Cole Darwin Blake

Jessica had her baby last week.  He is so cute and looks like a mini Danny!  Jess and Danny named him Cole Darwin Blake and he was born on February 23, 2013 weighing 7 lbs 11 oz and 19 inches long.  He has lots of blond hair and a cute little pointy nose.  We took a few pictures of Logan and Cole together today.

I can't believe how much bigger Logan looks than Cole and they were pretty much the same size at birth.  I had no idea three weeks would make that much of a difference!  Cole and Logan are exactly three weeks apart in age and I am sure they will be good friends too.  It is fun to see Jess with a baby!  I had Logan at FHE a week before Cole was born and Jess was holding him.  Then she passed Logan to Danny and he was kind of scared to hold him and didn't really know what to do.  Now that he has Cole though, Danny is not scared at all to hold Cole and Jess says he is really good with Cole.  It will be fun to see Logan and Cole grow up together.

First Bath

Logan took his first official bath today and as you can see:

He HATED it!  He cried the whole time and hated being in the water.  Poor little thing.

Being wrapped up in the towel and getting dry and warm was sooo much better.  He immediately stopped crying once he got all wrapped up.  What a cute little boy.  Hopefully he will start to like baths soon.

2 weeks

Logan is two weeks old now and at his two week doctor's appointment he weighed in at a whopping 9 lbs 3 oz (94 percentile) and was 21.5 inches long (98 percentile).  It looks like he might be a big baby like his brother! 

Logan definitely is a great gift from God and a blessing to our family.  He is really a good baby and so far likes to just eat and sleep!  His brother and sister love him a lot and so does his mom and dad. 

On Saturday, we had Roy take some pictures for us.  All Logan wanted to do during his photo shoot was cry but we did get a some good ones:

We also got a few pictures of all three kids and Emily and Colby.  They were all in clothes I had made them.

There is never a dull moment with three kids.  They keep me on my toes.  We are going to attempt church next week so we will see how it goes.

Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine's Day everyone!  What a great day to celebrate with the ones you love.  Since Logan is only 2 weeks old and we are still adjusting to having 3 little ones, we didn't plan anything real extravagant.  OK we didn't really plan anything. Ha Ha.

 

We did get a few cute pictures of the kids in their Valentine clothes.  We also did a few of our Valentine's Day traditions.  First, a couple days before Valentine's Day we had a blast making heart shaped cookies as a family.  I found a new sugar cookie recipe on Pinterest that claimed to be as good as the Grandma's Lofthouse Pink Cookies.  I had to try it out. 

Colby and Emily helped me roll out the dough so we could make the cookies.  They love using their rolling pins whenever they can.  After all of the cookies had cooked, Russell and Emily decorated all of the cookies with colorful sprinkles and conversation hearts.  The cookies all turned out really cute.  As for the claim to be as good as the Grandma cookies, well they were really good cookies but I don't think anything can compare to the goodness of Grandma cookies!  But the recipe is worth keeping and I will most likely use it again for Colby's birthday.  We delivered our cookies to our family on the 13th.  We delivered them a day early because we always seem to run out of time on the actual day and then we never get the cookies delivered so we end up with a ton of cookies left over.

Then on Valentine's Day, Russell made us our traditional heart-shaped pancakes and eggs.  They were very good!  We also made some fun Valentines for Emily to give out to all of her friends in her pre-school and primary classes.

We used tootsie pops to make butterfly Valentine's for the girls and Superhero Valentine's for the boys.  They tuned out really cute.  We had some left over so Colby gave one to Emily and Emily gave one to Colby.  They loved getting Valentine's from each other.  Later that day, we went for a walk around the neighborhood to deliver Emily's Valentine's to her friends.  This was  the first time Logan and I had really been out of the house except for doctors appointments or to go to my parents' house.  It was so nice to get out and walk again!

That night, my mom and dad and the Hughes' came over to deliver Valentine's to us.  Emily loved having Grandma read her a princess story while they rocked Logan to sleep.  Thanks for all of the yummy Valentine's and happy Valentine's Day everyone!

First Week

Being a parent of three has actually not been as hard as I thought it would be.  Probably because Russell has been home all week helping me so I haven't had to be on my own yet.  I think another reason it hasn't been too bad is because Emily and Colby have each other to play with and entertain themselves while I am busy with the baby.  When I had Colby it was hard to transition from one to two because Emily still wanted me to entertain her and play with her instead on the baby.  But now she has a buddy and Colby likes to play whatever she is playing.

