Potty Training...

We decided we're sick of buying diapers for 2 kids. There's only one way to fix that problem. Honestly, I've been terrified of potty training. I've heard horror stories. I don't handle the messes well, so I haven't wanted to start. We actually tried it back in January. I was convinced I could have Paisley potty trained by the time Molly came along. We didn't even make it 6 hours. So, here we are. She will be 3 in October. I figure it's time.
We talked it up with Paisley making it sound super exciting. We told her she could have some candy every time after she goes potty. I took her into the bathroom today and told her we were going to start, by being naked from the waist down. Well, she had a different idea in mind. She did not want to be naked. She took her jammies off, pulled off her diaper and went into the nursery. Set the diaper on top of Molly's diapers and said "I don't want to wear diapers anymore, I want to wear big girl panties". I said yes ma'am. From then on, I kept asking her if she needed to go. I let her choose what she wanted to drink. She had some root beer and propel (a.k.a. Juice at our house. We don't buy regular juice). She eventually had to go potty. We made a huge deal about this. She went a few more times and did awesome. I gave her some peaches and asked her if she needed to go potty. She said no. She said she'd go after she ate her peach. Then the phone rang. The next thing I knew, we had a puddle under the stool. I got her changed. Then she went poo in the toilet. Awesome!! A while went by without going. I continuously asked her if she needed to go. We were outside playing and I could smell something stinky. Sure enough, her little panties were saggy. She had pooped. I took her in and cleaned her up. Nothing more disgusting then panties full of you-know-what. Right after her bath I told her we should try one last time. She peed. We put a pull-up on her and now she's asleep.
What an exhausting day!!

Challenges...

Being a mom is hard. Being a mom to more than one child is extremely hard. I am having a difficult time being a mother to 2 kids. How do people have a lot of kids... like 2+ ? I am really struggling with giving 100% to each child. Before Molly, whenever Paisley needed something or wanted to play or read a book or whatever, I was there. It was her and I. Everyday. We did whatever she wanted, no questions asked. And once in a while I could talk her into letting me clean my house. She had my undivided attention. But things changed. Permanently. We had another baby. Her name is Molly. Cutest little chubby baby in the world with a smile that melts my heart. So just when I thought I knew what being a mom was all about, I have another child and realize I have no idea what in thee heck I'm doing. How do I drag my tired body out of bed to go turn on Clifford the big red dog and get a go-gurt for Paisley when I've been up feeding a newborn during the night? How do I do it without losing my patience when all the sudden she decides she wants a "green" go-gurt, not a pink one. Well, I just do it. There isn't an option. I'm the one who decided to have children. Heavenly Father trusted me enough with 2 of his precious spirits. I owe it to these girls to do the best I can. It's not easy. It's never going to be easy. So I have to figure out a way to do it, rather than dwell on how hard it is. I'm given 24 hours in a day. What I do with those 24 hours is all up to me. I have a newborn that needs me every 3 hours so she can eat. I have a 2 year old that needs me to get her food on the table, get her dressed, do her hair, change her bum, read her stories, play follow the leader and hide n' seek. But I still have a newborn that needs me to change her bum, bathe her, talk to her, hold her, make her smile, comfort her, and help her fall asleep. But... my 2 year old needs me to give her a bedtime snack, read scriptures, say prayers, read the hippo book and bath time book, and sing her not one, but 2 songs...
Not only do my kids need me, but I have a husband that needs me as well. All 3 of these special people in my life need me. They all need a clean house, food to eat and clothes to wear. So just how can I give 100% to each person individually? That is something I don't know the answer to. Something I try to figure out every day. Maybe I should get up in the morning before everyone else and get ready for the day. Take some time to read my scriptures and say my prayers to help get me going on the right track. It would give me a spiritual boost. Maybe that would help me feel more confident as a wife, mother, daughter and friend. I know realistically this won't happen, not everyday anyway. I'll keep trying harder everyday to be everything to these 3 special people in my life. I'll start tonight with a good nights rest. Or a good rest until it's time to feed my precious Molly.

2 Months...

I can't believe it's been 2 months already. Time just flies by when you have a newborn I guess. Yesterday, May 16th, little miss Molly turned 2 months. She went to the doctor yesterday and they gave her shots. I always hate those appointments but at the same time I am so grateful because they prevent my kids from getting sick. She's getting so big! She weighed 11lbs 8oz and she was 23 inches long. Which puts her in the 76 percentile.
Some of the things our little Molly is able to do are:

Smile (began right around May 1st)

She found her voice, in other words, baby talk.

Her neck is getting stronger so she can hold her head up a little better.

She's still sleeping a ton. Probably 18 hours a day... give or take. She still sleeps in our room. I like having her next to the bed. It helps me hold onto the newborn phase. She wakes up once, sometimes twice in the night, depending on what time we go to bed.

