February

How could you not love this little girl. She is the most gorgeous baby ever!

 Getting ready for the super bowl. Sadly we lost. But she sported the colors to well. 

 Smiley baby

 Even her sad face is adorable

 Finally got some socks to stay on her feet. I dont think that she knows what to think about them.

 So happy

 Daddy and Elsie

 This is one of my absolute picture of Elsie. Shes is just starting to hold onto things. 

 Elsie had her 2 month check up this month and had to get shots. She handled it like a champ and only cried for about a minute. Shes a tough girl.

January 2013

Our little girl is growing and growing. I just want her to stay so little. Being new parents hasn't really been that challenging though. We have a super well behaved and easy baby. She is a fantastic sleeper is really just all around happy. How could you not be with me as your mother though right? ha. She is a good eater. Too strong of a latch for my taste but I'm sticking through it. We love her so much and she makes our lives 100x better. She is still a little lady though weighing in at 7 lbs for her first month on this earth. 

 Mother and Daughter

 She loves to stay warm by the blow dryer

 swaddled nice and cozy. She really doesn't care for swings though. She would much rather be bounced.

 <3

 Working on her neck muscles to look at daddy

 Small enough to take baths in the sink

 Napping at church on her first Sunday

 And the highlight for this month is Aunt Emilee came to visit! They love each other! 

Thanks for coming all this way Emilee! You're the best! 

The many faces of Elsie.

Pictures of Elsie

Christiana wanted to use Elsie to model some new born headbands for her shop and of course I said yes. Her friend Candice was trading her professional photos for some headbands for her own little sweetie- piper. I was only expecting a few and since Elsie was already 6 weeks and its best to do newborns within the first week they are born because they stay really sleepy I didnt know how they were going to go. It seriously took a couple hours to get them and we had to have hands on her the whole time and a blow dryer (she LOVES the blow dryer.) Candice did a whole newborn photoshoot for free. Seriously so nice! Anyways without further explaining here are some of my favorites of my little model.

BABY ELSIE has ARRIVED!!

Monday, Dec 17, at my Dr's appointment he told me that I was dilated to a 3. We decided that if I had not had the baby by Sunday that we were going to induce labor. WOOHOO. But I didn't really want to wait. I wanted to have her as soon as possible to not be so close to Christmas. So I started to try home remedies to try and get it started. Over the next few days I would start to have contractions but they wouldnt last as long as they were supposed to or they werent as close together as they needed to be. It was getting very frustrating. Finally on Wednesday they were 5 minutes apart lasting 1 minute each time. Jordan and I went to lunch and the whole time they were consistent and then went home to wait til they had been like that for a while... but we got home and they stopped. So we tried some more things to get the contractions to start up again.

At 9pm we decided that it was time to go to the hospital. They were the same distance they were that morning, but I was in back labor so they were pretty painful and I had not practiced any coping skilling for the pain. I am not sure that they would have kept me at the hospital when I arrived because I hadnt dilated any more that I was on Monday but my blood pressure was 170 so they needed to have my stay and try to speed up the labor.

I got the epidural as soon as the offered it to me because if she was going to continue to face the wrong direction I did not want to keep feeling it. I was more scared to get that than to actual give birth, at least that's what I thought at that point. But it wasn't as bad as I expected it to be. Its just a scary thought to have someone put a needle in your spine. After that I just wanted to take a nap for a little before she came. I thought of it like a plane ride, or a long car ride. If you fall asleep time goes by faster and then the anticipated event will happen. It wasn't that restful though. And right before they started to have me push I was able to feel my contractions on my left side. Not that fun!

A little after 1 am on December 20 the nurse finally had me start pushing. It was just her and Jordan. We both had not planned on watching the birth but Jordan wasn't really given a choice and after the 2nd push I asked to watch with the mirror because they were insisting that they could see the head and I didn't believe them. It was a lot easier pushing while watching because then I was able to see the progress. After the 4th push the nurse had me wait for the Dr to arrive because she was ready to come out. Fortunately, he was there in the next couple of minutes and I was able to push again. That was the last time and our little girl was here. I didnt expect to get choked up and teary when she was there. I didnt expect to wish she was closer while they cleaned her up and be a little jealous that Jordan could be by her. I was trying not to cry because I felt stupid crying about it, but I couldnt help but let a few tears slide down my face. It was a very special moment and I assume that most mothers feel that way when they give birth to their children. I couldnt wait for the nurse to bring Elsie to me to hold. I was tired, emotional, excited, and a little scared to meet my little girl. But it was perfect. She is beautiful and perfect. It's weird loving someone so much the moment you meet.

I have always heard that giving birth is a beautiful thing and I never really understood it. How could something so gross sounding be beautiful? But thinking about my experience I can see how it can be beautiful, not the actual birth part-which was not as disgusting as I expected it to be-but the spirit that was there and the meeting of our little girl. Those were beautiful, touching, perfect moments.

Elsie Marie Smith

born Dec 20, 2012

5 lbs 8 oz, 18.5 in

arrived 1:32 am

It's Beginning To Look Alot Like Christmas

Over the last few years living with roommates, I have accumulated a little bit of Christmas decorations but not too much because I have always gone home for the holiday. This year is our first year being married and since we are due so close to Christmas we can not travel for the holiday. Bummer. So I wanted to make some decorations to make the holiday a little bit more special our little family.

One of our FHE's we went and picked out a tree, decorated it, made hot chocolate, and I copied Dawn and made a wreath out of the trimmings. Love it!

I saw several burlap tree skirts and I thought that I would give it a try. Will not use burlap ever again. HATE IT! so itchy! and it was not an easy fabric to work with. But for this year this tree skirt will do and it does it job nicely.

I had some extra burlap....

and of course everyone needs some stockings.

Another FHE Jordan and I and a couple of other couples from our ward went to the Zoo Lights. It was nice spending time with them but it was FREEZING!!

Getting Ready for Baby

A couple things that I did to get ready for Elsie to get here.

I saw a similar dresser on pinterest and I just fell in love with it. Christiana's sister gave us a dresser that was all black and I wanted to redo it for Elsie. When I started stripping it though I realized there was like 5 different layers of paint on it. It took 2 coats of stripper and A LOT of standing to get the paint off and start with a smooth surface. Dont look too closely though because the gray border does not match up on the edges because i cut them with a kitchen knife. ;) I love how it turned out though.

I got a little swollen while I was pregnant.

I saw a tutorial of a faux chenille blanket on pinterest and so I decided to give it a shot. This is the finished product. It took forever to cut all those lines and almost 3 spools of thread to sew them all

The car seat cover that I made from another tutorial that was on pinterest. It doesnt fit exactly so I need to remake it a little.

Katt was nice enough to give us a bassinet but it was not that cute and I stored my shoes in it when we were moving so it was dirty. This is the before and after of it.

all of the wonderful things that I received from my baby showers. I will have to buy a few things but I think that we were set up pretty good.