Introducing Brooklyn Debra Bassett

Last week was swelteringly hot here.  The temperatures were in the mid nineties all week and since our house doesn't have air conditioning I was really, really hot.  I went in for a doctor's appointment on Wednesday and the doc said I was making good progress and asked if I wanted to make an appointment for next week.  I must not have looked very enthusiastic because he quickly added "unless you want to be induced".  To which I replied "Yes, actually, I would like that".  It would work better with Reed's schedule and with my parents' schedule plus I was ready to be done being pregnant.  So the doc scheduled my induction for the following morning.  

Here I am at the hospital before I got hooked up to a ton of machines:

 I decided to try an epidural this time.  Unfortunately it didn't work like it was supposed to.  The first 45 minutes were great - I couldn't feel any contractions but I could still move my legs.  After they put it in I asked if I was still having contractions and they answered that I was just finishing one - it was wonderful, I couldn't feel a thing!  After 45 minutes though I started to feel the contractions on my left side.  It was pretty mild at first so I didn't worry about it but the pain got worse and worse.  I tried upping the amount of medicine but all that did was make my right side extremely numb to the point where I couldn't move my right leg, but I could move my left leg just fine.  The nurse asked if I wanted the guy to try again but by then I was already 8 centimeters and I knew I would probably have the baby before they could find the guy and have him adjust the epidural tube.  Anyway, the break in the middle of labor was nice but it would have been really nice if it had worked the whole time.  On the bright side the labor only lasted a little less than 5 hours total - hooray for short labors!  Reed and I spent part of the time trying to guess if the baby was a girl or a boy.  It was really fun to not find out this time.  So when the baby came out the doc lifted her up so I could see for myself - I couldn't believe it was girl!  I didn't have any feelings during this pregnancy one way or the other so it really was a surprise when the baby was born. 

Welcome to the world, little girl!

She weighed in at 8 lbs 11 oz - another good reason to have the baby sooner, rather than later.  She and Micah were the same weight.

 All wrapped up.  She was 20 inches long.

 I was so happy to see her, even if she wasn't very happy having her picture taken

 Sorry the picture is so washed out.  She has a lot of dark brown hair!

We had 3 girl names picked out - Aubrey, Jessica and Brooklyn.  A few hours after she was born we decided to name her Brooklyn Debra Bassett.  Lynn is Reed's mom's name and Debra is my mom's name.  They are both amazing women and we wanted Brooklyn to share their names. 

Happy Birthday Conner!

This year Conner was much more vocal about what he wanted for his birthday.  It is amazing to me how good his memory is.  When we started discussing his upcoming birthday he wanted to make a pinata, since Alan had one for his birthday.  He also wanted to make the exact same invitations and deliver them to all of his friends.  I said yes to the pinata and no to the invitations.  We decided to do a family party this year, but to make up for the lack of friends we did go swimming as a family (one of Conner's favorite activities).  So a week before his birthday we started on the pinata.  For some reason Conner decided he really wanted a horse pinata.  Conner had very specific ideas of how it should look.  I taped 2 balloons together, one for the body and one for the head, and then I tried to tape toilet paper rolls on for the legs but Conner didn't like that idea so we skipped the leg phase.  After 3 layers of paper mache I let Conner paint it. At this point Conner decided he did want legs on it but I couldn't get the legs to stick to the paper mache so we just painted it. 

I love the look of concentration on his face!

He was so intent on his work!

I glued felt legs on at the end and we added a tail, mane and ears and eyes to complete it.  The finished project:

We invited our friends Alex, Josh and Emily to come and break the pinata and have cake and ice cream with us.  Conner taking the first hit:

Alan made a dent in it:

I brought Micah over and handed him the bat at which point he burst into tears...he was still getting over his 105 degree fever and not really feeling like hitting the pinata, I guess.

Conner also decided he wanted a horse cake.  I have no idea where all the horse enthusiasm came from - he hadn't mentioned horses before his birthday and he hasn't mentioned them since, but he really wanted a horse pinata and a horse cake.  Thankfully the cake was a lot easier than the pinata.  Grandma and Grandpa P. were here to help celebrate his birthday so my mom helped decorate the cake, while my dad helped decorate the pinata.  They both turned out great!

Everyone singing to Conner

Make a wish!

This year was the first year that Conner was able to blow his candles out - Yea Conner!

Conner opening up his own creature power suit:

Yea! His own flash light:

Opening the water bottle that he picked out for himself at the store, and wrapped for himself.

He also got a new set of sheets that he was able to pick out and a container of sand toys that he was pretty excited about.  Happy Birthday Conner!

