Fathers Day

We are so grateful to have this hardworking, loving, caring person in our lives. We love you!!

Anniversary

On June 17th Jason and I celebrated our 4th anniversary. He surprised me by getting a babysitter for Cadence and taking me out to dinner...even though the NBA Finals were on. Don't worry he did get to watch it because the restaurant we went to had a TV.
Happy Anniversary HUBBY...I'm excited for many more years to come.

1/4 of a century

Jason turned 25 on June 8th. We went out to dinner and I made him his favorite funfetti cake. The kids were asleep by the time he blew out the candles and we ate some cake, but it was nice to get to spend some time together alone.

He only got to blow out two candles...I forgot to get some more. Oh well, I'll remember next year.

Carter Jay

Some pictures of my sweet little boy

Big sister giving him a kiss

Carter's "Birth" day

It all started around 6 am on Saturday the 17th. I was so excited...it was only one day past my due date and I couldn't believe that I had actually gone into labor all on my own.

I woke up feeling crampy, so I decided to walk around the house to see if it was really it. I felt one pressure wave and began to time, they were around 5-7 minutes apart. I decided not to wake anyone up yet and kept walking ...watching the clock as I felt each wave.

Finally at around 7 am I woke Jason up and told him I was going to call the midwife and tell her what I was feeling. I called her and she said she would be over as soon as she got showered and dressed. I told her I would keep timing and just relax until she got to my house.

Just a couple of days before I had an appt. with her and told her that I would like to be checked, she checked me and I was already at 2-3 cm but only about 25% effaced, so I didn't know if i would go quickly or not. I was hoping that once labor started it would go by pretty quick...but I was wrong :)

I jumped into the shower because the water helped me relax, I was probably in there a good half hour. It felt so nice to have the warm water run on my belly and back. I got into my birthing outfit and started listening to my hypnobabies cd's. I relaxed on my birthing ball while doing this and it felt so nice to just close my eyes and just feel the pressure waves that would be bringing me closer to meeting my little man.

As I was relaxing on my birthing ball my midwife and her apprentice showed up. I didn't even notice that they were there. I was so in tune with my waves and relaxing through each one. After about a couple of hours of relaxing on my ball I went into the living room to join everyone else. I ate some lunch and than just relaxed on the couch watching movies. LOL.

As the day progressed I decided to get into the birthing pool to see if that would speed anything up. The hours passed by and it started falling into the evening...still no baby. I was starting to feel the tiredness from laboring all that time. I got out of the pool, because it felt like I could feel my waves more intensely out of the water. I sat on the couch and listened to more of my cd's to help me relax.

After a few hours of being out of the pool I felt like I had the urges of pushing. I labored with that feeling for a couple of hours and than my midwife started getting the pool warm again. I was hoping that the end was almost near and I would get to hold little Carter soon.

I got back into the pool...the waves were getting more and more powerful. I just let my body do its own thing. I couldn't believe how long it had already been. I think I was in the pool for about another couple of hours. I didn't really know what time it was. Probably about 1 or 2 in the morning the next day. With every wave it felt very pushy. My midwife was so supportive staying with me the whole time and just letting me do my own thing. With one wave my water broke...the next a little more pushy. I was finally full on bearing my baby down, trying to breathe him down.

My midwife had to push me a little to give it everything I had. I could feel his head start to crown she told me to put my hand down and feel his head. I was a little hesitant at first, but I did. His sweet little round head was right there. I gave another big push and out came his head, than with another little push he slipped right out. I quickly put my hands under the water and lifted my sweet little boy out of the water. I cuddled with him and he let out a cry. It was amazing. I just held him looking at him, talking to him, kissing him. We all got our chance to share our love with our newest family member.

Carter Jay was born at 4:51 am the next morning of the 18th. He weighed 7 lbs. 7 oz. and was 20 in. long. We are so happy that he's here.

BABY SHOWER & 35 weeks.

My wonderful visiting teachers and companion our throwing me a baby shower on March 27th. If you live here in Arizona and would like to come...let me know and I can give you all the details.
I am doing great!! Baby is getting big and I am starting to get the "I'M DONE" feeling. I have my 36 week appointment coming up next week here at my home, which will be great because I won't have to drive an hour to Mesa. And than I am officially ON-CALL...so exciting. I have ordered my birth kit and the birthing tub, so you can come any time now Carter.

Jason has been very busy with work lately, so I've been just a little sad being here all by myself everyday, all day. It's hard but I appreciate everything he does for our little family.
I can't wait to have family down here this week to keep me busy. My 3 brothers are coming down to spend spring break here. It'll be fun!

31 Weeks

As you notice on my sidebar, my little baby ticker says 31 weeks....that's right 31 weeks!!! I can't believe that in only 9 weeks we will have our little baby boy here. I still have so much to do for this little munchkin, pretty much everything. But we are so excited, especially big sister Cadence.

For those of you who don't know our birth plan is to have a home/water birth. We are so excited to be able to bring this little boy into the world comfortably and peacefully. We have been preparing by using Hypnobabies which is such a wonderful way to birth your baby. If you are pregnant and are trying to go all natural look into this, its great.

I will try to post some pics of my belly when I take some.

Yay for pregnancy.

@ 2 Yrs. and a couple of months

You love to read. You might not know all the words, but you can sure tell me all about it.

Love you, MOM

Happy Noon Year!

This year for New Years we took Cadence to the Phoenix Zoo. They were having a celebration for kids. She had so much fun playing in the snow, which was more like mud, dancing, and getting to toast at noon with her own cup of sparkling cider. After the celebration was over we had some lunch than walked the whole zoo. Just let me tell you being 6 months pregnant and walking 2.5 miles is not my idea of fun, but Cadence had a blast seeing all the different animals. She was so tired, she fell asleep in her stroller right as we were leaving and didn't even open her eyes when we put her in the car.

Later Jason and I had our own toast and kiss at midnight. Cadence was asleep by 8:30pm. I guess we wore her out good. I dedcided that my New Years resolution for this year is to make some friends. I know that sounds pretty lame, but we have been here for almost two years and don't have any close friends. So that is my goal for this year. And also just to be a better mother and wife to my growing family. I hope you all had a good New Years celebration.

P.S. I have pictures, but for some reason it is not letting me upload them. I will get them up a little later, hopefully it will work by then.

Christmas

Christmas this year was okay...I'm not gonna lie. For some reason, Jason and I were not feeling very Jolly, as some may say. But here are some pictures of our Christmas.

Here is our tree, Christmas morning...just waiting for someone to come tear up all the wrapping paper.


Finally the little munchkin decided to get up and look at all the things Santa had brought her. at 9 am.

You can tell that this was Jason's idea of a gift, but she loves it.

Here is Cadence before Christmas dinner enjoying her new pony.

Our cute little Christmas Dinner table set up for the three of us. Which by the way I cooked all by myself. It was delicious.

Jason and I after dinner. We were stuffed.

Jason enjoying his new Christmas present which as his phone. I also got a new phone! We love them.

I am bummed I didn't get very many pictures. I had the video camera going the whole time and didn't even think to grab my camera until after we finished opening our gifts.

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas.