Pumpkin Patch

Hallie and I have started something new this week called "nap time." Some of you may have heard of this before. It's this magical time where you put your baby down during the day and they sleep for a couple of hours while you get stuff done! Wow. I am sad I didn't start this sooner. It is FABULOUS! Yesterday I totally got to scrub my kitchen floor. And I mean scrub. Hands and knees with a tooth brush in the grout kind of scrub. My house felt so clean! Just like when I was nesting.

Anyways, with my new found time I decided to blog and catch you up on our exciting lives. Jordan is slaving away at school and work, doing them both full time. Bless his heart. He has been training chickens and rats so far this semester. It is very interesting. But it is close to midterms and we are still unsure of how to plan our lives. Grad school? Straight to work? Sit on our butts and try to last on savings? (This option of course would only allow us to last about a month. lol) He has a job interview on Friday for a job that he could actually use his major, but we'll see.

I am busy too. Lately I have had some friends of mine come out of the wood works and ask for family pictures. It makes me so excited to do them, I love more experience. My friend Mallory asked me to do her family (which consists of her and her husband), but I loved doing it. Here is just a sample.

I'm so excited to do my friend Courtney's on the 5th! Hopefully there are still leaves....

And of course the Hallie update. She is doing awesome. She goes to bed around 10 and wakes up between 7-8, takes at least one nap in her crib a day, has started sucking her thumb (only during nap time though. Very strange), smiles all the time. She is so fun to take pictures of. We are constantly shoving the camera in her face. Maybe she'll be really good for pictures when she is a toddler. Who knows.

Besides all of that, I need to share my new diet story. A couple of weeks ago, Hallie started having blood show up in her diapers. So we went to the doctor. We saw one of the other doctor's in the practice because it was a Saturday, but usually we see Doctor Moore. So this other doctor decided it was probably a stomach bug because she had had a slight fever, and if the blood continued to call them back. Well it continued. We went in a little more than a week later and saw the same doctor again. He was very puzzled. He sought out Doctor Moore. Doctor Moore told him it was probably a dairy allergy and that I needed to go without dairy for a week to see what resulted and then to come back. Well the blood in her diapers started going away. Relief. But think about it. A non-dairy diet. No milk, no cheese, no sour cream, no yogurt, no chocolate, no cream, no campbell's cream of chicken or mushroom, no ranch dressing, no anything!!! Basically everything that I like to eat is no longer available to me. Awesome. Besides being the hardest diet ever, add most inconvenient to the list. We had a family dinner on Sunday and Gail made everyone mushroom chicken, and had to make my own little BBQ chicken on the side. Sheesh. I am grateful for her to do that, but man it sucks. I love mushroom chicken! Hallie will be checked again at her 4 month appointment for red blood cells in her diaper to see if we need to see a specialist. If not, good bye dairy until Hallie is at least 6 moths old. Yay for me. At least I'll lose weight. :)


 On to the real reason of the post! The pumpkin patch! Jordan's brother Spencer was here with his family and they made the suggestion of going to the pumpkin patch. I was excited, for I am the expert pumpkin carver. Don't let Jordan tell you different! We're going to carve them on Saturday, so I will post them later. The pumpkin patch had a train ride, corn maze, and other little things for the kids. Hallie is still too little, so we just picked out pumpkins. I decided that was alright because the first round of kids had Brant and Macy's kids in the train, and the conductor lost all of them on the ride and didn't notice for a while so all the kiddos were left by themselves! Yeah we decided to pass.

We decided to go look for pumpkins, so we left Hallie with Grandpa Sautter to watch her. It took us 10-15 minutes. When we get back, Grandpa Sautter is missing and Hallie's stroller (with her inside, and my wallet and things) is sitting there alone! AH! Panic! I think he forgot he was watching her, or maybe told someone else to or something but he was with Gail in the car leaving. Haha. Just thought I put this part of the story to give him a hard time:)

But overall it was fun. Had a great weekend with everyone. Yay for family!

Happiest 3 months:)

It's official. I have a 3 month old baby today. It is so strange. The time seriously flies by. Jordan and I love her to death. She smiles all the time. And I'm not talking just a little shrug of the lip. I'm talking full out ear to ear grin. Every time I go to get her in the morning I say, "Good morning sweet girl!" and she gives me the biggest grin. She's recently discovered she can grab things with her hands, so in the morning she pulls the blanket up to her face. It is the cutest thing. She also likes to suck her hand. Not her thumb, the whole entire hand. And slobber. Everywhere. She loves to slobber. Standing is also her favorite. Of course we have to hold her hands, but she loves it. We're so happy to have her. Since she is 3 months old today, I decided to put them next to pictures of Jordan and I when we were around that age. I think she is the perfect combination of us both:) plus her 3 month pictures.

