Brandon's blessing

The end of June, my parents arrived in town and we blessed Brandon at church (sort of like a christening). It was a simple affair since we don’t have any family here. It was especially nice to have my dad here because Brandon is named after him. Arvid is my dad’s first name. My brother Ryan who’s currently on a church mission in Chile also has the middle name Arvid.

With both our other kids, we took pictures in our dress clothes. This time we broke with tradition, at least part way. Here’s Brandon in half his outfit.

We also posed for our first out-of-hospital family picture. We have one of us at the hospital, which I already posted.

Several weeks ago our church celebrated the ground breaking for our new church building that’s being built here in Albany. Up until now we’ve been having meetings in various buildings around town. Mainly houses that have been converted to hold larger groups. This will be the first church in the city of Albany. We’re really excited about it. The only downside is that right now we live within easy walking distance from our current church and when they move it, we’ll have to drive (or leave at least a half hour early to walk). Small inconvenience since there will be a parking lot big enough to fit all our cars for once.

The ground breaking ceremony was short and sweet and all the kids entertained themselves while the adults watched the proceedings. My kids especially. Glad they enjoyed themselves.

 

The terrible, horrible, no-good, very bad day at the park

This next post is about a weekend trip that our little family of five decided to take not long after my mom left. Some of you may have heard this story already, but bear with me. We still think it’s funny.

So, it’s a Saturday and Sterling and I decided to take our family out to Thacher Park – it’s the local national park up the ‘mountain’. We heard there was a little beach up there and a cool wood playground, so we figured we’d make a day of it and have some fun with our kids. We took Sadie along for good measure.

We get to our first stop and get out of the truck. It was a little museum about the wildlife in the area. Obviously we couldn’t take Sadie with us, so we tied her up in the bed of the truck. I had just finished feeding Brandon and thought he’d be happy enough if I put him in a sling and carried him. So, as I’m lifting him into the sling, I had him positioned just perfectly so that when he suddenly spit up, it all went right down the front of my shirt – inside and out. And this wasn’t your typical little baby spit up, there was a lot! I gasped and called to Sterling for help. He promptly reached in the diaper bag and pulled out the first thing he could find – a clean, extra pair of Cami’s panties.

I used that to clean off as best as I could, along with a few napkins from the glove box, and we go on our way into the museum, with me smelling like fermented milk. Gross. Well, we stayed there for only about ten minutes before Austin started throwing full force tantrums; the kind that only a two year old can throw. We were just about to leave when a lady came in and asked who owned the black truck with the dog in the back. We said it was ours and she told us that our dog was chewing on the back of the truck.

Really?!

So, we head out to the truck and sure enough, Sadie has put a row of teeth marks in the plastic rim of the truck bed. Fantastic. It’s even more annoying considering we’re going to try to sell that truck in a month or so. Sterling went on to the truck with Cami while I came along behind still carrying Brandon, and towing Austin who decided to stop in the middle of the road and drag on my arm, continuing the tantrum from inside the building. Any of you reading this who are mothers know the exact kind of tantrum that I’m talking about. They go limp as a rag doll and make you drag them unless you decide to stop, then they collapse on the ground wherever they are (even on a hot, gravel road) and proceed to scream and cause everyone around you to stare. Yeah, it was great.

Sterling came back and got Austin and we finally made it to the car and into the various carseats and seatbelts. As we pull out of the parking lot, Cami asked if we could still go to the park. That child has a mind like a vise. If you tell her something, she will hold onto that idea for hours and sometimes days to come. We decided that she had been very good, so we’d still take her to the park. And let me tell you, it’s a very cool park. They don’t make parks that cool out west.

We got there and Sterling spotted a port-o-potty and asked Cami if she had to go. She’s been potty trained for awhile, but she gets so distracted playing that she doesn’t realize that she has to go until the very last second and then she’ll make a beeline for the bathroom. So we’ve gotten into the habit of asking if she has to go and sometimes forcing her to go sit on the toilet.

