Let's eat cake!... THEN go to to hospital!

We had a baby!!!  It was all so exciting, and wonderful, and FAST!  I can't believe it's been a week already. My due date came and went, but that was expected.  I had many of the signs of "getting closer" but nothing significant would happen.  It had to be Memorial Day!  The day started out normal enough.  We spent Sunday night at the cabin, playing games and eating junk.  The Park City Hospital was the same distance from the cabin as from Midway, so I didn't see any harm, especially since I brought our hospital bags and Anna's bag, in case she needed to stay with grandma and grandpa.

That morning, Bevan did a bike ride in Kamas, in honor of Mia McDonald, a little girl in our ward who passed away when her body rejected her heart transplant.  I had to shuttle him around and riding in a car always made my contractions feel stronger, but this time they didn't regress.  I'm sure the jalapeno poppers before lunch didn't help.  More family showed up for the barbecue and the place was hopping!  My contractions weren't going away, but they weren't painful either (a sign of TRUE labor right?) I tried to keep calm and party on.  It was Dad's birthday after all.  I tried to eat a hamburger (which later turned out to be a mistake) and pulled out my phone to start timing.  Uh, less than 5 minutes apart???  This might be it!  We sang happy birthday, dished out cake, and Bevan and I left.

If my contractions weren't painful before, the car ride triggered something.  Poor Bevan didn't know what to make of it.  He wasn't there for my painful labor with Anna (remember the blizzard?)  But, we made it in plenty of time, checked in, got changed, crawled into bed, and ordered an epidural.  I was already at a 4.  No time to spare!  The next 3 hours just flew by!  Once I was able to relax, my body did it's thing, and at 7:25 pm, beautiful Dallin Ray was born!!!  He weighed 8lbs 5oz and measured 22 inches long!  Tall boy!  The biggest surprise is that he's blond!  Blond eye lashes, brows, and hair!  We finally have a baby that's more of an Ackerson.  He does have Bevan's feet though.  We'll see if he and Anna end up looking like siblings.

We were the only residents of labor and delivery for the next 2 days so we got a lot of attention.  I love the Park City hospital!  The food was amazing and well worth all the buzz.  My favorites were the smoothies.  We ordered one with every meal!  Our favorite nurse, Holly, would hold Dallin all night, except for feeding time of course.  We did have to stay an extra day because I came down with some kind of bug that spiked my temperature.  Poor Dallin was slightly jaundiced, so they stuck him on the billi-blanket immediately.  I guess we both needed an extra day to recover.

I still can't believe that it's been a whole week!  I've finally settled into the newborn routine at home.  He's been a good kid!  He's a great eater (not the fastest, but still productive) and an OK sleeper.  I think he's grown already because I had to loosen the straps in his car seat yesterday.  He's the cutest little guy ever!  I can't believe I was even slightly apprehensive about having a boy.  Anna's been a good big sister.  She's always concerned about where baby is and what's he's doing.  Her first question when she wakes up: "Where's baby?"  Her only issue is that we're inside a lot more so I'm trying to arrange play dates for her.  It's been an adjustment, but a fun ride so far.  Hurray for babies!

The billi blanket really made him glow!

Yummy!  Our "Congratulations" dinner was mighty fine!

Aunt Charlyce and Uncle Don stopped by a couple days ago to represent Beverly and Lloyd (still on their mission).  It's crazy to compare how big Anna has gotten!  Was she ever that small?!

We have crops!

This is our first year with a REAL garden!  I knew when we bought our house that this south-facing area was perfect.  I built up the beds with some 4x4's and hope to add some gravel in the walkways.  So what's on the menu?  Lettuce, sugar-snap peas, bell peppers, anaheim chilies, tomatoes, basil, carrots, and yellow onions.  Obviously, no great quantities of each... this is just an experiment.  I want to see what grows well here.  I'm hoping to get some pasta sauce out of the deal, red sauce and pesto.  Anna likes to dig in the dirt next to me,  waiting impatiently for the bell peppers to turn red.  Did you know that's her new favorite food?  RED bell peppers.  Raw.  They're like candy to her!  My tummy is still large, awkward, and very uncomfortable.  But I find that the more active I am during the day, the better I sleep at night.