Also these two have been really fun with Logan.  They are big helpers maybe sometimes too much of a good helper.  Emily always wants to be around Logan and has even learned how to softly put his Binky back in his mouth to help when he is crying.  Here are some fun pictures of Logan's first week.

 Logan does a lot of sleeping!  He still sleeps most of the day waking every 2 hours to eat.  Night is pretty much the same.  The time he is most alert and awake is between 4 and 6 pm.  Then it is bed time at around 7:30 and he has his deep sleep until about 11. 

 I think the first week or so of a baby's life is the hardest.  First they go through the whole birth process, then they get shots and biliruben tests in the hospital.  Then because Logan's biliruben was a little low, he had to go back in a couple days later to the doctor to have it tested again, luckily this time it was okay.  Also during this doctor visit, we had Logan circumcised, which I know has got to be painful.  Logan took this procedure a lot better than Colby did though.  The doctor said it was probably because Logan was younger than Colby.  Logan was 4 days old and because Colby was in the NICU for a few days, he didn't get circumcised until he was 2 weeks old.  In all though Logan has been okay with everything and is a great baby.

 Here are some more pictures of these three cute kids.  Emily and Colby sure do love their little brother.  Whenever Logan cries Colby runs and tells me "Our baby is crying!"  I love how he says "Baby brother Loden."  He also asks me all the time if he can hold baby brother.  Emily also loves to hold Logan and help me give him a bath.  She also loves to give him kisses and hugs (sometimes too many).

 I love how alert Logan is in these pictures.  And I even caught a little smile!  Logan is already growing too fast too!  He was born at 7 lbs 12 oz, when we left the hospital he had lost a little weight and was 7 lbs 5 oz.  Then two days later when we took him to the doctor he weighed right around 8 lbs!  So already be has regained his birth weight and then some and he had grow an inch too!  I can't believe how fast babies grow.

Polar Plunge

On Feb 8, Russell participated in the St. George 2013 Polar Plunge to benefit the Special Olympics.  He participated with a bunch of guys from the Fire Department.  The weather was really bad that day; it was only about 39 degrees outside the water and it was raining and even snowing at one point.  Perfect time to jump into a pool of freezing water right!  Here's Russell to tell you all about his foolishness!

I was sitting at home one night when I got a text from Eric Dansie asking me if I wanted to do the Polar Plunge with the Fire Department. At first I was like "heck no that is crazy." He kept texting me funny emails and how fun it would be, so I took the plunge and said I would be there. I was excited at first then Tiffany said, "If you get sick you get to stay at you mom's house." So I wussed out a little and told her that I would just take pictures and watch. Boy was I in for a big surprise when I got there that morning. I got done working out that morning and started to drive over to the pool and it started to snow. I thought there is definitely no way I am getting in that water now. As you can tell from the pictures above, I got to the pool and saw Nick and he had on a pair of Turn out pants. I was like that is an awesome idea. He then proceeded to tell me that we are all wearing them when we jump into the pool. Oh boy I thought, I have no choice but to jump in now. If I did not jump in I would be the laughing stock of the Fire department, so I grabbed a pair of turnouts and put them on.

The idea that the guys had as you can see from the picture above, was to put on our pants and take off our shirts and dive in that way. As we waited to jump in we took some fun pictures with all of us and a lot of people were way excited to see that we were jumping in topless. Did I forget to tell you it was cold outside and the cold wind that blew by did not help either. Eric also bought little fire hats to wear when we jumped in the pool. To make the pool even colder, they dumped in a lot of crushed ice.

  

Here were are getting ready to jump in the water and  lining up to swim across the pool. Capt. Nelson said one, two, three and one after the other we dived into the water. As I jumped in and hit the water I thought holy $&;%#$ it is cold! As I was swimming I was pushing ice out of the way. I have never swam so fast in my life to get to the other side of the pool. Here we are at the end and Capt Hafen is the last one to get out. He was doing back strokes to the other end of the pool. Needless to say I was glad that I was able to do it and jump in to help raise money. We all had a blast.                                                           

Logan Lee Farnsworth

Welcome to our family, Logan!!  Logan Lee Farnsworth was born Friday, February 1, 2013 at 7:10 pm.  He weighed 7 lbs 12 oz and was 20.5 inches long.  He is a perfect little baby with all 10 fingers and 10 toes and a full head of thick long black hair!

Here is my final belly picture before delivery:

 And here is the beautiful baby that was in there after delivery.

