December Fun

We haven't done too much this month, mostly because I'm looking more and more whale-ish each day and have no energy. Here is a little update:

We have gotten a lot of ultrasounds and doctor appointment's lately. This little guy hasn't grown in the past three weeks. So we have one more appointment on the 23rd. And if he still hasn't grown, then we will be getting induced and having our little guy here Christmas Eve. Crazy no? Time to go to town on some donuts or something real fatty to get this guy to grow.

 My work has been so amazing throughout this whole pregnancy. I'm able to work at home when I need to. Which makes it so nice to stay at home in my unmentionables and still get work done, while being with Mady.

I still try and do fun things with here. Case and point. We made these cute crafts today. Adorable, no?

And Ray makes couch forts with her and plays bears.

 My parent's ward had their Christmas party, which we were invited to. I'm always up for a good excuse not to cook dinner for my family when we can get it elsewhere. That's pregnancy for you. Santa even showed up, which Mady was ecstatic about.

You know when you hit that point in your pregnancy, where something about you needs to change? And most of the time you change your hair? Yes, well after battling this urge. I finally gave in. Only I did the change to Mady, and gave her bangs.

 I wish she would have held still. But oh well.

 Then about two days later. I came out from taking a nap to find this:

 I seriously just sat and balled my eyes out. She just let me hold her and we both cried. She kept on saying, "I'm sorry, I promise I won't do it again." I wish I could say it was an easy fix. Just picture the right side of her head cut super short with some straggles, so if you look at her from that side, it looks like a mullet. So awful.

 So now it looks like this.

 You can kinda tell in these pictures that the left side is a good two inches shorter than the right.

 It looks worse in person. It looks really bad if I don't pull some of her hair up or something to hide it like in these picture.

 I know it will grow out. But its still so sad.

Christmas!

Christmas really didn't feel like Christmas this year. Probably because it was our first year doing something different than what we normally do. Not to mention we had to pretend Christmas came a few days early. What we normally do is have Christmas with my family and then race up to Lindon for Christmas with Ray's family. 

Because Mady is now old enough to appreciate Christmas, we thought it best to have our own. We were also planning on having our little baby boy Christmas Eve, so we decided to celebrate earlier. We pretended Christmas morning was on the 23rd. 

We usually do one really big present, which is from Santa. I had my Dad make Mady a cute kitchen. It turned out so cute. The two cuboards open up for the dishwasher, with a roll out drawer with a dish dryer it is for her to put her dishes in to pretend to clean.

The doll stuff was from Ray and I. So this is what she woke up to.

It was 8:30am and she still hadn't woken up. So we actually went and woke her up, since we had our doctors appointment at 11. 

She was so ecstatic about her cute kitchen, she didn't even notice her baby stroller and highchair off to the side until we said something.   

She was so happy, she ran to get her baby's to put them in the highchair and stroller.

Then she noticed the stockings. Which made her even more ecstatic.

She started pulling everything out, saying things like, "Oh! These are my favorite! Santa remembered!" And don't mind the bed hair. 

The things she got in her stocking were bubble bath, salt and vinegar pringles, orange sticks, socks and underwear.

Then we moved onto the presents under the tree. 

From her baby brother, she got a baby boy with a diaper bag and clothes. She loved it!

I wish we had taken a picture of her and all her toys she received, but we were running late. She got a cute polly pocket toy and books from Grandma and Grandpa Martel; Naketa, Joey, and Kaslo gave her building blocks and books; Ray and I gave her cooking things and food for her kitchen. 

Ray bought me a new laptop and a breast pump. And I bought him shoes, nursing scrubs, laptop stuff, computer games, and a hoodie. Ray received legos from his parents and I got nursing shirts and some really nice cookware. 

We had already packed for the hospital and my family was over to watch Mady and take her home with them after she played for a little bit with her new toys. We ran to the hospital to get checked over and tested. Last time we were there, the doctor said to plan on having a Christmas Eve baby...so we were. 

They did an ultrasound to check my fluids and see if he had grown. He had grown enough that they weren't too concerned about getting him out. So they did some more tests just to be sure. Here I am getting my stress test. 

