It's finished!

Kylan modeling the finished project


A view from one side


the other side

The closet is done! It turned out great and things are finally being put away. Now comes the hard part of organizing everything. It won't be easy, but it will be worth it!

My little sweetie

Olivia is such a sweetheart. She has been a great baby so far. We have been through a lot together. There has been some issues with feeding and she has been a trooper. We've made it through blisters, cracks, and lots and lots of tears. Oh and a case of mastitis. But we are getting by, thank goodness for technology and the breast pump! She has had to go from breast to bottle and back again and she is so laid back that she doesn't even mind. She even had a couple of stinky formula bottles and drank them like a good girl :) She is sleeping great, she usually will go 3-5 hours between feedings. And has gone a couple nights for 7 hours straight. She is also a very vocal baby, more than my others. She makes the usual newborn noises, but she also does what I like to call humming, or singing. When she's fed and happy, she sits and hums, it is too cute!

The other kids really love her. Kylan likes to hold her and rub her head. Caleb likes to show her off and give her kisses. Hannah likes her a little too much sometimes, she tries to play with her when she's sleeping and give her the binky. But then she'll tell me to put Olivia down when I'm holding her and Hannah wants to be held :) It should be interesting once we find a schedule and it gets back to normal. It has been great to have Grandma here helping out. I couldn't do it without her! And Nate has been helping out a lot too, he does laundry and has been cooking for us too! I have a great husband!!

The new arrival....

the pretty girl

On the way home

the proud papa

Big Brother #1

The Big Sister

Big Brother #2

Scrunchie face

Mom and the babe

The adventure begins.....We had our baby. Olivia Kathleen Shaw was born on November 17, 2009. She was 10 days early. She was born at 12:19pm and weighed 7 lbs even. She's 19 1/2 inches long. It all went pretty fast. I woke up on Tuesday morning and started having contractions at 6am. They were getting closer together by 9am, so I called Nate to come get me. We got to the hospital and in a room by 10am and when the nurse checked me I was a 4. At my last appointment I had been a 2 and that was the last Tuesday. So I had made some progress :) Well back to the story, I decided to wimp out and get the epidural, but she said it would be an hour, yikes! So an hour later I get it, she checked me right after and I was an 8. And since I had dilated so fast, my blood pressure was low so I had to be put on oxygen. Well, that just made me emotional since my Dad had just passed away and was on oxygen the last few months of his life. So both the nurse and the doctor were asking me if I was in pain, I just explained that I was just crying about my Dad. Anyway, it was just over an hour later that she was born. So it's been a whirlwind for the last few days. We are adjusting to having her here and she is such a cutie that we like having her around. We are glad that she came for an early visit! I can eat whatever I want for Thanksgiving now that my tummy isn't overcrowded :)

The wonderful world of parenting...

So tonight was mega busy for me...or at least it seemed that way since I'm big and pregnant and not really wanting to get out anyway. Once Kylan got home from school at around 3:30pm this was our to do list...

reading for Kylan for 15-20 minutes
piano practice for a half hour
make dinner
feed children to make them happy
Soccer practice at 5:30, since we have the Turkey shoot out on saturday
At 6pm we head out for a basketball evaluation for Upwards at 6:30.
Baby shower at 7pm
Then the regular putting kids to bed routine.

We get to the basketball evaluation and Hannah had fallen asleep. I get her put in the stroller and get about 5 feet from the car when she throws up all over herself and the stroller. Luckily I hadn't buckled her in since she was still sleepy, so I grabbed her and aimed her at the sidewalk. Hopefully missing the front end of the car in the lot :) So I call for the boys who have bee lined for the farthest point away from Mom, and make a U-turn back to the car. I grab every napkin that I have in the glove box (lucky for me I save every one on our road trips from the fast food places) the wipes, and search for the plastic walmart bag that I keep stashed in case of a potty accident. I thank my lucky stars that I had that stuff! So I wipe her down the best I can, cover her with the sweater that was in the car (again, lucky for me that I am a slacker and hadn't put it away earlier) because she was saying she was coldy. I reach under her to buckle her in, and got a nice handful of throw up, great! At least I knew she wouldn't likely want to go anywhere anyway, seeing as she just lost her dinner. Then we head into the building to do this blasted evaluation, which is the absolute last one since I missed the others. We got in fairly fast and it really only took 10 minutes. I felt bad taking her in because she smelled quite potent and I'm sure everyone we passed got a good whiff. But I really had no other choice. Anyway, now that I have written a novel :) We got in the car and headed to the shower, which now I wouldn't be going to, to drop off the present. I was super bummed, but what do you do, eh? Oh, I forgot to mention that it was Nathan's night for Elder's Quorum meetings. So I had no way to get out of going home and cleaning up all that wonderful smell off my daughter and her clothes. Enough of my pity party, hopefully now she will get better and I'm keeping my fingers crossed that no one else will get this. Sorry to anyone who came in contact with Hannah this afternoon!

37 weeks

I'm actually almost 38 weeks now, but I thought I'd post this anyway. I'm doing well, since I've past the point where I had Hannah. So that's a good sign. I guess we'll see if I make it to the due date or not, there's always a first for everything, right? Now the dilemma is finding out what to name the baby if it's a boy. If it's a girl then she will be Olivia. It's just the waiting game now :)

Our fun trip

We had a lot of fun at the farm with the Shannon's. The guys had gone shooting for the day, so we teamed up to take the kids. They all had a lot of fun!

Reality check

Our new travel system


Hannah couldn't get enough of the stroller and climbed in the basket, she got stuck :)


Our old Graco stroller


It's lime green with some yellow and has one picture of Winnie the Pooh, Tigger, and piglet.

So I got the infant car seat down from the attic last week to wash the liner. That's when I noticed that it was past the date where it says DO NOT USE after. So I start doing research and freaking myself out. I'm probably just paranoid, but I ended up finding a pretty good deal on the one we got. I found it at Big Lot's and it's the car seat and stroller combo for only $79! It's a Cosco brand, so hopefully it will all work out. Anywho, so now I have an extra stroller to get rid of. It's in great shape, other than needing to be cleaned. And I am going to work on that soon, hopefully. So if anyone wants a good Graco stroller, or knows someone who does, let me know. Otherwise it's going to go to Goodwill.

Nate the Great

Here's the closet with sheetrock in and painted


Here it is with the carpet installed.....it's coming together!

I have the best husband! He is spoiling me by remodeling our closet. He's such a handy man to have around! :) Now we are working on designing the shelving and getting it all set. We'll be buying the wood soon and hopefully will have it done before the baby comes! I can hope, right? :)