Hungry baby...

Madelynn was really hungry the other day...but she tried to get her dinner from her dad. Not super effective, but soooooo funny!

Birth Announcement

Thanks to my wonderful friend Kayli for taking the pictures for Madelynn's birth announcement. I had a whole lot of fun putting it together in photoshop.

Madelynn Dawn Young

 On October 31st at 12:42 p.m. our sweet little baby girl was born after 36 hours of labor. She was 7 pounds 15 ounces, and 19 1/2 inches long. I can't believe she is a week old now. It has gone by fast, but it also feels like she has been a part of our lives forever. The love a parent can feel for a child amazes me. We love our little Madelynn sooooooo much. We also think she is just about the prettiest little girl in the whole wide world.

September and October Recap

The months of September and October felt like they crawled by incredibly slowly at the time, but in hindsight they flew right by. We started off the month of September with what we like to call our "Engagement Anniversary". McKay proposed to me on Memorial day on purpose, so that we could always have a day to celebrate in the years to come. So this Memorial day we celebrated 4 years by going up to Draper to go shopping for a new couch. We ended up finding the perfect one up at furniture row across from Ikea. Since it was memorial day weekend it was on sale, and it happened to perfectly match the rocker recliner we bought for the nursery a few weeks earlier. We planned on having lunch at Sweet Tomatoes in Salt Lake, but by the time we had purchased our couch it was only 10 in the morning and we were not hungry yet. So, we decided to head up to Snowbird and attend Octoberfest. I have never been to Octoberfest before, and we probably wouldn't have gone that day either, except for the fact that McKay's sisters and our niece were up there selling their amazing kettle corn and we wanted to visit them. After a few hours of experiencing octoberfest with our cute niece, we were ready to eat, and finished up our day by having dinner at sweet tomatoes instead of lunch. It was a good day.

On the 17th of September we had our baby shower. Kayli, Rachel and my mom were awesome at getting things put together and I think the shower was a success. There were sooooo many people there and we received a whole bunch of thoughtful gifts. Thank you everyone who was in attendance! It was a special day.

Now I am going to jump to October.

We enjoyed the fall colors by taking multiple canyon drives. We drove both the Alpine loop and the Nebo loop. We also went up Rock Canyon and took advantage of the gorgeous backdrop by taking a few maternity pictures.

On October 21st we celebrated McKay's birthday. My handsome husband is now 28 years old!

 It was kind of a funny day. I had fully expected to either have a baby or be in labor by the time McKay's birthday came around because I had started to dilate about 3 weeks before, so I got everything ready for his birthday weeks in advance. It was the most prepared I have ever been for his birthday! I had all of his presents pre-wrapped and stashed in various places around the apartment. We celebrated his birthday by going to a doctors appointment in the morning where they stripped my membranes to try and get me to go into labor. After that we did what we thought would be some last minute shopping for baby items, and then a really really long walk  to try and jump start my labor. That evening we had McKay's birthday dinner at Kohinoor, a really tasty Indian restaurant here in Orem. Surprisingly enough my entire family showed up and even liked the food (except Jonathan, he didn't like it). We were really worried about them not liking the food, but it ended up not being a problem. Later that evening we had birthday cake and ice cream at our apartment with our good friend Kaimii and some of McKay's family. I got extra fancy with McKay's cake this year. I decorated the entire cake with home made gummies. Anyone who knows McKay knows that gummy candies are his absolute favorite, and that he likes cowboy stuff. So I had fun making him home made gummy cowboy boots and a gun. Happy 28th birthday McKay!

On Sunday the 23rd we carved pumpkins with the Rogers family. We made some fun pumpkins, but never actually ended up putting candles in them...

Halloween was interesting this year. We had 3 Halloween parties to go to. Seeing as how my due date was October 29th I did not plan a costume, then when Friday the 28th rolled around and there were no signs of labor I decided I should find a costume to wear to the various parties the next day. I ended up being a hula girl because it fit, and McKay went with his classic cowboy attire. We went to the young family Halloween party at McKay's moms house on Friday and celebrated with the nieces and nephews. Little kids make Halloween so much more fun. On Saturday we started the evening at a party up in salt lake with McKay's co-workers and then made our way down to Provo to end the night at the Christensen's Halloween party. They were all a whole lot of fun. I was so glad that we got to celebrate Halloween with those parties, because just a few hours after we got home from the Christensen's party, we went into labor...and the results of that will be a whole different post.

I heart black

I know this post is random but while getting ready for the day I realized that from the from the front, the color black makes pregnant me look awesome! It camouflages my giant belly wonderfully from the front and the back. When I turn to the side there is no hope in hiding my giant belly, but while I was getting ready in the morning and viewing myself in the mirror, I felt good! I am going to have to pick up another black shirt or two so I can feel a little bit skinnier on those days that I feel like a pregnant whale. Thank you black, and all your size masking abilities!

July 2011

The month of July was very eventful for us. We celebrated the fourth of July with the traditional Provo early morning hot air balloons and then the stadium of fire. We also celebrated a bunch of family birthdays. My brother had his 18th birthday, our twin nieces had their 8th birthday, our nephew had his 5th birthday, and McKay's mom had a birthday in which she turned older. McKay's sisters came out to visit from Colorado and Illinois over the weekend that our twin nieces were baptized, so we got to spend a lot of time with the Young's.

