4 Weeks

Despite my fears that my second baby would have colic, that Jackson would be a mess with an addition to the family, I would be too busy to enjoy little Drew, and that I would be too tired function the Lord has again blessed me and put me at ease.

I couldn't have asked for a better 4 weeks. It has of course flown by, but I have truly enjoyed the first month of life with 2 boys. After my mom left the first week we had about a week and half and then Adam's parents Larry and Wendy and his younger sister Lauren came. We only got to enjoy Larry and Lauren for the weekend, but it was honestly a blast! We got to celebrate Lauren's 20th Birthday, Bless Drew at church, and enjoy Valentines Day. Wendy was able to stay for week and leaves Friday evening, we will be so so so sad to her go! It was neat to see how quickly Jackson bonded with them and knew who they were from skyping and pictures. We sure feel blessed to have two sets of loving and supportive grandparents for our boys.

Drew is such a wonderful baby! I have decided the best word for him is patient. He is slow to cry, and slow to get upset. He only cries when changing his diaper and his clothes. He is a very loud sleeper and makes lots of sighs and grunts and he is sleeping. I have a tough time getting burps out of him and he seems to get a lot of gas in his little stomach. He is a great eater and seems to fill himself up each time he eats. The only hard part for me is feeding him is quite the process. When he is hungry he eats on one side and takes in a fair amount of air and as he eats if he feels like he needs to burp, pass gas, or work on a diaper he refuses to latch on and continue eating until that is taken care of. When he is finished taking care of business he will continue eating on one side and sometimes fall asleep. It's then time to change his diaper and then he will eat again on the other side. Then I usually have to burp him for a while, try to help him work out some gas before swaddling him and putting him back to bed.

He has for the most part been wonderful about going right back to sleep after feedings during the night. The tricky part is getting him to go down for the night. It turns out he is continuing in the Reynolds tradition of staying up late and sleeping in. He has been going down around midnight or one and then sleeping in till about 8:30. He gets uncomfortable and fussy starting at around 10pm and has a hard time settling down and getting his bubbles out to fall asleep. Lucky for me I have had Wendy the past week and she has taken the night shift and I've been able to get a couple hours of sleep in before the 2:00 feeding.

It seems like a light switch has been turned on and the past couple of days he has been come more alert and is staying awake for longer periods of time. When he is awake is very calm and mello. He loves loves loves to be held and cuddled especially when it is time for him to go to sleep. He sleeps like a champ as long as he is sleeping on someone's chest. Since coming from the hospital he consistently sleeps at night for 2 -21/2 hour stretches. During the day he will also go 2-3 hours at a time. At his 2 week appointment I was floored when he weighed 7lbs. 11oz. Although I have to admit I knew his face was filling out and he was changing.

I have truly loved that I have been able to hold him and cuddle him so much this first month. Between the help of my mom, mother in law, friends, and an amazing husband I've been able to give Drew a lot of love and time and Jackson still hasn't even noticed. Jackson has adjusted better than I ever could have dreamed! When Drew is gone he says "I 'ant Drew". In the morning he runs to go find where he is "hiding" in the blankets in the bassinet. He enjoys trying to give Drew a Tigger, binki's, and a toy here and there.

Sunday was a great day! Adam had the opportunity to give Drew a name and baby blessing. Drew was blessed to have his dad, 2 grandpas, 3 uncles, and Brother Drew Millar and Bishop Tom Blodgett in the priesthood circle. Drew looked extremely handsome in his little suit and Jackson didn't look to shabby either in his matching tie. I LOVE having two boys!

After church the whole Reynolds crew gathered together along with my parents for an early dinner to celebrate Drew's blessing and Laruen's birthday. Then we all went to Jon and Angela's house for dessert with the whole Bylund crew. It was a great day!

Lauren's 20th birthday was on Sunday, so we went to Outback for dinner on Saturday night and then did presents and dessert on Sunday afternoon.

Grandy, Papa, and Lauren took Jackson to McDonald's! Lauren is definitely in the running for favorite aunt since she crawled all through the place place and went down the slides with Jackson!

