we're sick

I had to post a better picture of Hayden. His last one was sad with his goopy eyes. His eyes got better after that picture, but then they are actually getting goopy again today. ugh. Its like a 4 days cycle with his eyes. 

Anyways, we have all been sick lately. It all started with Davis getting sick, then Gavin and I got colds. Then Hayden got sick. And then I got another cold. All in the span of 2 weeks. oh joy. But Hayden is still pretty sick. He got bronchitis and is having a hard time breathing, sleeping, and eating. The doctor said it will be another week before he gets better. If he doesn't start breathing better, he'll have to be put on a nebulizer.

So here's to our very Merry {sick} Christmas at home in bed!

Hayden 2 months old

Ok, I think this is my last post for today. Again, sorry for spamming you with a billion posts today!

 Here's Hayden at 2 months. He weighed 10 lbs 5 oz and was 22" long. He's in the 25% percentile on everything- weight, height, and head. So he's a very proportionate little boy! His tear ducts keep getting clogged so that's why his eyes are red. They clear up and then get clogged again a few days later. He's finally getting hair on the top of his head. It's a bunch of peach fuzz. We think he's going to be blonde to go with those gorgeous blue eyes.

 Look at that cute belly! The doctor thinks he's going to be slender like Gavin since he carries his weight in his belly and face.

Hayden is pretty good about tummy time. He can lift his head slightly and smiles and coos a lot. He can track a little too with his eyes. He seems to get cuter and cuter every day! Now that he's not as fussy, Davis and I both at different times have made that comment that he is a lot cuter now. A screaming baby just isn't as cute as a happy one! haha So glad he's getting over that phase. He usually sleeps 3-4 hours at a time at night and eats about every 3 hours during the day.

We love having Hayden! It was a huge adjustment going from 1 to 2 kids, but we're figuring it out and it's fun. Can't wait for warmer weather when I can take the boys to the park again. {we woke up to 2 inches of snow this morning. ahhh!}

my silly 2 year old

Gavin is full of personality. He loves people and will talk your ear off! After nursery a couple weeks ago, the nursery leader asked me if Gavin talks my ear off all day....He does. and apparently he talked their ears off too! Gavin loves getting into mischief and is always finding a way to make a mess. He absolutely loves playing in water. He drags my measuring cups up the stairs to our master bath, climbs on the toilet and then proceeds to play in the water. He could do that for hours! {in the picture, he only has a wash cloth. I must have confiscated the measuring cups this time}

One morning Gavin insisted on having sprinkles on his eggs. I caved and let him. He loved it.

We gave Gavin some orange in a real cup... he loved "washing" his hair with it. 

Gavin's is starting off the terrible two's with a bang! So much energy and mischief. He loves jumping up and down and seems to bounce instead of walk.

Thanksgiving 2010

 This was my little turkey this year! I love this pic. It's like I caught him red handed eating pumpkin pie or something lol

 This is his cute Thanksgiving day outfit one of Davis's co-workers gave him. It was really cute!

 Look at those chubby cheeks! Hayden is a little porker. He started small, but he sure is making up for that!

 Cute lil turkey butt :)

This is Gavin on Thanksgiving. Another cute sweater form Oma.

We had Thanksgiving dinner with Jimmy and Amanda at Amanda's mom's house. It was really yummy! It was a southern style Thanksgiving dinner with brussel sprouts and pecan pie. YUM! We really enjoyed spending Thanksgiving with her kind family. Her grandma enjoyed holding Hayden. 

Hayden got this worst bout of gas from thanksgiving dinner that night. He screamed for hours. ugh. At least it made it a memorable night. haha.

Gavin's 2nd birthday

Gavin turned 2 on Nov. 17. This is one of the adorable outfits that Oma bought him for his b-day.

  We had a small family party with cupcakes and had planned on making a cake and inviting friends over, but it didn't happen. Something about having a newborn around makes tasks take 5 times longer to get done! lol

 Gavin was so fascinated by the "fires". He still asks for "fires" to this day and any cupcake he eats must have fires in it! Silly boy.

 about to blow out his candles.

I think he got one out by himself, but he couldn't get the second without help.

For his birthday, Gavin got new pediped shoes and PJ's.