Me and Jonathan on his 18th birthday

McKay's sister Cecily's family (we had just introduced them to Angry Birds)

I was lucky enough to go spend a day in Cedar City with my extended family and attend the Shakespearean festival and my cousin Rebecca's bridal shower. It was only one day, but it was a busy, family filled day.

The Miner Family in front of SUU

We were also lucky enough to have some of my old college roommates over for dinner and games before Keri moves to Indiana for grad school. We had fun eating, playing some intense games of pit and clue, and holding baby Adelle.

Mary, Keri and Me

Mary holding baby Adelle

During the month of July our baby also got bigger and in turn I got a little fatter. I had to take the yucky glucose test and get tested for anemia. Luckily the month of July also brought us the results that I do not have gestational diabetes or an iron deficiency (yet). The end of the month also found me starting to get a little bit nervous as i realized that our baby would be here in less than 3 months! 3 months seemed like a long ways away until just recently. We also bought a crib and got it set up so that I could feel like we actually had a place to bring baby home to.

25 weeks!

McKay finishing up the crib

July went by really fast, but we had a lot of fun.

Life since April

We have been really busy these last 4 months. That isn't really an excuse for not blogging because I check other peoples blogs at least weekly, I just haven't gotten around to writing on my own. So since we found out we were pregnant we have had a couple of fun things transpire. We went on the Rogers family annual vacation to Ft. Myers Florida in April. In June My baby brother Jonathan graduated from high school while simultaneously graduating with his associates degree from UVU, and I taught my very last preschool class and entered the world of the unemployed.We also moved from our little apartment/house in American Fork  into a much more spacious condo in Orem. Then on June 17th we found out that we were having a little girl and decided to name her Madelynn (unless we change our mind sometime in between now and when we actually meet her). We also celebrated McKay's first fathers day. Even though the baby is only half baked we decided it counted. In between these things McKay has been working his way up the corporate ladder at Fidelty. He is loving his job. He loves the people that he works with and is doing really well there. He has already had a promotion and two pay raises. Yay for more money! I have been what McKay calls wife sick. Wife sicks is also known as morning sickness that lasts 24 hours a day. Because of that I have not been up to anything very exciting for the last few months. I am now going to talk about my battle with morning sickness, so if you don't want to read about it, stop now.

For the first two weeks that I knew I was pregnant I felt grand! I felt just a little bit nauseous and headachey, like i did before i miscarried last fall, so that is what I thought I would be up against for this pregnancy. Boy was I wrong. The day that i hit six weeks pregnant I felt like I had caught an intense flu bug and  started throwing up anywhere from 6-10 times a day. If i ate anything at all it would come right back up within half an hour. And quite frequently if I drank anything it would come right back up. After about a week and a half of that my doctor put me on medication and that curbed my vomiting to only 3-5 times a day. That meant that I would keep down my food for a few hours before it would come back up, and that I could usually keep drinks down. Then when I went to Florida my body decided to be nice to me and I only threw up a handful of times that whole week! But the second we  came home and the puking resumed. Then I hit 15 weeks, the point by which most pregnant people who experience morning sickness are totally done with it, and my puking subsided to only 2-3 times a day. That meant I could usually keep my last meal of the day down. I would eat at about 8:00 or 8:30 and then promptly climb into bed so I could try and sleep through the ensuing nausea and let my body actually get some nutrients. Then at about 20 weeks (when we moved) I started only throwing up every few days. I still feel nauseous everyday, but now my vomiting is only triggered by over exertion, lack of sleep, too much dairy (I think I might be a little lactose intolerant), having too much food or water in me or not enough food or water in me. And then occasionally a yucky smell (or a particularly nasty burp emitted by my husband) will send me running to the toilet. But for the most part those are things I can kind of control. I am proud to say that it has almost been a full week since I have thrown up! That may be way more than some people want to know, but that has been my life for the last 5+ months. I spent the better part of 4 months sleeping or laying on the couch watching T.V. until I had to eat, go to the bathroom or teach preschool. That is why I haven't had much to blog about. Luckily, because the sickness has subsided a great deal I am starting to feel a lot more like a human, and unless I am having one of my really bad days, I can actually do some stuff! And, since I am keeping most of my food down now, I have stopped losing weight. I lost about 8 pounds in the first half of my pregnancy, but at 25 weeks I think I have almost put those 8 pounds back on. Yay for eating food and being able to digest it! I seriously envy the pregnant women who don't get morning sickness, and I also envy the "normal" pregnant people who have morning sickness that clears up around 12-15 weeks. I hope my next pregnancies can be like that!

Well that about sums it up for now. Here are some of the pictures of our recent happenings.

 In Ft. Myers on the Caloosahatchee river.

 McKay getting in touch with his inner Alligator at The Shell Factory.

Boating in the Gulf of Mexico!

The Rogers cousins and my grandparents. None of the male cousins could come this year, so McKay was all alone (which I am pretty sure he was fine with).

 Jonathan's Graduation

 My sweet preschool class. They were a handful, but I miss them.

 Some of my coworkers from John Hancock Charter School. I miss them too.

 McKay's first fathers day. His sisters were sweet and got him a cute little onesie that says, "daddy's little princess". That will very much apply once this little girl is born.

Our last day at our American Fork apartment. Goodbye 17th ward. We will miss you!