Cami said that no, she didn’t have to go, and followed me onto the playground. We made it about five steps before she turned around and announced that she did have to go potty, so I told her to run to Sterling and he would take her. She made it about halfway to him before she peed her pants. The best part of this is that usually we keep an extra pair of panties for her, but remember what I used to clean off the baby spit up? Yeah. Couldn’t have worked out worse.

So, let’s recap. Brandon spit up all over me. Sadie chewed up the back of the truck. Austin was throwing major temper tantrums. And Cami peed in her pants. All four of our kids acting out in different ways in the space of two hours. Awesome! Doesn’t that just sound like the best day! Unfortunately, I’m sure there are some of you out there who just shrug and think ‘that’s a typical day at my house’. If you’re one of those: I’m sorry. I truly, truly am.

Despite it all Sterling and I were in a good mood and rather enjoyed ourselves. It was nice getting up into the ‘mountains’ and being able to see the horizon for once. They had an amazing look-out spot up there. Worth the drive and the horrors of the day just for that. It was beautiful.

Here’s a few pictures from the playground. It really was cool.

Fun with Mimi

The last several weeks I've been feeling kinda guilty that I haven't gotten around to posting yet, but then I checked my sister's blog and felt better because she hasn't posted in almost two months either. *hint hint Krista* :)

Since my last post was entirely about my youngest child, and I don’t want the older two to feel slighted, this post will be all about them and the fun they had with Mimi (my mom) while I was incapacitated.

Mom arrived several days before I went into labor and left roughly two weeks after. We were very glad to have her there for it all. She was a big help with the kids, running around and chasing them and entertaining them while I perfected my sleep-deprived-beached-whale-on-the-couch look. She took them to the pond at the park and let them feed the ducks. When I saw these pictures later I was surprised how close that goose got to Austin. Kinda scary.

 They played in the fountain.

They went to the playground and had a fabulous time.

We went to story time at the library.

They also buried Mimi in their stuffed animals. This seems to be a favorite activity of theirs.

It was great to have help while Sterling was still in classes (he started a new term two weeks before Brandon was born). Quick thing about Sterling, he has one week left of classes and a week of finals and then he is halfway done with the book work portion of PA school. It’s starting to feel doable!!

So, that’s really it for this post. Mostly just pictures. Enjoy!

Brandon Arvid - take two

Whenever I get behind in my blogging, and then finally get around to it again, I always want to catch up on everything all at once, but when I do that, I don’t feel like I give enough attention to each event and if I do, then you, my dear readers, end up with an insanely long post to read. So, I decided on a solution. I’m going to write the whole blog today, but then post a piece of it each day this week, so that you’re not completely overwhelmed by a super long blog all at once. How’s that for ingenious?!

So, I should probably start off by personally introducing you to the newest member of our family. I know Sterling did a great little post about it, but now it’s my turn. If you don’t care to know all the details of my labor and delivery, then stop reading now and just come back tomorrow.

I started having contractions Thursday morning. Nothing major, but every couple of hours or so they would become fairly regular. About five minutes apart for two hours, then they’d stop almost completely for another two hours, then they’d be back. I had a doctor appointment that day and mentioned to him about my contractions and about how fast my previous two were. He told me that I didn’t look like someone who was in labor. Ha, I thought to myself, I’ll show him! And I did!

I was hoping to have Brandon come on the 24^th because then all five us of would have been born on an even day in an even year (Sterling and I are also even months, and the kids are all odd months), but Brandon decided not to cooperate on that. He missed the deadline by 1 hour and 49 minutes. Oh well. Someone did point out in the comments from the last post that I did want Brandon to come on Memorial Day weekend. At least he met those expectations. Isn’t he an obedient child!

By evening my contractions hadn’t gotten much stronger and were still only occasionally regular, so Sterling and I just went to bed. Right about midnight the contractions woke me up because they’d started to get painful. I got up because I knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep again. My mom was staying with us, which was great because otherwise we would have had to call someone to come stay with the kids while we went to the hospital and by the time they arrived, Brandon would have been here too. She was still up, so she and I chatted for about an hour before she decided to finally go to bed. She said that if we left for the hospital, that I should just come let her know. About fifteen minutes after she went to bed, I finally decided to wake Sterling up and get going.