One of the funny Jackson trademarks is when he falls or gets hurt, he suddenly freezes and stays paralyzed for a minute and doesn't make a sound. Then after 20 seconds or so, he'll start to whimper and sometimes will start to get up. He is so funny how he just freezes in place. This is a picture of him doing it when he came down the slide. I think he must have fallen backwards and hit his head and then he just layed there frozen.

Jackson loves the mechanical horse at Kroger! If you know Jackson, you know how much he loves his dad, well Adam had just gotten home one evening and Grandy was headed to Kroger--the horse trumped daddy!

Drew got his first bath! Drew hated getting undressed and dressed, and as long as we weren't bugging him, he enjoyed sitting in the warm water and was content.

Jackson loved helping...he already had a bath that night, but practically got another one with as wet as he got! He thought it was really fun to help!

1 Week

Main Event

So it turns out something really big has to happen in order for me to blog it. Christmas wasn't a big enough deal evidently, but the birth of sweet baby Andrew Lawrence Reynolds can't be swept aside!

Wednesday night, January 20th, Adam came home from school and we were both completely exhausted! We decided to put dinner on hold, put Finding Nemo on for Jackson to watch a lay down and rest for a minutes. I stayed downstairs and fell asleep on the couch for about 45 minutes. It felt great. Little did I know that 45 minutes would have to last me until Thursday night.

Adam went to Young Men's and I stayed home with Jackson and Josh and Jenna came over to hang out for a while. I put Jackson to bed a little before nine and Adam got home shortly after. We decided since we had a little rest earlier in the evening we could finish watching a movie we had started a couple of nights before. I had a few contractions here and there, but nothing out of the ordinary. We finished and turned off the lights around 11:30. I made the comment, "I sure hope these contractions slow down." And Adam made the comment "Well if you'd just have the baby you could sleep a lot better."

We both fell asleep, but I was in and as contractions would wake me up. By 12:30 I was wide awake and decided I should get up and pay attention to find out how close the contractions were coming. I went downstairs and started timing them. They started at about 5 to 6 minutes apart and maintained 5 minute intervals for over an hour. I decided that maybe if I took a hot shower I could get them to stop. No luck. By 2:00 they were starting to get more painful and realized I was probably in denial and that I really was in labor. I was trying to hold out as long as possible so if we were going to the hospital they wouldn't send me home. I woke Adam up at 2:30 and said "I think tonight is the night. I think we are going to the hospital." He said "Really?" and I said yes, I've been timing them for 2 1/2 hours and they are 4 or 5 minutes apart. At 3:00 he was packing my bag because it was hurting too much for me to really stand up and walk around. We called Josh at about 3:30 and had him come over to sleep on our couch and stay with Jackson. We got the hospital and I was really hurting and having a hard time breathing during the contractions.

Triage took their sweet little time with getting me taken care of. When they measured me I was dialated to a 6 or 7. They admitted me at 4:30am and I called my mom to have her drive down and relieve Josh in time for him to get to school. They asked if I wanted an epideral and I didn't hesitate a second. They said okay they would get it going... not until 5:30 did they get the epideral in and by then I was dilated to an 8! The Dr. said he could break my water and we could get going and have the baby soon. By this time I was so tired from the pain and lack of sleep I told him I really needed like 15 minutes to just rest without anyone touching me and try to relax so I could get some strength and energy to push. I had no idea where the energy was going to come from but I was just too tired to think about pushing a baby out right then. The nurse kept bugging me for another 15 minutes and when the Dr. came back I told him I still wasn't ready. at 6:30 I told the nurse I was ready for the Dr. to come back and break my water. I had a feeling as soon as my water was broken, I would need to be ready to go. I was fearful of being able to do it knowing last time I had to push for 2 hours. I wondered if I'd really be able to do it or if I would have to give up and have a c-section.

I was at a 9 when my water was broken. 1o+ minutes later, I told the nurse there was a lot of pressure and I really felt like I needed to push. She told me she didn't want to have me start pushing too early and said okay and putts around for another couple of contractions as I felt like the baby was falling out. She finally went and told someone I needed to be checked. The resident Dr. checked me, said I was ready. I was barely able to roll from side to my back to get into the stirrups. The attending Dr. didn't make. I made about 5-8 ten second pushes and our sweet little boy was born.

We feel so blessed to have another baby arrive safely to our family.