And here is the story:  After going over my due date, I was scheduled to be induced on February 1.  We got up that morning and got ready to go to the hospital.  I expected the hospital to call us at around 10 in the morning like they did with Colby so we were ready to go by then.  While waiting for the call, we did our normal Friday routine of taking Emily to preschool.  We decided to walk to preschool today in hopes of getting the labor started.  Russell and I even took the long way home for more miles.  Then we walked back to pick Emily up from preschool.  This walking didn't really seem to do anything so we sat at home and waited.  Oh and we ate dinner at Costa Vida the night before because I heard that spicy food is supposed to start labor too.  Well it didn't but the food was good!  After lunch, I was getting really anxious and was getting tired of sitting around the house just staring at the wall and waiting so I decided we needed to go do something outside.  We decided to go shopping or at least wander around the store for a while.  Finally, at around 2 o'clock I got a call from the hospital telling me to come in.  Russell and I dropped Emily and Colby off at my parents' house and told them we were going to the hospital to have the baby.  We told them the next time they see us we will have a new brother.  They were really excited but mostly excited to be playing at Grandma's.

We arrived at the hospital and got all of the paperwork and IV's and everything in order to start the pitocin and by this time it was 3:30.  Before they started the pitocin, the nurse monitored my contractions and said they were actually real contractions that were happening every three to five minutes.  So they started the pitocin just to keep the contractions going and help them progress.  When we started, I was dilated to a 3 and about 60% thinned. 

Dr. Astle came in and broke my water a little while later and that is went the contractions really started.  He said it was hard to decide whether to break my water now or wait a little while because we never know how fast a persons body will progress.  Because I tested positive for Group B Strep, I needed to have the antibiotic on board for at least 4 hours before delivery to insure that the baby would be fine but at the same time, if they didn't break my water I wouldn't progress much at all.  Since my shortest labor was 7 or so hours we decided to break my water now.  Like I said that is when the contractions really started.  I was really OK with the pain for quite a while.  I didn't want an epidural so I was really trying to focus on other things than the pain.  During each contraction, the baby's heart rate would drop a little and then come back up when it was over.  The nurse said this was a squeeze on the umbilical cord.  She said we don't get to concerned about it unless it continues and mine continued.  We kept trying to adjust to different positions to try and get the baby to move and the cord to move but nothing seemed to help.  The nurse decided to check me to see if there was a prolapsed cord which meant instant c-section.  Luckily she did not feel a cord so we were okay but while she was checking me, the prob they use to monitor the baby's heartbeat came off of the baby's head so she had to place a new one.  Yeah that was not the most pleasant experience.  She did say that the baby was faced up instead of down which could be part of the problem. 

At 6:30, after Dr. Astle closed up his clinic, he came up and checked on me again.  By this time he said I was about a 5-6 so I still had a little while.  He told me he was running over to the other hospital to check on a patient then he would get something to eat and come back and we would have the baby by 8 or 9 that night.  After he left, I got up to go to the bathroom and by the time I got back to the bed the contractions were so hard I could hardly make it to the bed.  They had me knee down while Russell applied pressure to the pressure points on my hips and that seemed to help a little.  But I really felt like I needed to push.  By this time the contractions were really effecting the heartbeat of the baby so the on call doctor, Dr Dickens, came in to insert a prob of some kind that adds more fluid in to the uterus in hopes of relieving some pressure off of the cord and baby.  At a little before 7 o'clock when she went to insert it, she said I'm not inserting this because she is at a 9 and fully effaced and this baby is coming quickly!  I had gone from a 5 to a 9 in less than a half hour!  No wonder the contractions were so hard all the sudden.  The nurse thought that when I got up to go to the bathroom, the baby adjusted to the proper position and decided yeah it was time to come.  The nurses hurried and called Dr Astle to get back here and luckily he wasn't too far away.  Even though it felt like an eternity before he arrived because I was having contractions one after another and feeling like pushing the whole time, it really only took the doctor about 10 minutes to get there.  By this time all of the delivery carts and baby carts, and nurses were in the room just waiting for the doctor. I really wanted to say to the on call doctor to just deliver the baby but I was relieved when I saw Dr. Astle walk in the room.   As I was pushing, the doctor noticed that the heart rate was still being effected by the contractions and pushing so he knew the cord was around the baby's neck.  So we had to use the vacuum suction with this baby too like they had to with the other two.  After pushing a few more times with the suction, the doctor placed the most wonderful baby on my chest and I couldn't help but feel so happy to finally have him here.  I was worried a little bit though because Logan was born only after being in labor for 3 and a half hours (that has to be some kind of record) so I hadn't had the antibiotic on board for the full 4 hours.  I was worried that the baby would get sick or go to the NICU like Colby.  Dr. Astle said they would monitor the baby for 48 hours and see but he thought it was close enough to the 4 hour mark that everything would be okay.  I was relieved at that. 