We just love this little bug. This last week Hallie and I took our first road trip to visit Colorado. She did awesome. The whole drive there she only woke up once. The way back was a little more difficult, but I found out that she had a little bit of a stomach bug, so she wasn't feeling to good. But Colorado was so much fun. Hallie went to her first soccer game, powderpuff football game, trip to Lulu's, first time at the home ward that I grew up in, and the funnest time was her first time swimming. She did awesome! She never cried, unless I put her on her back in the cold pool. She didn't like that too much. Overall it was a really fun visit. But Jordan missed us way too much so it was good to be home.

 oh... I forgot to mention that I chopped all my hair off. haha. 13 inches. Still getting used to it. But I like it.

On sunday Hallie and I matched for church. Didn't notice until Jordan said something. But it was fun.

And yesterday Hallie and Jordan had the same hair-do:)

Well that is the update of our lives right now. We are super busy and loving life!

Hallie is 2 months old!

This last week was the funnest/craziest/hectic I have had in a while. My family came up to visit because 1. My sister-in-law, Mary, had her baby Logan! 2. Blessing Hallie and the new baby Logan. So everyone made the trek from Colorado to Idaho. I definitely had a full house. I am so thankful for my in-law's letting us take up our apartment and half of their basement:) It was so much fun. I'm sad it doesn't get to happen very often.

We all went up to the Rexburg hospital to visit the new baby Logan. He was a shorty!! 18.5 inches! Crazy! But he was 7 lbs 8 ounces. It is so crazy to see a brand new baby. You hear people talk about how fast your babies grow and you can't believe they were ever that small. Well let me tell you, they are right! Hallie is 2 months old now, and holy cow she is a monster! Putting those two babies next to each other was unreal. I couldn't believe that Hallie was smaller than Logan (weight wise). So crazy. But it is fun to add cousins to the bunch.

After a couple days of visiting the new baby, we decided to drive up to Yellowstone. My parents have talked about going there almost every time they visit, and this time we finally decided to go. The car ride up consisted of us playing words with friends with each other, so needless to say it went by pretty quick. We had a blast. My brother even got to speak some Mandarin to some people sitting in front of us at Old Faithful, which they informed us that Chinese people would never take their young babies anywhere. I just laughed because Hallie is such a trooper! She comes everywhere! My sister has most of the pictures but here are a couple from the adventure.

The day after Yellowstone was the day we blessed Hallie and Logan. Since Mary had a c-section just my brother and her dad came down for Hallie's and the family went up for Logan's. I am so proud of Jordan for being a worthy priesthood holder and being able to bless our baby. The blessing was so beautiful, Jordan is so eloquent:).  Hallie's dress was beautiful and it was such a beautiful day. All of Jordan's family that lives around came. It was so nice to have the support of all these amazing people we call family! All around it was an uplifting day.

Of course I had to do a photo shoot of my little princess of the day:) Here are a couple of my favorites.

 

After we blessed the babies we had a wonderful dinner that Jordan's mom prepared for us. She is so awesome and I'm so thankful for her. After dinner my little sister, Kaylie, was showing me her photo assignment and we decided to take some pictures of the Rexburg Temple. It was so fun to teach her some of the things that I had learned through college. After taking some pictures she informed me she had learned more from me in the last 20 minutes that she had in her past 2 photo classes. That made me feel what is the word.. hmm.. awesome. Haha. While teaching her I got an awesome picture and then taught her how to manipulate it. I think it turned out pretty amazing. 

