Casen the Chunkster 3 Months...

First off, let me apologize for the picture quality. I'm no photographer, and I usually take pictures with my IPad or phone, both of which have poor cameras. Time to invest in a camera or better yet a new smartphone!  I will tell Brian I'm investing in a new smartphone for our children. They are the reason I need a high quality cell phone, it's not for me at all. :) I need it to capture their childhood, because they grow up so fast, ;) Yep, that will convince him.

Anyway, look at that adorable chunkster sitting so cute in daddy's chair! He is just so squishy! I can't get enough of this sweet chubby boy of mine. 

If you have been reading Casen's updates you'll know that we had to put off his 2 month check up for 3 weeks until he was fully recovered from a nasty cold. So, his 2 month stats are more like 3 months. So this kid weighs 15.8 lbs and is 26 inches long! He is almost off the charts in height in the 99.71 percentile. 

If you follow me on instagram or facebook you may have already seen that Casen laughed for he first time yesterday! Is that not the best sound in the world? 

He also has found his hands and his thumb! I keep taking his thumb out of his mouth when he starts sucking on it and I try to get him to take his binki instead, hoping he will grow to prefer the binki. However, I've been told that thumb suckers are great sleepers, and this week both me and Brian have been up a lot with both of our children. So as of right now, I'll take the thumb sucking.

He is a great eater, obviously, and typically is a pretty good sleeper. This week he hasn't slept as well. He's been eating more too, so maybe a growth spurt is coming?? He is already in some 6 month clothing so I really don't need another growth spurt!

This boy is still a cuddler, and honestly I hope he doesn't outgrow it ever! Sometimes I admit it is hard to get things done when he just wants me to hold him all day. But now that I have a busy toddler who would rather play then cuddle most days, it's a good reminder that they grow up fast, and these days won't last that long. So it's ok if laundry doesn't get put away right this second, I'll hold my baby a bit longer. :) In fact I'm typing this while holding Casen on my lap. Multitasking is a mother's greatest talent right? 

A sibling shot is totally necessary since Lydia LOVES baby Casen. She asks to hold him all the time, however, now she doesn't like to hold him as long. She holds him for just long enough to get a picture and then says, "Mommy, he heavy! All done!" That's my cue to step in a grab Casen before she drops him.

Casen is the sweetest boy. He brings so much happiness to our home. I just want to keep him little as long as I can. We all just love him. Brian takes him as soon as he gets home and rocks him in the chair, then Lydia will want to hold him, and when Lydia is in bed Mommy gets to rock Casen some more. I'm doing my best to make him a Mama's boy (honestly what Mom doesn't want a mama's boy). I'm probably spoiling him too much, but I'm not worried. My plan is to love him so much that no other woman will be good enough for him. :)

The Dark Side of Christmas...

Christmas is a time of year that is filled with traditions. As families we watch What a Wonderful Life, decorate our trees, go to temple square, and read the Christmas story from the Bible. For our family this year we of course participated in all the traditional Christmas activities; however this Christmas was not going to be all traditional. December of 2015 was a much awaited month for the Rose family not only for Christmas but for the long awaited Episode 7 of STAR WARS.

I consider myself a true Star Wars Fan. I'm proud to say that I grew up watching the original trilogy on VHS (remember those?) NOT the remastered versions.

www.fowllanguage.com/comic/star-wars-denial

 I remember my siblings and I would pick our favorite movie out of the trilogy and take turns watching them over and over. My favorite was The Empire Strikes Back, I thought Luke's training with Master Yoda was awesome, and I would find myself day dreaming about my own Jedi training.   However, since marrying a Star Wars super fan,  I've been informed that my knowledge about the Force is incomplete. I've recently been exposed to what Brian likes to call, "The Dark Side of Christmas."

In honor of The Force Awakens we each got a Star Wars ornament in our stockings this year. Brian got the Darth Vader ornament, I got Chewbaca, Casen 3CP0, and Lydia scored on the Yoda ornament.

