Jarret is 2 Months

Jarret had his 2 month check yesterday. Here are his stats:

Weight: 13 lbs 1 oz - 80th %
Length: 23 3/4 in- 75th %
Head: 15 1/2 in- 40th %

Jarret is taller and skinnier than Darci was at this age. Darci was 1 3/4 inches shorter and 10 oz heavier than Jarret is. And Boys tend to be bigger. Their heads are were about the same, but since the scales are different for boys and girls Darci's head was 75th % I guess boys tend to have bigger heads too. It's fun to compare this stuff. :)

Jarret's skills:
Smiles, coos and growls, and tries to laugh.
Holds his head up well. Sits up while holding mommy's hands.
When on his tummy if mommy moves his arm so he is slightly on his shoulder he will kick his leg to roll over to his back (not officially "rolling over", but it's a start),
Still nurses a ton, although sometimes he decides that it is just too hard (I can't say I disagree) and he begs me for a bottle of breast milk.
He sleeps very well at night, usually wakes up at 2:30 and 5:30. Can fall asleep in his bed on his own without crying himself to sleep.
Grabs mommy's hair or shirt and won't let go.

Here are some pictures we took today for his "2 month Photo Shoot with Mommy"

Jarret's blessing

Sunday Nov 6th we blessed Jarret in Church. My Grandma and Grandpa came from Washington, and my cousins and my brother came down from Portland. It was a great day. Merrill gave a very good blessing. And we all got together at Mom and Dad's for lunch. We got just a few pictures of Jarret. He was ready to eat and did not want to cooperate so this is the best we got.

Such a handsome little guy!

"help Daddy, they're taking too many pictures!"

"Wait, how's my hair?"

Our first Family picture of the 4 of us!

Halloween

For Halloween we got to go to 2 Trunk or Treat activities. The first was Saturday at our wards activity. There was dinner with chili and corn bread, combined with another ward. And then a 3rd ward joined for the trunk or treat. It was huge, lots of people and tons of fun for the kids. My brother Randy and his wife Capri came with their 2 boys (and also Capri's mom and Brother and his wife) and my brother Cory and his girlfriend Cheryl also came. Cory and Cheryl passed out the candy from his truck while we took the kids around to get their candy. Darci was too shy to say trick or treat, but it didn't take long for her to get how it all went down. She walked up to the trunks and held up her bucket, and then off to the next one. Then on Monday we got to go to another Trunk or Treat for Randy and Capri's ward. The kids got way too much candy.

My cute little pumpkin

Sorry Jarret, you are too little to get candy. Maybe next year.

Darci with the pumpkins we carved. She loved helping carve the pumpkins and lighting them every night

Me and my little pumpkin and Sailor girl. (Merrill was sick, so he had to stay home)

Darci and Wyatt. They held hands the whole time. We had to tell them every time to let go so they could pick their candy, otherwise they would just stand there looking at the bowl of candy.

Group shot. Love Easton's costume, he got a lot of attention as the Joker.



And here are some recent pics of Jarret and Darci.

