Utah, Brian Regan & Boise!

This past week was a busy one! On Friday Andrew, Rebekah & I headed to Utah to spend some time with Nanny. We were all sad that Grandad couldn't be there because he was away, but we mamaged to have a good time.

Rebekah was such an angel on our drive down and slept most of the way! She only started to get fussy when we were about 40 minutes away. 

On Saturday we headed out to SLC with Andrew's mum. We stopped at the Aisian market, an organic market place in Trolley Square and went to Hires Big H for lunch.

If you haven't experienced the deliciousness of the Big H burger you need to try it soon! It's possibly the best burger I've ever had. :) 

Later that evening Nanny watched Rebekah so Andrew and I could go see Brian Regan!

We got really awesome seats and we're only five rows away from the stage! 

I don't think I laughed that hard in a while, Brian Regan was

H-I-L-A-R-O-U-S! My favorite story he told was about his experience trying to juice bananas. We got some great pictures of him too! 

We left Utah pretty early on Sunday & then before we knew it Wednesday was here and we were off to Boise!

Andrew got his interview notice for his green card and that's why we were heading down. 

Rebekah wasn't as happy about this drive down. She sleep for two hours and then we had to pull off and feed her. 

She kicked us out of our bed as soon as we got checked into our hotel.

Andrew and I always book dodgy hotels, I was worried someone was going to go all Normsn Bates on us, but we survived the night! 

We started to get nervous the closer the interview got, but it wasn't as bad as we thought. The guy interviewing us seemed  nice. Things went smoothly until he told us we forgot a form.

Yikes! We were both nervous that we'd have to start the application process again. But he gave us a month to get the form back to him and it's on the way now. So now it's just a matter of waiting for Andrew's green card to arrive. 

Two months!

Rebekah

I can't believe how quickly you're growing  up, today you turned two months. 

You're a tiny, sweet little thing and are still weighing under your birth weight at 5 pounds 9 ounces and are 20 inches long. We see the dr on Tuesday so we can see how much you've grown! You can't hold your head up on your own yet, but you've gotten pretty good at holding it up for a few seconds. You love looking around and following our voices. You smile lots, we've even heard a few laughs! You love snuggling up to mommy and daddy, we love it too! You're still a very peaceful, happy baby who's survived to long drives to Utah and Boise. 

I'm excited to watch you grow, see you develop your personality and learn how to use your body. You're already a beautiful little girl and you're only going to become more gorgeous as you grow. You have your amazingly attractive parents to thank for that! :P We love you very much Rebekah Kathleen! 

Rebekah's first month!

Rebekah

You're such a sweet little girl, I can't believe you're already a month old! It feels like we were just bringing you home from the hospital. It's been so exciting adjusting to being your mommy! I feel truly blessed because you're such a happy baby, you hardly ever get fussy. Right now you love stretching (you stretch your neck a lot & it reminds daddy and me of a turtle), you love your dummy and growl at it when it falls out, you love your bouncer, you love mommy & daddy cuddles, you love moving, especially your hands and you love smiling. You get the hiccups a lot and don't like them, but who can blame you. I'm so glad Heavenly Father sent you down to us Rebekah. You're a little angel and mommy loves you so much! 

Baby Shower!

I was planning on having my baby shower the Saturday after I got discharged from the hospital, I quickly learned that this wasn't a good idea. I was still and still am recovering from major surgery and learning how to be a mother. So I pushed my baby shower back a week, which made a huge difference. I'm feeling more confident as a mother now and I feel a lot better from my surgery. :) 

 Amber and Elizabeth came over early to help me decorate and get things ready for the baby shower. Then the party began! We played the ice cube game to see who's water broke first. Then we decided to play Ticket to Ride, not a typical baby shower game but what the heck. :) We had lots of fun!

 Rebekah was an angel and slept during most of the baby shower, she only woke up once to eat.

Home Sweet Home!

 Thursday evening I was discharged from the hospital and we brought Rebekah home! Amber stayed the night to help me out since Andrew had to work that night. We still have a lot of settling in to do but I'm glad we're home now. :) Andrew's lovely mother came down on Friday to help us get settled in and adjusted to being parents. It was so nice having her here to help out with things, I really appreciate all that she did/does for our family. :)

 We came home to these gorgeous flowers from daddy and these lovely flowers from nanny and grandad. :)

I had my first week alone with Rebekah at night while Andrew was working and I think I'm getting the hang of things. She's such a calm and happy baby, which makes learning how to become a mother so much easier. I can't believe how quickly the time has gone since we've brought Rebekah home! It's crazy to think  she'll be two weeks old on Tuesday!

Home Sweet Home!