I brushed my teeth, packed a bag, got some snack food for Sterling, then pulled him out of bed and made him get dressed. (Quick side note, Sterling has worn the same shirt for all three of our kids births. Yes, it was done on purpose. He jokes that by looking at the pictures that we won’t be able to tell the difference. Never mind that he has a goatee right now.) The pictures are a little blurry for some reason. Crappy camera, I suppose.

Anyways, so by this time, I was in a lot of pain. As we’re getting our shoes on, I mentioned to Sterling that I had the urge to push. Now I finally get what medical personnel mean when they say that. We hurried downstairs and out to the car. I had to pause before climbing in the car when a big, painful contraction hit. A car passed us as we stood there and we realized it was an ambulance. Nice to know they’re around when you might need them.

Sterling drove like a madman to the hospital, blowing through three or four red lights to get there. He dropped me off and went to park the car and I waddled my way up some stairs to the elevator (which is by far the slowest elevator in the entire world!) and into the delivery room. Fortunately they were expecting me and got me straight into a room. Also fortunately, we had a false alarm a couple weeks before, so we’d already been to the hospital and had gotten all our paperwork done and everything, so it was all relatively easy.

They put me in a room and told me to get changed into a hospital gown. I immediately asked about getting an epidural. I had one with both Cami and Austin and I was in so much pain that I did not want to go without. I was told that first the hospital had to get a full liter of fluid in me via IV and they had to get some blood tests back from a lab before they could give me an epidural. Generally the process takes about an hour and a half. And I’m thinking: are you freaking kidding me?!

Sterling arrived to see me dressed, standing next to the bed. I couldn’t make myself climb up on it. Up until this point I’d been in pain, but hadn’t cried at all. Then my water broke. It was at that moment that I realized that this baby was coming and that I was going to have to do it all without an epidural. It was then that I started to cry.

That only lasted about two minutes though until the next contraction hit. The nurses and Sterling manhandled me up onto the hospital bed and the midwife came in to check me. She said it was all happening now. She began to scrub down to deliver when my doctor came rushing in. He’d been on call at the hospital, otherwise I don’t think he would have made it. Keep in mind that we arrived at the hospital at roughly 1:25 and I started pushing at 1:33. It was all very quick. They didn’t even have time to start an IV. It was also so fast that I didn’t get a last pregnant picture of me in the hospital gown. Not that I was really worrying about that at the time.

So the doctor got there and scrubbed up in record time. I started pushing. I’ve seen lots of movies where a woman gives birth and in the movies she’s always screaming. (Why women in movies don’t get epidurals, I’ll never know.) What I do know is that the screaming that they do is very, very realistic. I was certainly screaming. Then my doctor (a man) yelled, yes yelled, at me to “stop screaming, it doesn’t help.” Part of my brain was thinking uh yeah! It does! And besides how would you know? You’re a man! You’ve never done this. It totally helps! Sterling told me later that he almost punched my doctor. I wouldn’t have blamed him. I wanted to as well.

Fifteen minutes and three contractions later, we had ourselves a baby. While I was pushing Sterling was yelling encouragement in my ear, even going so far as to tell me that some of my screams were really impressive. At one point he was chanting “You’re doing great. Here comes his head. It’s almost out. Great work, his head is out!” To which the nurse responded “No, not yet”. I had changed from screaming to grunting and growled at Sterling “Don’t lie to me.” Looking back, we all laughed really hard. That’s probably the highlight of the whole thing. I mean, apart from having the baby, of course.

Brandon was born at 1:49 am on Friday the 25^th of May. He weighed 7 lbs. 12 oz. and was 21 inches long. (Sterling guessed he’d be short like our other two – 19 inches. Nope!) Our first picture of him is one that Sterling already posted of him sucking his thumb. The kid’s a natural! Which translates to dental work someday.