Darci wanted to be in the picture too, silly girl

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Pictures by Capri Bird

Jarret's birth Story

Warning, this is long and may be too much info for some. Just so you know. ;)
Sunday morning we were getting ready for church. I wasn't sure if I was going to go, it was getting too uncomfortable to sit at church. Merrill said I should come just for sacrament, so I hurried and got ready to go. I got in the car (it was almost 10:30) and all the sudden got this pain in my back and then it was gone. I thought "was that a contraction?" so I checked the time and we headed to church. We pulled up to church (it was about 10 min later) and I got the tightening in my tummy, I thought "ok, that was a contraction, probably just braxton hicks". Then seven minutes later it did it again, and again, and again. I stopped timing them and just tried to pay attention. They kept coming, and seemed to be regular, but not painful. I was gonna go home, and needed to take Darci with me, but she wanted to go to nursery. Contractions continued, and by the time relief society started they were getting a bit more uncomfortable but still not painful. I walked around for a few minutes and noticed that they seemed closer together, I started timing them, 5 min apart. By the time we got home, they were 4 min apart. Still no pain, sometimes i could barely feel them, but they stayed regular for hours.
By about 5 pm I was really starting to wonder what was going on. So I called the Doctor, and he suggested that I go to labor and delivery and get check. So, we slowly got ready, and dropped Darci off at my parents and headed to the hospital around 8. We checked in and went to triage, she check me and I was dilated to a 3, one more than I was at the dr 3 days earlier. I walked around for almost an hour and some of the contractions were getting a little painful and 3 min apart. The nurse checked me again and I didn't progress and was only 50% effaced. So, she sent me home. She said I was in pre labor and it could be hours to days of that before active labor began, and to come back then. I was very reluctant to head home, I didn't want to be coming back and checking in being in a ton of pain, when I had already been there. Plus when she went to call the dr, my contractions got worse and I had 4 that were 2 min apart, but she just said they were irregular now and I would be more comfortable at home. So, I left (and NOT happy about it) as we left L and D the contractions were getting pretty painful. I thought about turning back, but the nurse had said I should have painful regular contractions for about an hour before I came back, whatever! We got home and seriously 20 min later my water broke (it was about midnight). Back to the hospital we went.
Once I got in the car, holy cow the contractions were hurting and getting worse and closer together as we went. We got to the hospital and since it was the middle of the night all the entrances to the hospital are locked and you have to check in at the ER. And that took longer than I would like. And then they had to wheel me through the hospital to the next building to labor and delivery. And we got settled in the room and they had to test to make sure that my water had indeed broken and then they checked me, I was at a 4 (it was just after 1 am) and then they got my IV going, and gave me fetanyl through the IV, which they said would help with the pain, but it didn't. By this time my contractions were basically back to back, lasting what seemed like forever. Then finally the anesthesiologist came in and started my epidural, finally. He got it in by 2 am, and the nurse checked me again, I was 10 cm and 100%. Seriously, I went from a 4 to a 10 in 45 min, (the dr and nurses were like "no wonder you were in so much pain, you were contracting super fast"). And the epidural didn't kick in till about 2:20. I started pushing at 3:05 and he was born at 3:32.
And now we have the most amazing little baby boy. And yes, as painful as it was, it's worth it. We love our little Jarret soo much, it's so hard to teach him to be able to be without someone holding him (so that he doesn't get spoiled) cause all I want to do is hold him, I guess in that way, I am lucky that he loves to eat so much during the day. He has been an amazing little sleeper at night, the last 4 nights, he has only gotten up twice to eat, So nice! We are so lucky to have him in our Family!

Poor Darci

After I had Jarret and was still in the hospital. My mom brought Darci back in to see me and Jarret, and they came in with Darci riding in the little blue car that we push the kids around. At first my thought was, oh geez, Grandma is spoiling her way to much. And then my mom proceeded to tell me that Darci had hurt her leg and couldn't walk. They weren't sure exactly what happened or where it was hurt, she just wouldn't stand on it. They took her to the Doctor and after him pushing, bending squeezing all parts of her leg with no reaction from her, except when they tried to get her to walk, they determined that she had strained the ligaments in her hip area and to give her ibuprofen and try to get her to start walking on it.
After a couple days of that, and her starting to crawl and refusing to walk, and getting an x-ray of her hip and it being normal, we decided that it had to be in her lower leg. So when I had to take Jarret to the doctor for his weight check, we brought Darci with us and he checked her again, with the same result (her not reacting to anything but pain when he tried to make her walk) he was at a loss. And referred us to an orthopedic specialist and to get an x-ray of her lower leg. The x-ray showed that she had a very very slight fracture in her lower tibia. So, the next day we headed to the orthopedic specialist to get a cast. Yes, my 2 year old little girl is now sporting a bright pink cast on her lower left leg and foot. She calls in her cool boot. My mom did a good job preparing her for said boot and so far she thinks its pretty cool. She has learned to get around really well. She still refuses to walk on it (they said its fine for her to walk on it, they encourage that) she is still just a bit nervous and it hurts still to put pressure on it. She crawls and scoots and last night was sliding around on her tummy and army crawling. She can get up and down from the chairs and couch. I am pretty amazed how well she is doing with it. She does get a little whiny sometimes, but she is also dealing with a new sibling so I don't blame her at all. She is such a trooper. Here are some pictures and videos:

At the specialists

Checking our her x-ray

getting her cast on. She picked out the pink boot

Here is her scooting along the floor.