 

Well and now to finish it off... My little Hallie girl is 2 months old! I cannot believe it. Time really does fly when you have kids. She is the funnest little bundle of joy. She started smiling a couple weeks ago and now she is really getting the hang of it. I can talk to her and she will give me the biggest grin. She mostly does it for me, but she will do it for Jordan too. It just takes him a little more work. This last weekend she was smiling at everyone in the family. She must have missed them:) 

But today was our 2 month wellness check up and our first round of immunizations. I just felt so terrible because she didn't even know what was coming! She layed on the table just fine and gave the PA a huge smile right before the PA was going to "stick" her. The PA looked at me and jsut said she felt so guilty that she was about to prick her. She had three shots to get and the PA went as fast as she could. Hallie started with a huge wail and sucked in her breath and her face got super red and she didn't breathe. Kinda freaky when they do that. But she took another breath let out two more cries and was fine. I had picked her up between the not breathing and the cries to cuddle so that might have helped. And so far she has been doing fine. I gave her some Tylenol, as per doctors orders, and she has been asleep ever since. A wonderful time to write on the blog I suppose. I'll have to post a picture with the band aids on her legs, but I wont dare to wake her up right now.

All I can say is that I just love my little baby. She is so much fun to play with, hold, and just stare at. Jordan and I are the luckiest parents in the world:)

★JOY★

This is officially my new favorite picture of Hallie:

Hallie is Jordan's Baby

I have not written in forever, but only due to the fact that Hallie refuses to let me put her down. She will fall asleep in my arms, I will lay her down to sleep and 10 minutes later she is awake. So it has been hard to clean my house let alone write a blog post! Hallie's sleeping patterns have been awful. But....

The past 2 weeks have been awesome! Hallie has been sleeping for at least 4 hours at a time at night. I know that doesn't sound like much, but when she has been waking up and crying at least every hour and a half, 4 hours is a miracle!

Last night was amazing! Hallie slept for 7 straight hours! I woke up around 8:30 and I freaked out a little thinking that something was wrong. I looked over to Hallie and she was fine. Then I look to Jordan and start laughing hysterically. This is what I find:

All I have to say is Hallie is Jordan's baby 100 percent. If there ever was a Daddy's girl, Hallie would be a prime example.

Hallie is now 10 pounds and almost 7 weeks old! Where does the time go!? We just love her. Even though she is SUPER high maintenance:)

♥Hallie Jane♥

Well it finally came! Jordan and I are the proud parents of the beautiful Miss Hallie Jane. I know it was a surprise for a lot of you, including Jordan and I. We are just so happy that she is here safe and sound. But I know you are all dying to hear the story.

It all started many weeks ago at the doctors office. My doctor was out of town for the week. My regular appointments were every Tuesday. On this particular Tuesday I was told that I had borderline high blood pressure. Which most of you know can lead to preccalampsia or toxemia. I was told to come back on the Friday that week to see if it would go down. I came back on Friday and I still had high blood pressure. I had also developed a cold/flu symptoms, the usual stuffy nose and sore throat. My doctor was still out of town so the PA said that we should just wait until the doctor came back to see what he said.

I waited until the next Tuesday. My blood pressure had gone down, cold remained. My doctor told me that I was fine and to just take it easy. At this time I was 37 weeks. Well the moment that I had high blood pressure I would pray every night that Hallie was ok and that I would go into labor when the time was right. It amazes me how Heavenly Father knows exactly what you need.

38 weeks rolled around and I had my appointment in two days. It was Sunday and I woke up just not feeling very good. I was kind of nauseated, but not enough to make me worry. Jordan and I went to Stake Conference, where we heard some amazing testimonies. I'm glad we went. Jordan's parents were driving his brother, Spencer, and sister, Chalai, back from Oklahoma and they arrived that Sunday night. Usually I am chipper and so happy when Jordan's family comes. But I was just in a terrible mood because I was not feeling good. I started to get a pain right where my diaphragm is. From about 4 o'clock on I just kept telling Jordan, "I do not feel good." It was just this weird I not feeling good. About 11 o'clock Jordan and I decided to get some rest instead of hanging out with his family.

When we got to our apartment, the pain got more severe. It was a constant pain that I can't even really explain. The best I can put it, was that I got the wind knocked out of me, but the pain from that would not go away. Of course, I started to cry just worried out of my mind. We decided to try and get some rest.

I slept for about an hour and a half when the pain was really intense and I felt like I was going to vomit. I called my mom. I didn't know if I should go to the hospital or what I should do. My mom told me that if I had any doubts in my mind to just go. It wouldn't hurt. I just felt so embarrassed. What if it was nothing and the pain would just go away? I decided to first call the answering service to my doctor. Basically he was NO help. He told me that I could go into the hospital now if I was worried or wait until they opened at 8. The pain was getting more severe and it was 2 in the morning. I could not wait. I just did not feel right. We decided to drive into the hospital.

