Photo shoot with 2 year olds

So as I mentioned earlier, I took the girls and Jaron to Fotofly here in Draper to get some pictures taken.  I knew I shouldn't have had high expectations with 2 year olds but the session itself turned into a nightmare.  I wanted to get some pictures of the girls together and then all 3 kids together and that did not happen.  Luckily we did get a few cute head shots of the girls and a few of Jaron by himself but I was very disappointed.  The girls were so clingy and would not pose of any picture of any sort.  At the end I just gave up and took what we did get.

Here are some...you can see how desperate I was when I got out the fruit snacks!

I thought the head shots turned out cute of the girls so I ended printing a picture of each kid on a canvas print and we just got them back and hung them up in our family room.  I love that wall and looking at the cute pictures of each of them.  When Shane hung them up my first comment was 'wow, we have a lot of kids all of the sudden!'  Here are the pictures we used for the canvas prints and then a picture of them hanging up in our family room.

Newborn Pictures

We had a few different newborn pictures taken of Jaron that I wanted to share.  We had the photographer at the hospital come in and take some.  Then we went to Fotofly with the girls the week after he was born and got a few cute ones.  And then I took a few myself one day just for fun and thought some of them turned out really cute.  So here are Jaron's newborn pictures.

One Month

Jaron is one month!  I would like to say I can't believe it's already been a month but really, it feels like he's been in our family a lot longer already.  He fits right in and we've all been adjusting well.

Here are some things about Jaron at one month:

• Eats 4 oz every 4 hours and has been since he was 2 weeks old.  Even the doctor was surprised he eats that much and keeps it down.
• Has not been the best sleeper or schedule keeper.  I can only compare him to the girls and my girls were on a perfect schedule from day 1 and I can't get him on a schedule or even napping that well.  It just varies day to day.  I'm trying to be patient but he likes to fuss and squirm and wake up at any time during his naps.  I've tried lots of different things and so far nothing is really helping.  It might be that he has 2 sisters that do NOT know what shhh or please whisper means...
• He's been doing pretty good at night.  He'll go 4-5 hour stretches between feedings.  The hardest part is once you feed him he likes to stay awake for a while.  I shut out the lights completely except for a small hall light and that seems to be working better the last few nights.
• At his 2 week dr. appt. he weighed 8lbs 6oz.  So quite a good weight gain in just 2 weeks.
• The girls are obsessed with him.  They want to hold him touch him and kiss him constantly.  It's almost a little too smothering but I try to let them so they feel involved and love him.
• Is just as cute as can be and I love to just sit and talk to him when I get a few minutes.
• Smiled at me when he was a week old a couple times and has started smiling more regularly to me talking to him just in the last couple days.
• Has really strong head control.  When I'm burping him, he many times will pick not only his head up off my shoulder but his whole body and then slams it down again.
• Shane was doing tummy time with him and he rolled over from his tummy to his back a couple times.  We even got it on video.  He isn't doing it on any normal basis but was fun to see him do that already.

$2 Tuesdays

So I did it... I went somewhere by myself, with all 3 kids.  Brigitte and I had this brilliant idea to go to 2 dollar Tuesdays at Thanksgiving Point this week.  I knew it was going to be crowded so at least I was mentally prepared.  I took Jaron in his stroller so I could keep him covered and the girls just walked.

It was super crowded just like I thought.  I don't think I've ever seen so many strollers in one place.  We went to the dinosaur museum.  I had never walked through there so it was pretty fun.  The girls didn't really care about the dinosaurs but liked some of the exhibits and especially the hands on activities they had for them.  Towards the end I could tell the girls had enough so we went to leave and had to walk through the most crowded crazy part.  I was holding Aria, pushing Jaron and told Siena to follow me.  I walked 10 steps turned around and couldn't see Siena.  So I started walking backwards looking for her only to find her holding onto the pants of some other lady.  I think she thought she was holding on to me, lol.  I could see the lady looking around like, whose child is this?  Then as we left I told the girls to follow me down the sidewalk only to walk 5 steps and see Aria already in the middle of the parking lot.  So it was a little crazy but I was proud of myself for going out with all 3.  However, I don't know how often I'll really do that.

Brigitte took a picture of all of us out for the first time...Jaron looks thrilled don't you think?  He was ready to be home with a bottle in his mouth.  Or was in impersonating the dinosaurs??

The J-LO's

As you know from pictures of my whole pregnancy, my sister and sister in law were both pregnant right along with me.  We were only 9 days apart in due dates between the 3 of us.  Well since I had my c-section scheduled, Jaron was born a few days early.  I thought my sister in law, Whitney would be right behind me but to all of our surprise she ended up being a week late.  My sister, Lori, was waiting patiently for her husband to get back from his internship and ended up going into labor 5 hours after he walked in the door. (hello perfect timing.)  So, Jaron was born 2 weeks before his cousins and Landon and Owen were born on the same day!

My family has nick named the babies to J-LO's because in order of birth, their initials are J L O.  I think it's kind of cute.

So, here are the J-LO's!

Siena and Aria meet Jaron

After my weird reaction to the anesthesia, by late afternoon luckily everything had mostly worn off and I was semi back to normal.  They got me up and let me stand for a few minutes and so at least I was functioning.  After the girls naps, Jennifer brought the girls over to the hospital.  It was so fun to see their reaction to the baby.  I was worried they were going to be freaked out by me in the hospital bed and have no reaction to Jaron but I was wrong.  They were happy to see me and were very curious about the little baby.  They kept pointing to his nose, his mouth, etc.  I had 2 empty bottles that Jaron had taken and gave one to each of them and those were a total hit.  They were so excited and each left holding theirs.