During the Christmas season like most mothers, I thought it was important to try and teach my children about the true meaning of Christmas. Since Casen is 2 months old, he was the perfect pupil. He sat still, didn't talk out of turn and smiled whenever I talked to him about baby Jesus. Lydia was also a good pupil. By the end of our Christmas Story she was able to identify baby Jesus, Mary, Joseph, and the Shepard with our family Nativity we had on display. Brian, however, felt that this year more teaching was needed. He began to teach Lydia the ways of the Force and made sure that she was proficient with identifying the major Star Wars Characters. I had to film it cause it's just too funny.

We've established that Brian is on the side of the Empire and I think that he has successfully turned my toddler to the Dark Side. As you are about to see, Lydia prefers Darth Vader over any other character in the franchise.

A Few Minutes Later...

The Rose Family has experience the Dark Side of Christmas. "There has been an Awakening," in the Rose Family household. New Christmas traditions are about to come forth. I have a feeling that Star Wars will be a part of our Christmas for years to come.

Casen is 2 months...

 The month of December has been filled with snow, cookies, Christmas fun, and colds. Everyone in our little family has been sick this month, and my poor, little, baby boy is no exception. Luckily, it was just a cold and he was feeling better just in time for Christmas! We've not been to the doctor for his two month check-up and vaccinations since he's been home with a cold. So, we've pushed back his appointment and I'm not sure of his stats. He has gotten so chubby, and has grown so much I'm anxious to get his measurements. He is 2 months old and he has already outgrown his Christmas jammies which are a 3 month size! So, next week we'll find out when we go to his well child exam.

Casen is starting to smile a lot, and I just LOVE it! He's such a good baby, and really cries when he gets hungry. With his first cold he was still not very fussy.

This baby boy of mine loves to be held and cuddled. I try to hold him as much as I can during the day, but having a busy toddler makes it difficult. So, when Lydia goes to bed we make sure to get lots of one on one snuggle time before mommy goes to bed. Since Casen was sick with a pretty bad cold he got lots of cuddling, and slept with us holding him most of the time. Since then, he has not wanted to put down! He is feeling better, but just wants to be held all day long, and all night! These past two days I've been trying to get him used to being put back down again, it's been difficult. Especially since we are potty training Lydia. But that is another story for another blog post. :)

Casen loves to be talked to, as soon as you make eye contact with him start talking he smiles and coos right back. He especially loves his mama. He listens for me when someone else is holding him, and turns his head in my direction all the time. His Daddy just adores him, which melts my heart. Brian holds him all the time, and  Casen loves his Daddy too. He recognizes Brian's voice and is all smiles when Brian comes home from work and talks to him.  Casen is such a sweetie, and the most fun, easygoing baby. These two months have just flown by, but at the same time I feel like Casen has always been with us. We love this boy of ours, he has just completely stolen our hearts.




Here are some more pictures of sweet baby Casen...

This was taken right before Casen got sick. I love this picture, his belly is just too cute.

Lydia and Casen Christmas morning. While Lydia was holding Casen she said, "He heavy." We had a good laugh at that comment. 

Casen sleeping Christmas morning.

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I'm not kidding, he always gives me the bird when he is sleeping. My Dad is holding him in this picture and he thinks its the funniest thing ever. 

Lydia and Casen watching Tangled.

Casen looking adorable as always.

A picture I took today cause he is always so smiley and happy.

Casen's 4 Week Update

My sweet baby is 4 weeks old! It's like I blinked and his first month of life was gone! These pictures were taken by my sister Kami when he was 2 weeks old.

 At two weeks old Casen weighed 10 lbs. 5 oz. and was 22 inches long. He gained two pounds in two weeks! He is a snuggler, which mom and dad LOVE!  He is a very good eater, and sleeps pretty good most nights. He tends to get gassy sometimes around 3:00 a.m. which is not the most fun for any of us. Usually it means both mom and dad are awake trying to help Casen, and if he is particularly uncomfortable, and crying a lot, it means Lydia will wake up as well. Luckily, this has only happened maybe 3 or 4 times, so we are hoping Casen's little body starts figuring out how everything works and he grows out of this quickly!