 

 

 

 

So far he’s grown phenomenally. We just had his two month checkup and over the last month he jumped from the 52nd percentile (in weight) to the 74th percentile. He’s a big boy. He weighs almost 14 lbs right now, which means that in two months he’s almost doubled his birth weight. Neither Cami nor Austin weighed 14 lbs until they were 4 months old.

He’s such a sweet baby and has already slept through the night twice (from 11 pm to 7 am). Hopefully it’ll continue. I’m loving it! Many people have told me that three kids are the hardest. For me, it’s been a walk in the park. The older two entertain each other, and I take care of Brandon. Super easy.

Finally here are some pictures from the last two months of my newest little boy.

 

 

And that’s a wrap for day one.

Baby Boy

This is Sterling, and I wanted to get some quick info out to everyone.  Erika will probably do a better post later.

Erika started having contractions at 12 am today and we went to the hospital at 1am.  Her water broke soon after and the baby was on his way.  No time for an epidural! The nurses started hopping around and scrambling cause this was happening quick.  Erika handled the whole thing amazingly!  He was born around 2 am after pushing during 3 contractions.  He is 7lbs 12 oz.  I don't know his length yet.  We'll say...short.

Here is Brandon Arvid Fenwick:

Happenings

Well, 3 weeks out and I'm still pregnant. But I figured that since this boy still hasn't come, that gives me time to update our blog. Ok, so I'm not really doing this of my own accord. Once again family is pestering me for pictures.

So, to start off, this was Sunday. 37 weeks and 2 days. I feel huge and am SO ready for this kid to come. Unfortunately, with Sterling starting classes again this week, this would be the worst possible week for him to make an appearance. My mom gets into town next Monday, so hopefully he'll wait at least until then. We're really hoping for Memorial Day weekend (which is when I would have an induction scheduled anyways) because then Sterling would have a three day weekend to be with me. But we'll see what happens.

Speaking of Sterling, his first term of PA school is over and done with and, of course, he got great grades (As and two A-s). He started again yesterday and so far it seems like it should be alright. Busier than last term, but okay just the same. So far there's not too much busy work, just reading in his monstrous books.

In other news, Austin turned two! It's been fun to listen to him start speaking a little bit more. He'll mimic several animal sounds and says 'mama', 'dad', 'come' and things like that. Cami was a late talker too, so I'm still not worried. Here's a few pictures of his birthday. We had Grandma and Aunt Ruth on skype so they could enjoy the party as well.

A few weeks later my mother-in-law, Joyce, came into town from Utah to visit us. It was great having her here. She really seemed to enjoy spending time with two of her grandkids. She was here for General Conference and Sterling's birthday. She stayed for two weeks and it still didn't feel long enough. Thankfully, she's coming back in August or September.

My husband is now 28! Only two more years til he hits the big 3-0. And right after that, he'll be graduating from PA school and entering the real world. What an exciting time! Here's a few pictures of his party. He got two cakes this year because I wanted a fruit pizza and he wanted a chocolate cake, so I made both.

The following day, Joyce and I had the opportunity to take the kids to an Easter Egg Hunt. A lady in our church puts one on every year for all the kids in our church group and other people she knows, perhaps from work, but I'm not sure. Anyways, there were perhaps 40 kids there, and 10-15 teens and another 20 adults or so. All of us were allowed to hunt for eggs. They were scattered across the grass in her front yard and in her neighbors front yard, all over her back yard, and in a little forested area next to her house. Quite the extensive operation. Don't know how or why she does it, but the kids had a blast. I felt bad because they easily picked up more than their (and my) share of eggs, but they had so much fun. Both Austin and Cami just walked around and picked up everything they saw and stuck it in their little basket.

The lady also had some of her neighbors bring food and they had a full breakfast buffet going as well as cookies to decorate, fruit, muffins, and more. It was fabulous!