I have another video, but for some reason, it won't load. I'll try it again in another post.

100th Post

This is the 100th post on our blog! And What a special post it is...

Introducing Jarret Reed Larsen! Born at 3:32 am on Monday September 19th. Weighing 7lbs 9oz and 19 inches long.

This next picture is of Darci after she was born, when I took the pic above of Jarret it reminded me of this picture of Darci, so I thought I would include it.

Darci loves her little brother. I thought it was super cute when she just laid down next to him and just stared at him. It didn't last long, but it was so sweet!

So far he is a great baby. He nurses fantastically, he took to it right away like a pro! He loves to just be close to Mommy and he loves to nurse. in the last 18 hours he is either sleeping or eating. He is very healthy and as you can see, he is VERY cute! ;)

The differences between his birth stats and Darci's are: Darci was born on the 9th of June at 3:38 am, and Jarret, the 19th of Sept (the 9th month) at 3:32am. Darci was 7lbs 15oz and 19 inches and Jarret was 7lbs 9oz and 19 inches. (lots of 9's) And they both had lots of Dark hair :)
Oh, and Darci was due on the 22nd of June and Jarret was due the 22nd of September!

Jarret shares his birthday with my cousin Shelby and a friend Addison, who is the 3 year daughter of our good friends Aaron and Brookie Bedwell. Happy Birthday!

Mommy is doing well! Healing very well, no problems. So much better than last time. Soo glad the labor and delivery is over! I will post the birth story soon!

My sisiter-in-law, Capri took some really great pictures yesterday. If you have facebook, get on and check them out. She tagged me in them, so you can see them from my profile.

Capri just posted some of the pictures on her blog http://randyandcapribird.blogspot.com/

Our House

Well, we've owned our house for almost 2 months and we've been living in it for about a week and half. There's been lots to get done, and we are slowly getting there. Just getting the important stuff done and organized before the baby comes (he is due in 30 days!) , and before I am too worn out from being pregnant to do any of it (which it is getting there fast).
As I've posted before, we (Merrill and my parents) re-finished the wood floors. It was a HUGE project that pretty much took the whole month of July. But they look GREAT! I am very happy that it was done, but I'm sure we will never re-finish wood floors again, for many reasons.
I re-finished the shelves in the kitchen cupboards, they were looking pretty worn out and stained and had goopy stuff on them, so I sanded them and put on a finish, so now they look tons better and I feel comfortable in putting my dishes and food on them. I would like to put down new counter-tops, but that is a project that will have to wait till we have some money. Along with a list of things, but they are things that can wait.


Here is our house. This was the picture from the real estate agent. Our grass is now very dead and full of weeds, and has been for months now, and the bushes are bigger. Not sure when this picture was taken, must have been a while ago. But this looks pretty good, so instead of taking a new picture I'm just using this one ;)

Here is our living room before we re-finished the floors:

Here is our living room after we moved in:


And another angle (my camera seems to only take dark pictures):

Here is a before picture of one of the cabinet shelves I re-finished (see how icky):

And after:


Our kitchen before we bought the house:
And after (we got a fridge, replaced the stove top (with my grandma's old one, so much better than what was there), and replaced the dishwasher (the other one was broken), and then all the cleaning we did, not that you can tell from the pic):


The main bathroom (this was before we moved in, it doesn't look much different now, just that there is a shower curtain and towels hanging)( oh, and different floor, in the bathroom and kitchen, which was done before we bought the house):

Darci's room (missing her dresser, there is a pic of that in a previous post):

Here is the dinning room. Nothing fancy, we have our computer desk in there too, which still has stuff piled on it:

Another view, showing the built in cabinet (and Darci's basketball hoop):

Here is a virtual tour of the backyard. With the shadow its hard to see the area still in the sun, but it goes back till the wall and the little hill. There is no fence, the neighbors yard starts at the top of the little hill.



Sorry, no pics of our room or baby's room. they are not picture worthy yet. ;)