When we got to the hospital I got hooked up to monitor babies heart rate and to see if I was contracting. I did not possibly think I was having contractions. The pain was in my upper ribs and constant. As soon as she hooked me up she asked if I felt like the pain was more intense. I told her maybe a little. She told me I was for sure contracting. I was stunned. The pain I was feeling could not be that! She then checked me for dilation and I was between 1-2 centimeters. The nurse happily told me that I was in early labor and that they would probably just send me home.But they wanted to check me again in 2 hours just to make sure.

During that time I threw up and started to actually feel when I was contracting. But the pain was getting more severe. When I would contract it felt like a rock in my upper abdomen. I had Jordan feel it and he thought it was abnormal. The nurse got a hold of my doctor and they decided they wanted to do blood work.

After my blood was drawn I tried to find a comfortable position to sleep. I finally did and slept for about an hour when I was woken up by my nurse. She was very calm and told me that I had HELLP syndrome. She told me that they were going to start me on oxytocin right away and that Jordan and I were going to have a baby that day! We were so excited. And then we started freaking out a little because we had not brought anything with us to the hospital. We asked the nurse and she said that Jordan had time to run home and get everything we needed.  Jordan decided to leave right then so he wouldn't miss anything.

About five minutes after Jordan left my doctor arrived at the hospital and came to my room. He checked to see if I was dilated any more from 5 in the morning. He checked and I was still between a 1-2 and they had just barely given me the first dose of oxytocin. Then he got up turned to me and said, "we have to do a c-section, and we have to do it now." I was floored. I think my jaw literally hit the ground. He went on to explain that I was not dilated enough and if we waited any longer the c section might not be possible and vaginally would take too long. He then went on to tell me my liver enzymes were through the roof and that is why I was having such bad pains. He also went on to tell me that my blood platelet levels were at 43,000/mm. A normal persons levels are at 150-160,000. I was more than half below.

After my doctor left the room I immediately started to cry. A c-section had never crossed my mind the entire time I was pregnant. Let alone an emergency c-section. I was so scared. To top it off my nurse said, don't worry I'll make sure the doctor doesn't start before your husband gets back. I called Jordan right away. He wasn't even home yet but had to drive back (which he told me he drove 85 the whole way). He got there and again I burst into tears. I didn't even have time to call my mom to tell her what was happening. All she knew is that I had gone into labor, but she didn't know about the c-section. I sent her a quick text to tell her to call Jordan if she needed anything.

While that was going on, the anesthesiologist came in and explained to me what was going to happen. I was going to have a spinal tap. Basically everything he said was in one ear and out the other. I signed the forms, Jordan was dressed and I was about to walk into surgery.

Before we left the room, Jordan gave me a priesthood blessing. He didn't have oil or anyone to help him, but he did it anyway. All I remember him saying was that Heavenly Father loved me and would be with me. As I walked across the hall Jordan's parents showed up. We got to give them hugs, and again I started to cry, along with everyone else there (including the nurse).

I walked into the surgery room all alone, but the strange thing was, I was completely calm. I had stopped crying and I knew everything was going to be ok. The spinal tap went completely fine, it was not scary to me one bit. I was so excited when Jordan walked in. It took all of ten minutes before little miss Hallie was out. They brought her over the curtain so I could see her. She was so beautiful. Jordan got to hold her while I got stitched up. I finally got to hold her when they took me into recovery. It was the most releaving feeling in the whole world. Everything went smoothly and I had my little girl in my arms. She was simply amazing.

After the labor and recovery, we were wheeled to my room. Jordan and I decided to look up HELLP syndrome on the internet. This might not have been a good idea. I'm wondering if my doctors didnt really explain anything to me because they didn't want me to freak out. But basically there are 3 classes of HELLP syndrome. I had Class 1, which is the most severe. After further reading, if it is not caught in time, 1 in 4 women die from the syndrome. This was very scary to me... to think what could have been. But I know that my prayers every night kept me safe, and Jordan having the priesthood authority to give me a blessing of comfort and safety gave me the peace that I needed.

All in all, this experience has made me appreciate the church and the gospel in my life. It has made me appreciate my temple marriage, that Jordan and I are sealed for time and eternity. Not death till us part. We are together FOREVER. And if anything would have happened to me or to Hallie, we would, and will have each other, as a family forever.

That is the story of how Hallie Jane came into our lives. She is the biggest blessing in the world. She is healthy, safe, and beautiful. We couldn't have asked for more. We love her. After a week we cannot even imagine life without her.