Over all Casen is a mellow baby. He doesn't cry very much unless he gets gassy, and if he is upset he just wants to be held by Mom and he calms right down. We feel pretty lucky to have such a good baby, especially since we have a busy toddler to chase after.

Speaking of my busy toddler, during Casen's newborn shoot I wanted to get some sibling pictures, and Lydia just would not cooperate. This girl will not look at the camera for anything, and she is just too busy doing her own thing, so pictures and danged near impossible. Luckily we got a few cute ones, but none of her smiling and looking at the camera.

Hahaha, this picture pretty much sums up my day. Lydia loves her brother, a little too much most of the time. :)

And this is all Lydia wanted to do during the photoshoot. :)

I love this picture, I just wish she was looking at the camera.

Eventually we did get some pictures of Lydia looking at the camera. so she decided not to smile at all.

It totally reminded me of those old black and white photos taken of children during the early 1900's; you know the ones where they don't smile? Well, Kami got a kick out of it as well so she did one in black and white. :)

Hahahaha....oh toddlers they are so funny.

Anyway, we are so glad that Casen is here. He is so much fun, and we just love having a little newborn in the house again. I feel like with baby number two the newborn stage is going by so much faster! So I decidedI need to soak it up while I can, even if those times I need to soak it up fall around 3:00 a.m. 

Casen's Birth Story

He is finally here! We couldn't be happier with the arrival of our little man. He is the sweetest, cuddliest, and most handsome baby boy you have ever seen! After months of anticipation, a week of contractions and false labor, an unintentional natural delivery, we are finally home with our sweet new baby.

Casen's birth story is completely different from Lydia's. With Lydia I was home having contractions basically all day long. I woke up with contractions around 6:00 a.m. and they gradually got stronger and closer together. I was afraid of going to the hospital in case they would send us home, so I stayed in our house as long as I could. It was actually Brian who said, "Enough is enough we are going to the hospital." When we got to the hospital it was 10:30 p.m. and I was dilated to a 6. We were staying!! Hooray! At this point my contractions were kinda painful and they were happening every 15 minutes, so they weren't too close together. They gave me the epidural and life was good! The epidural was perfect. I could move my toes and feet, but I felt no pain. My doctor was just getting home that day from being out of town so the nurses were trying to get a hold of her. In the meantime, me and Brian just slept. I was finally dilated to a 10, but no word from my doctor and my water wouldn't break. The nurses kept moving me into weird positions trying to get my water to break with no luck. I really didn't mind, the epidural was so great that I just kept sleeping. Finally, the nurses got a hold of my doctor and she said to give me some pitocin to help my contractions get stronger in order to break my water. My water finally did break just when my doctor arrived. The nurses woke up Brian and it was time for me to push! Brian must have suddenly felt the responsibility of parenthood or something because they were just telling me to push for the first time, and Brian suddenly got light headed and crumpled to the ground! He passed out right there in the delivery room! The nurses got him some juice and reassured him that it happens all the time. Ha ha, but don't worry he gets teased plenty. Once Brian was up and feeling better it was time to have our baby. I pushed for maybe 20 minutes and our little angel came into the world! It was love at first sight when we saw Lydia for the first time. She was so alert and came into the world with eyes wide open; eager to see everyone and everything. I'm happy to say, she is still the same. :)

Me with Lydia ready to come home.

Lydia just minutes old.