Hayden's blessing

 Hayden was blessed by Davis on Nov. 14, 2010 while Davis's parents were in town. It was a nice blessing and Hayden was good during it. This is his cute blessing outfit from Oma. He looked really good in it!

In the circle were Bishop Vioro, Bro. Janson, Bro, Stockwell, Steve Hayward, and Tyler Barrus.

Hayden 1 month old

I am so far behind on blogging on here! So I'm going to blast everyone with a bajillions posts to get caught up. sorry!

Here is my sweet baby boy, Hayden at 1 month old. He weighed 7 lbs 13 oz and was 20.25 inches long. Hayden seems a lot stronger than Gavin was at this age.

Right around 5 weeks old, Hayden decided he'd had enough of being a happy baby and became a very fussy, needy baby. But things are getting better now. I kinda stopped blogging on here when he became fussy. Whenever he was a wake, he was screaming. It was terrible. I've adjusted my diet and we use gas drops regularly, so things are a tons better now.

My boys!

Gavin is a really good big brother. He is very interested in Hayden and gives him kisses all the time. But he has had to adjust. We've had a couple fun meltdowns. But he's done pretty good.

Happy Birthday, Gavin!

Crazy to think that 2 years ago today you were born. We love you so much! You never stop talking and always make us laugh! You love fruit snacks, going to the park, feeding the ducks, reading books {for hours}, Elmo, "washing your hands" aka playing in the water in the bathroom sink, taking baths, going for walks, playing in the leaves, giving Hayden kisses and high 5's, helping burp Hayden, and pointing out things to us. 

For your birthday, you got new Pediped shoes, PJ's, and we're going to shop for a pull toy this weekend.

Hayden's birth announcements

Here's a preview to Hayden's birth announcements. I am getting $25 GC from Shutterfly to post this here, so why not? :) 

Andante Dots Cerulean Baby Announcements

Customize your own baby announcement at Shutterfly.

View the entire collection of cards.

Hayden's newborn pics

 

Here's some pics I took of Hayden when he was almost 2 weeks old. We had paid a photographer to take some of him, but I was very disappointed in his lack of skill and blurry shots. So I decided my amatuer skills could do better than him and we made a homemade studio with lighting from Home Depot. And it worked out pretty good! I'll be posting about the studio we made on my craft blog soon.

I crocheted his diaper cover. Isn't it cute?

 There's nothing more peaceful than a newborn sleeping.

  Love a good gas grin!

 Hayden is a pretty good baby. He has 2 cry spells a day: after lunch and right before bed. Hoping those go away soon, but other than that, he's really sweet and easy going.

 Gavin calls Hayden his baby "brodder" and gives him tons of kisses and high 5's. It's been interesting having 2 kids, but we're adjusting pretty well. Everything with the second baby has been easier, I've been surprised. But we are definitely looking forward to the day Hayden sleeps through the night! Right now he wakes up every 3-4 hours. Sometimes every 2 hours.

Hayden Davis Gardner

We got 2 surprises last Sunday....having a baby 3 weeks early AND finding out the baby's gender! We welcomed baby Hayden on October 10, 2010 at 3:28am. He weighed 5 lbs 9 oz and was 19" long. Here's a few pictures.

 The "right after birth" picture is like a rite of passage. But you have to take it! This is right after birth at like 4am so please excuse the ugliness.

Our sweet little man. He is a very sweet baby.

Gavin meeting his little brother for the first time later that morning.

Gavin loves to point out Hayden's eyes, nose, head, etc.

Hayden had jaundice and so he was a "Blue Man" with sunglasses for a day.

Gavin thought his sunglasses were SO cool and had fun playing with them too.

Keeping Gavin entertained at the hospital was the hardest part. And then we had to stay a little longer in the hospital than normal, so the poor guy was bored out of his mind.

This is our sweet little man. He lost 10% of his body weight at the hospital and had issues with jaundice so that's why we were there longer. But he's healthy and thriving now.

 

My 3 boys. Love this picture!