They came to the hospital one other time.  This time they were a little more crazy running around the room but were still happy and fine.

Since being home the girls have been so good with Jaron.  They always want to help me feed him and hold the bottle, sometimes a little roughly but overall they give him kisses, and pet his hair a lot.  The 2nd night I was home they even asked to hold Jaron and they were so excited to hold him and give him kisses.  They had huge grins on their faces.

Both girls but more Siena then Aria have become obsessed with their dolls.  They dress them, feed them, burp them.  I got out a couple preemie outfits that were given to us and Jaron doesn't fit and they carry these around all day long putting them on, asking me to button them up only to immediately unbutton and undress them and repeat, over and over.  It's really cute actually.  One time Aria asked if Jaron could come play in their doll house.  I obliged for about 60 seconds but it was sure cute.

The hardest part to this adjustment for them so far is that I couldn't lift them or carry them for 2 weeks.  The first day was so hard I couldn't even leave the room without them going hysterical.  I had been gone for 4 days so I get that.  But they also don't understand when they ask me to pick them up why I can't.  I sit on the couch and tell them to climb up but it took them a couple days to figure that out.  Now for the most part they are ok and now that I can cuddle them if they climb up on the couch but that first day home was so hard for them and for me emotionally.  It's nice now that the 2 weeks is up and I'm pretty much back to normal.  Shane has been great doing all the lifting and helping me when they get to much for me.

Shane's mom has also been staying with us and stayed the whole time I was in the hospital.  She has been amazing and has done so much for us these last 2 weeks in taking charge of the girls, their schedule and I never had to worry about one thing regarding the girls while I was in the hospital.  My parents also came and got the girls a couple times and it was fun for them to get out of house and a nice relaxing day for me as well to take a nap and just focus on Jaron.

Jaron's Birth Story

Since I was having another C-Section this time around we had the date of July 29 scheduled for a while.  That was nice to know I had an exact end date in mind and I was happy I made it to that date so that this little boy could be as healthy as possible.

Just like last time we had to be there at 4:30 AM!  They hooked me up and went through all the paper work, drew some blood, monitored me, etc.  About 6:15 they walked me back to the OR.  They gave me my spinal block, which was great.  In fact it hardly hurt and I didn't feel nearly as much pain going in as I did last time.  Within minutes I was numb.  We had to wait a about 15 minutes for Dr. Langer to show up but they found some music for us and we just hung out.  Soon she walked in and got started.  Everything went off without a hitch and soon she told us she was getting close and out he came.  Dr. Langer kept going on and on about what a big baby he was and how she couldn't believe I carried a baby that big in me.  I was nervous thinking 'how big is he?'  Soon she showed him to us over the curtain and he looked just normal and healthy and crying which was great.  When Shane first saw his weight for a minute he missed the 7 on the left hand side and thought he weighed 11.6lbs.  He cried a lot and I was surprised how different his cry was then either of the girls.  Shane went over to be with him and take pictures.  After a while he was doing so well that they let Shane bring him over to me while they were still working on me.  Soon they got me all closed up and ready they wheeled us back to our room with me holding Jaron.  They took him to the nursery briefly to bathe him and check him out a little more and then Shane wheeled him back to our room.

A little bit about Jaron's name.  We had a really hard time deciding on a name.  Everything I liked Shane didn't like and vice versa.  Finally we went back to our lists and found that we both had Jaron on our list.  So that is basically how we picked his name.  I really like the name actually and think it will be a good name for him both now and when he gets older.  His middle name, Preston, is after his grandpa, Shane's dad.  I never met Preston as he passed away when Shane and I first started dating.  But I'm sure Jaron and Preston met before Jaron came down here to earth.  I hope Jaron feels a special bond with his grandpa's, both Preston and my dad.

That first part of the day was great.  The rest of the day was kind of a nightmare.  I don't know what happened but I had some weird reaction to the anesthesia and I couldn't focus my eyes, they kept darting back and forth.  So the whole room was moving.  I wasn't nauseous but did throw up every time I tried to sit and talk.  In fact I told my mom not to have the nurse come in the room (ha ha) because every time she does I start throwing up when I talk to her.  My parents, Shane's mom, Michelle, and Shad all came over to visit during the day and while I remember them being there, I can't really remember anything I said to them.

The rest of the time in the hospital was great.  I had great nurses.  One funny thing that happened is that the hospital was making this big deal of the 'celebratory dinner' that we got to have one night.  Everyone kept talking about it making sure we had the paper to order, etc.  It was pretty funny since the choices were the same as the regular menu (although the food service person that delivered it said 'well they make this one fresh'...as opposed to....)  It ended up being a really nice dinner that they presented with a table cloth, flowers, sparkling cider and chocolates for dessert.  We had to take a picture just so we could document it and made sure Jaron joined in on the fun.

Shane stayed the first 2 nights and then I was on my own the last night, which ended up being the one night Jaron decided to wake up from 11-2:30am! I sent him to the nursery at 2:30 and got some sleep.  I stayed in the hospital 4 days instead of 5 this time.  I was ready to be home in my own bed without nurses coming in every few hours to take my vitals, etc.

On Thursday we hung out in the morning.  Poor little Jaron had to get circumcised.  Traumatic but he did great and although a little cranky afterwards for about an hour, he then zonked out for the rest of the afternoon.  We dressed him in his little going home outfit and home we went.  He has been a sleepy little boy and doing pretty good in the nights.  It's nice to only get up for 30 minutes to feed and change him as opposed to an hour with the girls last time.