the nurses took him to nursery while I tried to get some sleep and wait for a recovery room to open up. We had him sleep in our room the first night and we didn't get much sleep with the nurse coming in every couple of hours to check on us and I think Jason had the most uncomfortable bed ever. The second night the nurse wanted to wheel Braydon into the nursery around 1am to do some lab tests and she asked if I wanted her to keep him in there for a whiles that we could get some sleep, I felt bad saying yes but I was so exhausted after the past couple of days.
It’s now been almost 3 weeks since he was born and it’s still an adjustment. He likes to sleep all day and be awake most of the night. Since Jason has school and work I’m up with Braydon trying to get him to fall asleep most of the night but he has gotten better. I’m able to get him to fall asleep by about 2am or 3am and then he sleeps until about 8 or so. One thing we haven’t been able to do is get him to sleep in his crib. Everytime we get him to fall asleep we lay him down and he wakes up 5 minutes later crying his eyes out. I’ll admit I’m a wimp and I don’t like him crying so after about 2-3 minutes I go and pick him up and hold him until he falls asleep again. Anyone have any good ideas on how to get him to sleep in his crib?
He had a doctors appointment yesterday and we were told that he weighed 8 lbs 5 oz, not exactly at his birth weight but the doctor said that’s fine since he was rather large to begin with, he‘s in the 50th percentile in weight. He is now 21.5 inches long which is in the 85th percentile. The nurse came in and did a PKU test while Jason held on to Braydon and Dr. Buchanan came in and spoke to me about different things. They did tell us that we need to get him some vitamin D drops which apparently breast milk is deficient in. And the worst part of the visit was that we had him circumcised. We decided to do it in the doctors office rather than the hospital because some insurances won’t cover the cost believing it to be more cosmetic than necessary. In the hospital that could end up being a $1500 procedure that we would have to pay out of pocket. In the doctors office it’s a 1/3 of the price at $325. I didn’t want to watch but I was in the room while they did it and Jason ended up helping out with the procedure, by dipping Braydon’s pacifier in a cherry syrup and by holding onto his hands to comfort him. The doctor told us everything he was doing and showed us all of the pieces that he uses. They actually numbed the area with a shot of lidocaine which Braydon didn’t enjoy. Jason was doing perfectly fine being that close and watching until the doctor asked him how he was doing and told him about another dad that was helping him in the hospital that passed out. After that Jason felt a little woozy and had to sit down. After the procedure was over Braydon was not happy at all. We stayed in the room for about 20 minutes trying to calm him down by feeding him but every few minutes he’s let out a huge cry which would make the milk fall out of his mouth and then he’d cry more. We finally decided to try and get him dressed and in the car seat thinking that the sooner we got him home to an environment he recognizes the better. He passed out as soon as we put him in the car seat and placed the blanket over the visor. He slept for almost the entire afternoon, waking only for 15 minutes to eat and then he’d be asleep again.

Our Family!

Our handsome little boy

I just liked to watch him

Jason held on to Braydon while I tried to get dressed and wait to be discharged

I thought this was so cute, they were both passed out.

D-day!

Today is our official due date and we still don't have our little guy to hold yet. I went to an Indian restaurant last week hoping maybe the spices might help induce labor but I could only eat a few bites of that before I felt a little sick. I've walked around quite a bit hoping to induce labor as well but so far that hasn't helped. When we went in for our doctors appointment yesterday Dr. Langer said that I'm still a tight 2cm dilated and 80% effaced, which was disappointing to hear. So with that in mind she'd like to induce me by this Friday evening, our appointment is at 8:30pm and then they will break my water in the morning to get the contractions starting. I'm excited knowing that there is an end in sight but I think that also makes me more nervous just because once we go in there is no turning around (not that we would want to). Another plus to having this scheduled is I know that Jason will be there rather than worrying about him missing it while he is at school or work. The doctor said to bring lots of stuff to keep us occupied so we'll be packing a bigger bag than what we have already, any ideas on what we should bring?

Also in other news, last Friday was my last day of work until my maternity leave is over and I have to make a decision on whether or not I want to go back. The person that I was training was only there 6 days out of the 10 that she was supposed to be so we'll see how much she actually picked up on. I'm sure I'll hear something from someone about it over there. I'm just excited to be able to spend this time with Jason and soon we'll add Braydon into the mix. We'll keep you all posted...

Baby Shower

Last weekend one of the sisters in our ward threw a Baby Shower for Braydon. I've never been a fan of the games and everything at these things which is why I was so happy to hear that she didn't like them either. I had friends from work, church, and family.



And as promised, here is an updated side profile of the big baby bump. I've had a lot of people tell me that it doesn't look real but it is. Also in the background you can see our brand new table that we bought, Jason did a great job of putting it all together. And there are only 2 chairs visible but it came with 4, we just hadn't put those ones together yet.Our doctors appointment last Wednesday went well, however there weren't any changes in dilation or efacement from the week before. We did get to see him on the portable ultrasound and he had chubby cheeks but that could just be gravity since he is head down. He looked very handsome, just like his daddy. Our doctor measured his head and as of Wednesday it was around 9 cm or so, which is what a 39 week old baby should be so he's measuring a week ahead of schedule. I know that Jason and are I feeling ready to finally get to hold this little baby boy. We have another doctors visit scheduled for Monday January 24th and I hope that things are finally progressing.