Hayden's story
Let's see, I was dilated to 1 cm at 35 weeks, 2 cm at 36 weeks, and 3 cm on Friday Oct. 8 (almost 37 weeks). My doctor, Dr. Wiles told me I may not make it to my next appointment and that he was on call that weekend. We were a little surprised because we had thought Gavin had come early because of all the stress I had in my life then. It never really occured to us that baby #2 could come early as well.

The next day, Saturday, we had a wedding up in DC for one of Davis's classmates. We went, but left a little early. We stopped by to see our friends, Becca and Cory and meet their newest addition, Emma. We didn't stay long because I wasn't feeling very good. On the way home, we timed my contractions. They were 7-10 minutes apart, but then they'd slow down. We got home and put Gavin to bed and we continued to time my contractions. They were getting harder, but still weren't really consistent. I cleaned the house, shaved my legs, and finished a craft trying to get my mind off the contractions. Finally at 11:30pm we decided they weren't regular enough and we were really tired. So we thought they'd stop if we went to sleep.

Well, about 12:15am, my water broke. In bed. ugh. I had just decided I was not having a baby that night! I told Davis my water broke and he jumped out of bed faster than I've ever seen. *note, my pants absorbed all the fluid fortunately.* We called our friend Amanda who we'd previously asked to be "on-call" in case this happened. We then called Dr. Wiles and headed to the hospital. I was admitted and told I was at 5cm. I asked for an epidural after I'd gotten my IV and checked in, but they told me it would be 30 minutes before I got one. When I arrived, the contractions were do-able. 15 minutes into the 30 minutes, I was dying. Finally 1 hour later at 2:00am I got my epidural. At that point, I was at 7 cm and contracting every 2 minutes and very miserable. I got the epidural, they let me sleep for a little bit. *note: my epidural worked on both sides this time. yay!* Then the nurses came in with Dr. Wiles on their heels and I was ready to push. 3 pushes later at 3:28am baby #2 was born and pronounced a boy!

We had a boy name prepared, but when the nurse said the name right after he was born, it just didn't sound right. That wasn't his name. So in the hospital, Davis and I went over names and decided on Hayden. A name we hadn't really considered before. But we liked it and it fit him. And we changed the spelling twice. Talk about indecisive!

Hayden's birth was so different from Gavin's. It was so much better and faster. The only thing I would have changed was getting that epidural sooner, but that was out of my control. Davis got 2 weeks off from work and its been nice spending all this time together as a family of 4.

pumpkins!

We went as a family to Chesterfield Berry Farm last Saturday because they had a free admissions event going on. So the 3 of us go in for free. yay! {normally it is $12/person} Here's our pics from our fun outing.

 Racing rubber ducks. 

{ok, so none of the other kids there wanted to race against Davis}

 Gavin riding in the awesome wagon we bought at the Brandermill consignment sale that morning. Killer find!!

 Shooting corn.

 They had some animals for the kids to pet and feed. Gavin liked the bunny rabbits the best.

 Gavin had his first taste of soda. He loved it! and spilled it all over himself as you can see.

 Playing in the corn pit. I still keep finding corn in clothes!

 They had delish BBQ and pumpkin shakes. YUM!

 They had a tractor ride out to the pumpkin field. They had a special for $20 for any 5 pumpkins. So we got 2 ginormous pumpkins and 3 smaller ones. Poor Davis had to lug those things back to the car. When we got home, Davis weighed them and they weighed 75 pounds each!!

 My favorite picture of the day!!

We bought Gavin a slide on Craig's list. Thank goodness for Craig's list! New slides can be like $150. We bought this one for $30.

 He absolutely loves it!

 It has a slide and a wheel. What more could a little boy ask for?

So I realized I haven't been recording much about the pregnancy lately. Everything is good. The baby is head down and very low. So yes, I am rather uncomfy right now. I'm dilated to 2 cm right now, 75% effaced. Which is normal for this stage of pregnancy. It's been a bit harder to get prepared for this baby since we don't know the gender so I don't know what to buy. But if all else failed, if we have a girl, she just might have to wear a blue onesie once or twice! haha  I am really excited that we've gone the entire pregnancy without finding out. It's been hard. I hate surprises, so it is a real accomplishment for me! I am so excited to hear the doctor tell us what it is. That will be a great moment.

Anyways, we're pluggin along. Hope everyone is doing well!