Update...

Nope, no baby yet.  He did flip his little head down, but now he's just chillin' out.  My doc actually had me regressing a little from last week to this week.  How does one go from 70% effaced back to 50%?!  Oh well.  At least I'm getting a lot done lately.  You can call it "nesting" in a dirty, sunny, outdoors way.  We've been helping Tom and Kim with their sprinkler system.  No fun trenching for me, but mostly parts delivery, teflon tape-wrapping, order-giving, Anna-chasing (though her little cousins have even made that easier), etc.  It's really made the time fly and taken my mind off of the "watching and waiting" period.  I wouldn't mind having a Memorial Day baby to match my Thanksgiving Day toddler.  It would also be nice to have him arrive while Bevan is still on his off-season vacation, which ends June 3, which is coming up quickly!  He's been a huge help with all of this lately.  He's so busy and so helpful, fulfilling my every request, he even forgets to shave (if his hair was longer, he'd look just like Gordon Hayward).  I will miss him when he goes back to work... but I will welcome back a steady paycheck and a smooth face.
I can't believe how much our lives will be changing pretty soon.  I'm almost more nervous with this one than the first.  How is that possible?  Is it because I KNOW what to expect?  I KNOW how much work it's going to be?  Am I even better prepared this time?  I guess we'll see!

Another Milestone for Paul!

We took a trip to Logan last Friday for Paul's graduation with his Masters of Engineering degree!  Who doesn't like a road trip to Logan?  I like to see it when it's all green.  I also wanted to see his and Stefanie's new love nest!  Ah, to be newly-weds!  New apartment, new stuff, new life... not being able to split utilities 6 ways anymore... all those wonderful changes!

The procession was a lot more fancy with a bagpipe band and such.  The ceremony was fun, but started dragging on and on, especially when they started in on the PhD grads.  Mom and Paige (Anna's nanny for the day) took Anna outside to get her wiggles out.  Well, she wiggled her way through a fence into the adjacent cemetery and started playing on the headstones.  Nobody saw exactly what happened, but she managed to gash her cheek!  A little while later, we were in Instacare getting some stitches.  Anna didn't seem to be phased by what was going on.  She enjoyed all the free suckers and popsicles.  What a tough little girl!

We made it in time for the after-party with Stefanie's family at the park.  What a shin-dig!  Pizza, chips, cake, and Paul's favorite: Mt. Dew!  It was Anna's first taste of the stuff, and all she could say was "more juice!"  

Big boy!

I can't believe we're down to only 3 weeks!  Maybe we can widdle it down to 2?  But I'm alright if he cooks a little longer.  At my latest appointment, my doctor suspected that Louie's head is not where it should be this late in the game.  An ultrasound the next day confirmed that his head is still under my left rib cage.  Humm, what now?  According to the measurements, he's already over 7 pounds!  Really?  Feels like 20!  My next appointment is Tuesday morning and if he's still misbehaving... well, I don't know what happens next.  I guess we'll just have to wait and see.  Anna was head-down at about 20 weeks so we never had to worry.  She's always been such an good, obedient, little girl!  Here's Louie's latest glamour shot!

Lately, I've been scrambling to get our yard in order.  Bevan has been a huge help!  He's cleaned out the garage, taken down the christmas lights, tilled the garden, painted the shutters, sprayed weeds, poured buckets of fertilizer on every tree and shrub, and follows me around, lifting ginormous bags of potting soil.  I'm so sick of my "seed starts" this year, so I kicked them out of the house.  They weren't ready for the window boxes, but I didn't care.  They really do look pathetic right now, barely sprouts, no flowers, but who cares.  They had to get planted.  Our pressurized irrigation water isn't running yet due to a break upstream, so we've been hand-watering.  What a pain!  Do people really enjoy watering plants by hand?  I sure don't.  I like setting a timer and walking away.  How can I be so unfeeling this early in the season?