Logan was born at 7:10 pm weighing 7 lbs 12 oz.  We all laugh when we heard the weight and said we should have held out for two more minutes so he could have weighed the same as his time of birth!  He is the cutest baby ever and the first thing I noticed was all of his long dark hair!  I love babies with lots of hair.  Colby and Logan have both had a lot of hair and poor Emily only had a little peach fuzz.  Shouldn't it be the other way around; shouldn't the girls have the hair? 

After getting me and Logan cleaned up, we had a few little visitors:

Emily and Colby were really excited to meet their new little brother.  I was happy that they were able to come to the hospital and see us because when Colby was born, they wouldn't let anyone under 14 in to see even if it was a sibling.  This time though the nurses said they could definitely come see.  When Emily walked into the room she say the baby and had the biggest smile on her face.  Colby on the other hand was not so excited.  He walked in and had a really confused look on his face.  First he looked at me with all of the tubes and IV's in me (not to mention I looked like death), then he looked at the baby was like what is that, what has happened, what is going on, and what is wrong with my mom.  Then Lacie lifted him up on my bed and he realized I was okay so he was okay.  Colby didn't say much while he was there but finally before they left, he did point to Logan and say "Cute baby."  It was so funny.  Emily loved Logan from first site.  She held him and kissed his head and just loved on him.

Here is our first family picture with all five of us!  We still cannot decide who Logan looks like.  Emily looked a lot like my side of the family, Colby was a definite Farnsworth from day one and still is. But Logan really has his own look.  At first he looked like Colby with Emily's chin but he has changed a lot even in the few days he has been here.  Russell says he looks more like me. 

After the kids left, we went up to our room on the Mom & Baby floor where we spent the next two nights.  The first day Logan did not want to eat at all.  He just wanted to sleep.  He wouldn't even root or suck on a finger.  I was really worried about it but the nurses and the lactation specialist said that sometimes babies act like this for the first 24-48 hours and then they start eating.  He would eat a little and we also tried to get him to eat by supplementing a little formula. We decided to check his blood sugar to see if he was okay and the blood can back just fine.  The lactation lady told us that sometimes babies act this way after a hard delivery because they hurt.  Their heads hurt and they just want to sleep and rest and try to get rid of their headache.  Then once their head stops hurting, they eat just fine.  She suggested doing Skin to skin contact and that usually wakes them up and makes them feel better.  I did this for most of the first day and it seemed to work.  By that second night, Logan was eating much better and all day Sunday he ate every two hours.  I was so relieved to know he was finally eating well. 

Sunday Grandma and Grandpa Farnsworth and Uncle Tyler came to visit us.  Grandma had a great time holding Logan but Grandpa and Tyler said he was still too small to hold!  We also had some visitors Saturday night.  A couple guys from the Fire Department came and saw us.  I thought it was really awesome that Capt Nelson and Dansy came and saw us.

Our family doctor, Dr. Pendleton came and check on Logan Sunday afternoon when he was close to 48 hours old. The doctor said Logan looked great, the Group B Strep hadn't seemed to bother him, and we were okay to go home. 

Here are a few fun pictures we took while in the hospital.  I love the last one with the sign that says "Cutest Baby in the Nursery."  He definitely was.  Don't you just love all of that hair?  He has more hair than his dad! hee hee!

And here we are getting ready to go home!  Finally!!  I found these way cute Fire Fighter clothes and had to buy them.  The little bib says "Future Fire Fighter". (Like Dad!).  I was so glad to be going home because those hospital beds are sooooo uncomfortable.  I used to curse our bed at home for being too hard but when we got home and I laid down on our bed it felt like I was lying down on a cloud!  It was so comfortable compared to those darn hospital beds.  I love my bed now and I will never say I hate it again.

Anyway after we left the hospital we went over to my parents' house to pick up Emily and Colby.  They were so happy to see us and to see their new brother again. 

Here are three of the cutest kids ever!!!  They are such good kids and I don't know what I would do without them.  They truly are my reason for living and the light of my life.  I love them so much.

Welcome to our family, Logan; we are so excited to have you in our family.