 

Every year in Albany they have the Tulip Festival in Washington Park, which is just a block away from where we live. Everyone we've talked to since we arrived here has told us that we need to attend. Usually the tulips bloom just in time for the Festival in May, however, this year, it's been warmer than usual and the tulips bloomed almost a month early. We stopped by the park to see them all before they were gone. When we went to the Tulip Festival this last weekend there were only one or two patches of tulips left, so I'm glad we went when we did and took pictures.

This statue is in the middle of the tulip beds and the fountain goes whenever it's warm enough. We're not sure if kids and dogs are allowed to play in it, but it doesn't stop anyone. I imagine they're not supposed to, but I've never seen anyone tell them to stop. Now, if I may draw your attention to the figure at the top, we think it's Moses, and the item dangling off the end of his staff. Look closely. Yes, that's a ghost.

I took that first picture and then turned to take pictures of the tulips and when I turned around again, a strange lady (strange as in she was stranger, not that anything was weird about her) was standing by my kids, a man I didn't know was holding onto my dog and my husband was no where to be found. I panicked for half a second until I caught a flash of yellow up on the statue. The groundskeeper was an old guy and Sterling could tell that he didn't want to try to climb that statue to get the ghost down, so Sterling jumped in to save the day. My hero!

Here's a few pictures of the actual tulip festival which was much like a regular state fair in Utah, only on a much smaller scale and without the rodeo afterwards. They had pony rides for the kids and face painting and big blow-up bouncers. We're too poor for them to do much of that, but we did enjoy just walking around looking at the booths and everything. Sterling was such a trooper carrying/pushing both kids while I just walked around trying not to go into labor.

On May 1st, Sterling and I took a trip north to Glens Falls to see a Riverdance performance. It was part of his birthday present this year. He's always wanted to go - he's talked about it since I've known him - and I've never seen them, so I bought tickets. It turns out it was their farewell tour. Riverdance is completely retiring from US touring and going overseas for a little while before being done-for forever. It was a one night only performance in New York and then they have maybe three or four more stateside shows and that's it.

 We weren't allowed to take pictures there, but I found a few on the internet. The first has the same female lead dancer that was at our performance, but the main lead guy is different. The one at ours was insanely tall and had hair that reminded me of Johnny Depp in Edward Sizzor Hands. I'm sure the dancer would be flattered to know I thought that about him. They had a tap-off competition between the guys in the last picture and the main guy. It was crazy and I'm very impressed. It was a great night and I'm glad we got to go.

This last Saturday, the day before Mother's Day, Sterling and I celebrated our 6th anniversary. It's crazy that it's already been six years! I doubt anyone remembers this post, but I make it a point to take pictures of us each year on or around our anniversary. Sterling was once again, very helpful this year.

 

We didn't get to go out to eat this year (yet - we plan to once my mom gets here), but we had a nice dinner at home, interspersed with having to check on the kids and then putting them down for bed. It was hectic, but nice enough. Then Sterling went upstairs into our attic and lit candles in a circle, recreating the night he asked me to marry him. We danced for a bit to some music, then he presented me with a beautiful diamond ring. I haven't been able to wear my wedding ring for several months because the store that we bought it from went out of business, so it has no warranty on it and the prongs are starting to wear thin, so I don't wear it because I don't want to risk losing any of the diamonds, but now I have a wonderful alternative. I couldn't be happier! I have the most wonderful husband and I look forward to another blissful six years of marriage. (And many more after that, I hope.)

On Mother's Day, we were able to get online with my whole family and talk to Ryan, who's on his mission in Chile. We all got to talk to him at Christmas while we were all at my grandma's house in Colorado, so it was fun to do it again. We weren't able to do video this time, but it was nice nonetheless. This was last Christmas.

I just have to say that the internet is amazing. Between the six of us we were in New York, Chile, Hungary, Alaska, Utah, and Missouri (in order from left to right). It's amazing that we can all get on wherever we are and be able to talk to one another. What would we do without modern marvels?!

 

Well, I think that about covers it for now. There might be more coming soon, but for now, I'm done. Enjoy!