In the beginning... 6 lbs 15 oz. 19 1/4in

Proud parents of two darling boys! These were all taken the day Drew was born.

It is fun for me to have so much family nearby to come and visit me. Angela and her three girls all came by but I neglected to get a picture--it was a near miracle that they let Drew's three cousins in since visiting restrictions have been so high due to flu season and N1H1. Jason dropped by after his surgeries both days I was there. We also had a couple of friends from church come by which was also very nice and thoughtful.

On Friday, the day I headed home, Jackson was ready to try holding Drew. It went as well as could be expected.



I was anxious to come home after being in labor all night Wednesday night and sleeping in the hospital bed Thursday night. They told me I would be discharged Saturday morning (which was basically just like Jackson's deliver I was admitted Wed. night had him Thursday and stayed till Saturday. With Jackson thought I hardly got out of bed the whole time I was at the hospital I was so swollen and uncomfortable and in pain). With Drew's deliver though I felt so good on Friday that after I showered, dryed my hair and had make-up on I was ready to head home. I asked the nurse if I could head out Friday evening instead of Saturday morning. The pediatrician cleared Drew and the chief resident of OB cleared me to leave by 7:00pm which was 36 hours from the time I delivered.

Not long after being home, Bishop Blodgett and his wife stopped by to share a congratulations, meet sweet Drew, and take our picture for the program on Sunday.

To help with the "excitement" and transition for Jackson I bought matching sleepers for them to wear to bed. He was most excited about matching and knew he had one just like "baby's". As part of my coming home surprise Adam went out and bought a new chair for Jackson's room. I had been searching Craig's list and other sites all week trying to find a chair for his room for reading since we moved the recliner to Drew's room.

I was thrilled to wake up in my own bed on Saturday morning especially since it was my 27th Birthday!! It was a pretty low key day and I completely enjoyed it. I slept in Saturday morning thanks to mom taking care of the boys after Drew's 6:00 am feeding. Mom had bought a huge collection of GeoTrax trains at a yard sale last summer and kept them for Jackson for when Drew arrived so he would have something new to distract him. It totally worked for him and Adam! The boys played for a long time with the trains, and when Jackson went down for a nap Adam spent another 2 hours making a whole new track.
Adam did a great job with birthday presents this year. I got a new ipod docking station with speakers so I can listen to music downstairs, an ipod gift certificate and new earphones (I guess he is hoping I hit the track again and exercise with my ipod:)). He and I went out Saturday night to a few stores because he wanted my input on my last brithday present, and ottoman storage bench. It is perfect for our living room and does a great job of storing a bunch of Jackson's toys.

My mom was incredible during her week stay with us after I returned home from the hospital. Even though she only lives an hour away, I cried after she left out of pure gratitude and love for her. She did so much to help me and our little family during the week. I can't thank her enough for her help and sacrifice.

She did it all. She cleaned my nasty stove/oven/microwave and bathroom. She did our laundry (multiple loads a day it seemed), she played with Jackson, she took the early morning shift with Drew, she took us to McDonald's, she helped get their pictures taken, she sewed Drew's nursery curtains, bed skirt, basket liners, mobile cover, and quilt, hemmed Adam's pants, read to Jackson for hours, fixed my living room curtains, fixed and cleaned up our meals and a host of other things that I will forever be grateful for.

Jackson's first time wanting to hold Drew.

Yes, it was me that put my sweet baby of only a few days old in Jackson's play dump truck. I have pictures of me as a tiny baby in a doll stroller, so I figure we can put Drew in a dump truck:) I just hope Jackson doesn't get any ideas...

Drew's classic "O" face.

When Adam came home from church Sunday there were 4 or 5 emergency vehicles at our townhouse complex. There was a small fire in one of the townhomes and Jackson thought he had struck gold when Adam took him in the rain to look at the fire trucks and ambulances. I hope my boys realize at an early age what a great dad they have!

We got our biggest snow so far this year one day last week. Although Jackson isn't big into sledding yet, he does like to walk around and point and say snows. Adam used our dust pan to shovel a path to our gate since we don't have a snow shovel:) And Jackson used a spackle thing since we couldn't find our garden shovel. Gotta love the student budget.