 Thursday evening I was discharged from the hospital and we brought Rebekah home! Amber stayed the night to help me out since Andrew had to work that night. We still have a lot of settling in to do but I'm glad we're home now. :) Andrew's lovely mother came down on Friday to help us get settled in and adjusted to being parents. It was so nice having her here to help out with things, I really appreciate all that she did/does for our family. :)

 We came home to these gorgeous flowers from daddy and these lovely flowers from nanny and grandad. :)

I had my first week alone with Rebekah at night while Andrew was working and I think I'm getting the hang of things. She's such a calm and happy baby, which makes learning how to become a mother so much easier. I can't believe how quickly the time has gone since we've brought Rebekah home! It's crazy to think  she'll be two weeks old on Tuesday!

Rebekah Kathleen!

Well, I made it to 38 weeks and then Rebekah was born! Part of me thinks she was waiting for her Auntie Amber to get to Idaho. Amber was supposed to get here early Friday morning, but because of bad weather back home she wasn't able to get here until Monday January 6th.  

The day started off just like any other day. School had just started back up, so Andrew and I were getting back into the swing of things. We went out to BK for lunch and then hung out until it was time to pick up Amber from the shuttle bus drop off. Then we helped her unpack her things, took her shopping to get some groceries and then headed home.

We went straight to bed after we got home. It was only 10:30, I know we're old.. I woke up around 12:30 a.m.  to go to the bathroom and my water broke! Luckily I made it to the bathroom, so there wasn't a mess. Andrew didn't believe me at first when I told him my water broke, he thought I just peed myself and since I've never experienced this before I wasn't really sure what was going on. 

We decided we'd better go to the hospital just to be safe. I'm surprised at how calm we were after I told him my water broke. We didn't have our hospital bag packed, but we were able to remain calm and stay level-headed as we gathered the items we needed. 

We got to the hospital around 1 a.m. We filled out some paper work and then we were led to the maternity unit.  

 Waiting anxiously for the nurse to come into the room and see if my water had actually broke AND DRUM-ROLL PLEASE... it did.

Andrew's anticipation of becoming a daddy after he heard my water broke.

 I wasn't dilated or having any contractions yet, so they hooked me up to lots of machines, one monitored the baby's heartbeat and the other monitored my contractions. After I was hooked up to the machines we headed to a different room. I found this part scary because I was laying on the bed and had no idea where we were going.

Around 7:30 I started getting pretty intense contractions that were about a minute apart, but I still wasn't dilated much. They had me on some medicine that helps produce contractions and that was helping some. Around 8:30-9ish I decided that the pain was too much for me to handle and that I really wanted to sleep, so I told the nurse I wanted an epidural.

I was able to get the epidural quickly and then I went straight to sleep. I woke up when one of the nurses came in to check on me and felt pretty well rested. That changed pretty quickly. All of the sudden Dr. Evans and about 5 nurses were in the room. Dr. Evans explained to Andrew and me that Rebekah's heartbeat was dropping, he said this could be due to the umbilical cord wrapping around her head. He took me off the medicine that helps produce contractions and put a tag on Rebekah's head to monitor how she was doing.

Once I was off the medicine Rebekah's heartbeat started to return to normal. Dr. Evans explained that a C-section might be our best option. He didn't want to risk waiting on me to get dilated to a 10 (I was now a 6) and have Rebekah's heartbeat drop again. They decided to keep an eye on us for a while since her heartbeat had returned to normal and then go from there. 

I went back to sleep and woke up around 1ish. Dr. Evans had told one of the nurses to put me back on the contraction producing medicine, but as soon as she did that Rebekah's heartbeat started dropping again. This is where things got scary. 

Dr. Evans came over and talked to Andrew and me. He told us that they were going to do a C-section because Rebekah's heartbeat was dropping again and he didn't want to gamble with her life. He explained that the epidural relaxed my body really well, but because of how relaxed I was Rebekah thought it was time to come out and started pushing which resulted in her heartbeat dropping. 

Dr. Evans and the nurses kept saying ASAP which means "as soon as possible" when talking to the surgical unit and others about preparing for my C-section. 

The urgency in their voices had me worried and the possibliity that Rebekah or I could die during the C-section. As soon as things calmed down for a second I had Andrew give me a blessing that everything would be all right. We headed to the OR and the doctor's went to work. My body was so numb from the epidural and the extra anesthesia I was getting that I could only feel a little pressure.

Andrew came into the OR right before they started cutting and held my hand. He said he watched some of the surgery. Once they got Rebekah out he brought her over to me so I could see her. I was really tired though so I didn't look at her too long. She's a beautiful baby girl though! 

After the surgery was complete we got settled into a new room and I took a nap until Andrew came in with little Rebekah. 

Shortly after that Amber arrived at the hospital, she was coming to visit Andrew and me while I was in labor, she didn't know she'd have a new niece when she got there! Andrew, Amber and I talked for visited for a while and enjoyed Rebekah's arrival. Then I slept a lot. :) 

Welcome baby Rebekah Kathleen! We're very excited to have you in our lives. :)