Now for Casen's story. I woke up on my due date with some mild cramping and I knew that it was going to be the day! With Lydia it took a while to get to a six, so I figured it would be the same this time. We went to Ogden to exchange some pajamas at Carter's in the morning, and took Lydia to Chick-fil-A for lunch and let her play in the playground. Afterwords, we came home and took a nap. At around 4 O'clock the contractions were about 7 minutes apart so we took Lydia to my Mom's and and then came home to pack the hospital bag; and I wanted to clean a few more things before leaving for the hospital. It was funny because as long as I was up and moving the contractions seemed to be farther apart and not as bad, but as soon as I sat down they seemed to get worse. We waited around till about midnight then I decided that it was time to go. My contractions at this point were 3 minutes apart, and were pretty intense. We got to the hospital and the nurse checked me, I was only at a 2!!! I couldn't believe it! My contractions seemed intense and were close together, I didn't know why I wasn't dilating. I was scheduled to be induced the next morning, so they didn't want to send me home. So the doctor (my doctor was out of town..again so the on-call doctor) told me to walk the halls for a couple of hours to see if that would help. I was not excited about this, I thought I would be laboring forever. So me and Brian started walking laps. Every time I felt a contraction  coming on I would grip the side rail and Brian would rub my back. (I've had terrible back labor with both kids). We walked for a little over 1/2 hour, and I told Brian that I had to have made some progress, the contractions are getting worse, so we went back to my room and the on-call doctor just happened to walk in at the same time. She checked me and was very surprised to find that I was at a 6! I went from a 2 to a 6 in a little over 1/2 hour! The doctor said that she would come back in a little while and the nurses started to admit us and call the anesthesiologist to come get me the epidural. By now it was a little past 3:00 a.m. The anesthesiologist to my room at about 3:15 he seemed to take forever to give me the epidural. My contractions were still about 3 minutes apart and getting stronger. I just wanted some relief, I'd been doing this since 3:00 in the afternoon. He finished at 3:30, and said I would start to feel the affects in about 15 minutes. My contractions were so bad he started me out with a manual dose. I couldn't feel any difference, he had me roll to one side to try to get the the epidural to take, no such luck though. At this point I was hardly aware of anyone who was in the room, my contractions were getting closer together and stronger. I just gripped the side rail and Brian's hand and just tried to to breathe through each contraction as it came. I then realized that this epidural was not going to work, I was going to have to do this on my own.

Finally, I had one very strong contraction and my water broke all over the bed. After that, there was no break between contractions. I remember saying, "I need to push, he's coming, I need to push." The nurses kept telling me "Don't push, don't push." Since there was no doctor in the room. They called my doctor a minute before and she said that she would be there in fifteen minutes. The nurses said "I don't think you have fifteen minutes." So they called the on site doctor, he started walking up the hallway when I finally couldn't "not push" any longer. I gave one push and well, into the world came our little boy, right onto the bed. One of the nurses picked him up and held up my perfect little boy. After he was born the on site doctor came in and delivered the placenta, then my doctor came in a stitched me up. Casen Brian Rose was born at 3:55 a.m. on October 18th. He weighed 8 lbs. 9 oz. and was 20 inches long. We are so happy he is here and a part of our family. He brings so much happiness into our home.

Here is his coming home outfit. We thought it was appropriate since he was born opening weekend
of Brian's deer hunt.

Home at last!

Hospital Pictures

Photo Credit Kami Leishman (Who else?? :)

Lydia really does love her brother I promise :) It was nap time when we took pictures so she was super grumpy. Plus she was ready for Mom and Dad to come home.

First Family Picture as a family of four!

40 Weeks

Well guys, today is the day....my due date. It's looking like little baby boy Rose is already taking after his Dad since he is in absolutely no hurry to get here. :) I had my 40 week appointment this morning and to tell you all the truth I did not want to go. I was scheduled to be induced Monday (my doctor was out of town this week and he gets back on Sunday) and I just knew how the appointment would go.

The doctor would take an ultrasound of the baby and say, "Well, he is still head down, face down, his weight looks good, fluid is still good. Now let's check you, well looks like you're still at a 2, but your scheduled for an induction on Monday so have a good weekend."

So, guess what happened? My appointment went exactly the way I knew it would. I'm still at a two, the doctor said everything looks good and looks like Dr. Bier will be inducing me Monday; just like I thought.

BUT the good news is my induction date was moved up to Sunday morning at 9:00 a.m. So yay! I think I can handle being pregnant for one more day and two more nights. :) To pass the time I've been cleaning and I made quite a few freezer meals. Mostly I just double what we are having for dinner and freeze half of it. I made clam chowder, chicken pot pie, chicken broccoli alfredo, meatballs, and yesterday in some kind of crazy nesting urge I cooked a turkey! But, the funny thing is, I cooked it late, like I started it at 7:00 p.m. I really don't know why, I just felt like it needed to be done right then.