Shadow...

The cutest thing happened to Paisley yesterday. Actually, it's probably not cute because it made her cry. She was carrying some of her clothes down to her bedroom. She got to the landing, screamed and started crying. Chase went to go see what was wrong. Her clothes were all over the stairs. She had seen her shadow. It was late morning, so the sun was shining through the windows around the door. Chase had to explain to her that we all have shadows. It was pretty cute.

1 Month Old...

Wow! It's already been 1 month. Before little Miss Molly joined our family, the days and weeks just crawled. But now I can't slow them down. It's a little bit different having a newborn when you have another child to care for. When it was just Paisley, I slept when she did, I had more "me" time, I got more done around the house (atleast I like to tell myself that). But, I also ask myself why I didn't get more accomplished. Like, some scrapbooking. I'm pretty behind on my scrapbooking. Now with 2 kids, it feels like I don't accomplish anything unless Paisley is gone with Grandma Kenna for the day. I love having a guilty consence... no, not really. But, I'm already feeling the guilt of having 2 kids. I feel guilty when Paisley comes to me with a book, right as Molly starts to cry to be fed. Now I'm putting Paisley on hold while I tend to Molly. Thankfully she handles it ok. I handle it the worst. Paisley sure loves having a little sis. Maybe a little too much. She loves to get right up in her face and give her loves and kisses. No wonder the little miss got sick. Paisley never got sick when she was a baby, so this whole newborn sickness stuff is something new. I sure do love my girls though. I enjoy their ages for different reasons. Molly doesn't really have her own personality yet, but she loves to cuddle. Paisley hates to cuddle, yet she has thee cutest personality mixed with lots of energy that I could just watch for hours. I just hope and pray that these girls will always be the best of friends, even when they're teenagers. I never had a sister, or brother, so they're pretty lucky to have each other.

Little Miss Molly Mitchell!

So here's the story...
On March 15th I had a doctor appointment at 9. We dropped Paisley off at Grandma Lori's and went to see Hartman. He checked me and I was still "thick and closed". I told him I hadn't felt the baby move as much the past week, as I normally had. He did an ultra sound and found that my water was pretty low. Lower than he'd like. With low fluid and a decrease in movement, this had him a little worried. Since I was a week away from my due date, he thought it was best to end the pregnancy. He hooked me up to the monitor for a stress test. Everything was fine. The front desk said they would call Ogden Regional and see when they could get me in for an induction, and they would call and let me know. So we left to go pick up Paisley. I finally called Hartman's office because I hadn't heard from them. Ogden Regional wanted me there by 4. It was about 11:30. We ran home and decided to go out to lunch since I wouldn't be able to eat for quite a while. We went to Village Inn. It was nice knowing when the baby was coming because we had some time to pick up the house. Paisley laid down for a nap and we cleaned. We showered and by then it was time to leave. Chase gave me a blessing. Then we left. I had all sorts of emotions running through me, I didn't know whether to cry or what to do. I all the sudden felt guilt for having another baby because Paisley would no longer be the only little girl in our lives. I was worried how this would effect her. I was pretty nervous to get started. I had heard some pretty bad things about being started. I was scared to have 2 kids. I was excited to meet this little angel. So many emotions, I shed some tears. Anyway, we got Paisley dropped off, took one last picture of the 3 of us, and headed to the hospital. I tried really hard and didn't cry when we left. We got to the hospital and they checked me in. They took us to our room and I put on my pretty hospital gown. They asked us a million questions. By then it was about 6 pm. They started me on Pitocin. The baby's heart rate got pretty high, so they took me off the Pitocin. I didn't know it, but I was contracting on my own at this point. Anyway, Hartman decided he wanted them to give me the epidural because he thought it would slow the baby's heart rate down. This was about 9 pm. I had been really nervous about getting the epidural, so I was a little hesitant. When I was pregnant with Paisley the epidural went very smooth. This time however, the anesthesiologist had a difficult time getting it in the right spot. Once he finished and I settled into my comfy hospital bed, I was feeling pretty good. We decided to try and get some sleep. Try is the key word. I didn't sleep a wink until about 5:45ish. My nurse came in the room at 6:30 and I woke up. Chase slept but not much. He was up at 6:45 wondering why it was still dark outside. It was a long night. Around 7:15 they checked me and I was about a 4. Hartman told me he'd be back around 9 am to check me again. If I wasn't to a 6+ he was going to break my water. 10:30 came and Hartman was back to check me. I was barely to a 5. So he broke my water. Then I slowly started progressing faster. By the time I was about an 8, my epidural had worn off on my left side, I could feel the contractions. I was hysterical. I wasn't expecting any of this. They called the anesthesiologist back in to give me more medicine. It felt like eternity, but Chase tells me it was only about 15 minutes. Once the medicine kicked in, I was doing great. By then it was time to start pushing. Hartman got there, we were all ready, but I was extremely numb that I had no idea when to push. But, I kept trying. By then the 2nd dose of medicine was wearing off. I was beginning to feel when I needed to push. The baby was moving down, but not real fast. By this time, I was beginning to feel things again. Hartman gave me 2 options. Vacuum or wait 45 minutes and try pushing again. I wanted to keep pushing. Finally I decided I didn't want to feel pain like I had before, so I gave in and had him use the vacuum. Then Hartman found that the baby was posterior. So he had to do some adjusting with the baby. After a few more pushes and some help from the vacuum, she was born. Exactly 1:30 pm. 7 lbs 20 inches long. Paisley was 7 lbs 1 oz and 20.5 inches long. So pretty close in size. We're so happy that she's finally here. She's a beautiful girl with long, black hair. I'm so thankful to be a mother to 2 very sweet girls. And what a sweetheart Paisley is to her baby sister. Adjusting to having 2 kids has been a little bit of a challenge, and I couldn't have done it without my sweet husband. I really, seriously have thee best husband in the world. I love him so much. I'm excited for the fun we're going to have as a little family of 4.