After a few hours, the doctor said our little guy seemed ok and that we would not be induced! We could wait until the 26th to be checked again. This was great news. However, it kind of stunk that we had already celebrated Christmas.

So we went home, I being determined to eat as much as I could to fatten this little guy up. Mady slept over at my parents house on Christmas Eve since I was having contractions. We ran over in the morning to see her open her presents from my family.

My parents had given her my old doll house from when I was a girl. She loved it! The kids gave her a mini tramp, which she plays on all the time. 

Overall, it was a great Christmas. We were sad we weren't able to send some time with the Martel's. But were glad we didn't have our guy. Can you imagine trying to celebrate a birthday and Christmas? Ugh, no thank you!

November

November was full of awesomeness! The best thing that happened by far was meeting Kaslo!

Isn't he precious? He had to stay in the NICU for a few days due to an infection. But he is just as cute as ever. Naketa and Joey are doing great!

While we were up visiting, the boys were put to work!

Check out this load of apples from the orchard!

It was turned into 52 gallons of apple juice. 

Can you say YUM!?

And well that's about all that happened in November. Mady and I did make some awesome cookies. 

She loved using the cookie cutters to make shapes.

Oh, I did have my baby shower, too! Thank you to everyone who was able to come and for the wonderful gifts! I loved every single one. 

We spent Thanksgiving with the Martel's this year. I'm so lame I didn't even take pictures. But the food was amazing, as well as the company. It was just plain perfect. 

Here's a few Mady moments for you that just made me laugh:

Mady called me at work one day, "Mom!! Guess what?"

"What?" 

"It's snowing!"

"Really? Wow, that's so cool!"

"Yeah! Now my baby brother can come!"

To help give Mady a time frame of when baby brother would be here, we told her when it starts snowing, he'll come. Well apparently, she remembered. Now we're telling her when Santa comes. We'll see if he really does decide to show then. 

Another time I was taking Mady to preschool  and this was our conversation:

"Someone woke me up this morning when I was still tired. I can wake up all by myself, Mom."

"I'm sorry I had to wake you up, but we had to get ready for school."

"Yeah, but Mom, I was still tired. I can wake up by myself."

"I know you can. But sometimes I have to wake you up so we're not late."

"Ok, but next time I'll wake up by myself."

I was really worried about how the time change would affect Mady. But she's taking it like a champ.

Also, here's an update on the pregnancy:

I was put on bedrest, because of some pains and contractions I have been having. The pains have been pretty intense, nothing at all like the contractions I've experienced. This is like pain I can't move and just have to cry out it hurts so bad. My doctor thinks it could be placental abruption, because of how painful they sound. But because I haven't been spotting or bleeding, I only had to stay on bedrest for a few days. I got my doctors note to go back to work and just be really careful. Hopefully, things will stay good and I won't be put back on bedrest. 

Trick or Treat!

Mady was super excited for Halloween this year. We bought her a mermaid costume. She was so excited to wear it!

 We went out the pumpkin patch and chose our pumpkins.

Mady wouldn't touch the guts last year, but this year she actually grabbed three handfuls and then was done.

I let Mady look at carved pumpkins online so that she could choose what she wanted her pumpkin to look like. Can you guess which one she chose? She wanted the scary one.

When Halloween actually came, it was soo cold. So I talked Mady into being a princess so I could dress her warmer. 

 I had to dress up for work too. Unfortunately, the only thing that fit me was my brother's old football jersey. Don't we look great?

 Mady had a blast getting so much candy. We gave a lot of her candy away. There was no way we could eat it all. I wonder what we'll be next year....

Naketa's Baby Shower

When I found out Naketa didn't have anyone throwing her a baby shower, I was more than happy to offer to throw one for her. I love me a good party! It turned out great too!

Here is the diaper cake I made for Naketa. It turned out pretty good for it being my first one.

 It took forever to make these dumb things, but they really made the place look great!

 Here's the table:

 The food was so good!

 We even saved the pumpkin cake for Joey's birthday, which was the same day as the party.

 I wish I would have taken pictures during the party. Like of our mommy-to-be and all the wonderful friends and family that came. But, alas, I did not. Anyways, here is a picture of the cute parent's-to-be.

I loved putting together the party and had fun making everything look great for Naketa! I can't wait to see her little boy!