 I put the turkey in the roasting pan, fed Lydia some dinner and while she was in the high chair I scrubbed the refrigerator and started dishes. Brian came home late from  studying at school and checked on the turkey for me. He asked, "Where is the red thing that pops out?" I proceeded to tell him that it was there he just need to look! He responded by saying, "No it's really not here, are you sure you bought a turkey with it?" I said yes I'm sure then I walked over to the roasting pan and looked at the turkey, sure enough the red popper thing was not there, then I realized...I put the dang turkey in upside down! Luckily Brian flipped it over and it still turned out moist and yummy. I tell you pregnancy brain is a real thing!

I have not taken many pictures these past few weeks of our outings, but I do have a few to document.

Monday Brian was staying at work late to get some studying done. It was Food Truck night at Black Island Farms, which is not far from where Brian works. So me and Lydia met Brian and then went to Food Truck night. It was so YUMMY! I'm now officially a fan of food truck food. We didn't stay and participate in many of the festivities since we got there late and Lydia was getting tired and there wasn't anywhere to sit and eat, plus she is super picky so we ended up going to Wendy's and ordering her some chicken nuggets off the dollar menu on the way home since she refused to eat at Black Island Farms.

We had a Mommy and Lydia day last week and went to McDonald's for a happy meal, made some moon sand to play in, and decorate a pumpkin! We went to the dollar store and I got this Styrofoam pumpkin with some jack-o-Lantern stickers for Lydia to decorate with. Well Lydia did not like the stickers on her pumpkin at all. She got mad every time I tried to put them on. Which I thought was so funny, cause all two-year olds love stickers, but Lydia only liked her pumpkin plain with no face, so no Jack-o-Lanterns here.

So, we have done some fun stuff during my last few weeks, and I'm glad we did since Lydia's days of being our only baby have now turned into hours!!! Baby Casen will be joining us so soon! We are all so excited and I can't wait to see my Lydi Bug become a big sister. Wish us Luck!

Trying to Survive the Last Two Weeks....

I have two weeks left until my due date, and it seems like I have two hundred weeks left! I think I'm more anxious about baby #2 to come than I was for baby #1.

This was taken at about 36 weeks. He is so low now we don't get any more pictures of his face. But look at those cheeks! I can't wait to see his little face in person!

I can't wait to be able to get on the floor and play with my two year old again, and I can't wait to be able to chase her around the house without every step causing me discomfort. Not to mention, I'm dying to meet my new baby. I just dream about holding him, and introducing him to his big sister. I'm so excited for those moments. I loved spending those couple of days in the hospital getting acquainted with newborn baby Lydia, and I'm very excited to do the same with baby Casen. As far as my pregnancy goes,  I'm at that point where baby boy is so low it feels like he is just going to fall out, sleeping for more than 3 hours at a time simply doesn't happen, and most of the baby preparations are done so all I have left to do is watch the clock. I keep thinking that I should just enjoy these last two weeks where it will be just me and Lydia, but honestly, I think we will have more fun together when I can actually run around after her instead of waddle.

My feelings about being super pregnant today. 

Whining about these last two weeks won't help them go by any faster, so today I decided to just simply fill the next two weeks with at least one thing to look forward to each day  so I keep those end of pregnancy blues away. So, today after a disheartening trip to my doctor (looks like this guy isn't coming until at least my due date) I decided to get festive and break out my Halloween decorations.
 

You can't tell from the picture above, but those books are ones I made a few years ago. I used some old books that I had and covered them in some festive scrapbook paper. I then used letter stickers to title them. The purple book is simply titled "Book of Spells" and the orange book is titled "Hogwarts a' History." They are probably my favorite Halloween decorations.

Now our house feels a little more festive, and since it's FINALLY looking like fall outside today I'm thinking we'll have some soup and homemade bread for dinner and curl up and watch Hotel Transylvania with Lydia before bedtime. That should keep my mind off of being pregnant for the rest of day. Let's hope....