She did it!

Paisley did such an awesome job sleeping in her new room and big girl bed last night for the first time. She woke up early... like 7, but she did awesome. She even took a 2 hour nap today, which was much needed for me too. We're both feeling refreshed and ready for the rest of our day. Not sure what that entails, but we're ready.

Big changes...

It's been a really long time since I've blogged about anything. I'm either really lazy or we're really busy. Not quite sure which one, but hey, at least I'm trying right. What happened tonight has been a big fear of mine for quite a while. We moved Paisley downstairs to her brand new bedroom and big girl bed. She'll be 2 1/2 on April 27th so I guess she's old enough to move out of the crib. I never realized how hard it would be to do this. Chase did a really good remodel job. He painted the walls... 2 are bright pink and 2 are white. We got new carpet, it feels like you're walking on a pillow. I bought her furniture at a yard sale during the summer. I'm making some decorations for the room. She loves it! We also turned the living room downstairs into a play room. We put pictures on the walls, pulled out my old tv, hung a valance above the windows and put all of the toys in the living room. It looks so much better. Paisley absolutely loves it downstairs. I love it too because I can be on the computer or getting things done upstairs and she's not right under my nose. Tonight is her first night sleeping in the new room. We all sat on her new bed and read scriptures. Then we sang a song and had prayer. I was worried she would decide she didn't want to sleep downstairs but she climbed under the covers and got comfy, then I sang her another song and walked out. We set up the baby monitor, but I haven't heard a peep. Yes, I cried. She looked so teeny laying in this huge big girl bed. I feel like a bad mother, sending my baby down to the basement. But in reality, it's not that far away and she was so excited about her new room. I have to give her more credit. My baby girl isn't such a baby anymore.
Speaking of baby. I am 38 weeks today. I've been having some contractions off and on for the past few days. We went to the doctor today. I went totally expecting him to check me and find I'm dilated or else send me to the hospital because she's coming soon. The complete opposite happened. He checked me and those dreaded words came out of his mouth... Thick and Closed. Ugh! I'm not sure I can make it 2 more weeks. My back has been really sore this pregnancy and I'm tired. I feel like a balloon. But... I have to think about the positive things. I'm healthy and as far as we know the baby is healthy too. I haven't had any complications. There are so many people out there who would do anything to be pregnant but for one reason or another they aren't, and I am blessed to be pregnant. So I think I can handle 2 more weeks. My doctor said he's going out of town next weekend and he'll induce me on Thursday the 17th if I want. I'm not sure what I'm going to do. I really don't want to be induced, I want to go on my own, but at the same time, I don't want to take the chance of delivering while he's gone and have some kind of complication. It's hard to know what to do. I'll go to my appointment on Tuesday the 15th and just go from there. Hopefully I will have progressed some. Who knows, maybe I'll go a week early like I did with Paisley.

Lagoon

For the past few years, we've been going to Lagoon on July 4th with Chases family. For some reason it's not crowded on the 4th. This was Paisley's first year, and I think she had a fun time. A couple of the rides scared her, but for the most part she liked all the rides.

San Diego

At the end of April we took a family vacation with my parents and went to San Diego. We drove. My parents rented a car. We left our house about 10 in the morning on April 26. We drove to Vegas and stayed one night. The next morning we drove to San Diego. We went to the Beach, the Zoo and Sea World. It was a lot of fun. Paisley did awesome riding in the car. We took a portable dvd player to keep her entertained. We were a little squished, but not bad. Have a look at our week in Cali.