Setting new records

Early Friday morning (1:30 am) Micah woke up with a fever.  I could tell by feeling his forehead that he had a fever so I gave him some ibuprofen and we were up and down with him the rest of the night.  At 7:30 that morning I took his temperature and it was 102.8 so I gave him some more ibuprofen.  Micah kind of perked up a little after that and ate a little bit of breakfast but after 45 minutes he wanted his blanket and he just laid on the couch.  He was extremely lethargic and didn't have the energy to move - he just laid there.  After 3 hours I took his temperature again and it was 103.2.  Its never good when their temperature goes up while on medicine.  I decided to call the doctor and they set up an appointment for 45 minutes later.  We got to the appointment by 12 and they took me in.  After a few questions they took his temperature and it was 105 - Yikes!  That is a new record for our kids.  The highest temperature our kids have ever had has been around 103.5 and it wasn't a record I was hoping to break.  Anyway the nurse quickly gave him some tylenol and gave me a wet cloth to try to cool him down.  They did a quick strep test and it came back negative so they decided to draw some blood to see if he had any bacteria in his blood.  That was not fun.  The poor boy was so sick that he didn't have the energy to fight at all but he did cry pretty hard.  I felt so bad for him.  It was scary to see him so sick and lethargic and to feel how hot he was and see how red and flushed he was.  Anyway after an hour and half of sitting in the doctor's office his temp was back to 103 so they sent us home.  They said that it was probably a virus.  He stayed pretty sick the rest of that day but his fever never got back up above 103.

 Here is what he did all day - laid around in his diaper, preferably snuggled close to Reed or I

That night my parents came for a visit and Reed and my dad gave him a priesthood blessing.  He slept, restlessly, in our bed that night and by the next morning his fever was much lower.  He continued to improve until he actually started to play and walk around by Saturday afternoon.  It was such a relief to see him walk over to the toys and dump out a box and to hear him start to chatter again.  Today he has been great, he is eating again and getting into everything and happily chattering away.  Days like Friday make me so grateful for how healthy we usually are - good health is such a blessing! 

Micah

 Micah had his 18 month well child check last month.  He is a healthy boy.  At the time he could say about 10 words including mama, dada, Ahya (Alan), ba (ball), mo (more), ah-duh (all done), uh-oh and a couple others.  His vocabulary has exploded since then and he can say a lot more words and a couple of phrases, like "I yuv uu (I love you).  Here are his stats:
weight:  25 lbs
height:  32 inches

Here are some interesting facts about Micah and just some random pictures:

-  He LOVES to be outside

He loved throwing this ball down a hill at Grandma and Grandpa B.'s house

-  He loves to play duck, duck, goose.  He will walk around the circle and pat everyone's head while saying "duh" and then he will hit some one and take off running and we assume that means "goose"!
-  He really likes to climb into things and on top of things.

-  Micah really likes babies, especially our neighbors baby girl.  In fact he can say her name (Emily) but he won't say Conner's.  He loves to bring her food and put it in her mouth and if she has a bottle he won't leave her alone -he keeps wanting to help by putting it in her mouth.  He also likes to cover her up with her blanket and give (throw) her toys.

Micah and Emily a few months ago

Micah loves his dad.  In the picture below Reed, Conner and Micah all squeezed into the boy's box house.

-  Micah is a super messy eater.  I remember all of my kids being messy at this stage but Micah seems to have taken it to a new level.  He went through a phase were he would rub his hand in his food and then rub it in his hair, so you could tell by looking at his head what he had recently eaten (syrup, peanut butter, yogurt...).  Also, he can use a spoon but he usually chooses not to.  He prefers to eat his yogurt, pudding and cold cereal with his fingers.  I guess it is faster and funner to use your fingers.  Also, he will throw his food when he is done - every time.  I have been working with him on just leaving his food on the plate and saying "All done", but no luck yet.

Micah enjoying some chocolate pudding

-  Micah loves to wear mittens and gloves, unless he is outside in the snow.  He used to find Reed's gloves and insist that we put one on each hand and then he would walk around the house, so proud of himself.  He also loves to put my big oven mitts on.  The last time it snowed I put his mittens on and took him out to play.  I think the mittens only lasted a couple of minutes before he got them off and he did not want them back on again.  So every couple of minutes he would fall in the snow and I would hear him start to cry and scream "owie, owie, owie".  I would go pick him up and hold his hands to warm them and then try to put his mittens back on but he still didn't want them...silly boy!

Here he is with his red hands, playing in the snow.

-  He likes nursery.  The first time I took him I set him down and he just stood there looking around.  After a bit I left.  Later the nursery leader said they weren't sure if he could walk because he didn't move the entire time he was in there.  Now he is more comfortable and he will walk around but they said he is still really quiet and likes to just stand back and watch everyone.

-  He can throw massive temper tantrums.  He throws himself on the ground, arches his back, kicks his feet and SCREAMS.  When he is like that there isn't much I can do to calm him down, he doesn't want to be picked up.  Usually I have to leave the room, or at least walk to the other side and pretend to be busy,  and let him run out of steam (which can take 10 to 20 minutes).  He has also started to bite and scratch when he is angry.  Both of his brothers have marks on their faces where he has scratched them and Conner has the imprints of Micah's teeth on his arm where he bit him and broke the skin.  We are working on this, but it is slow going.  

 Micah throwing a massive tantrum

-  Micah still really likes to put stuff in his mouth.  Especially dirt.  It is so frustrating to see him outside playing and suddenly he will bend down, grab a handful of dirt and shove it into his mouth.  Gross!!!  He also has an annoying habit of chewing on crayons and biting the tips off of markers.  I bet we used to have over 100 markers and now we probably have half that many, thanks to Micah.

Micah just bit the tip off a blue marker.

The next three pictures are of Micah trying to get some M&M's out of a baby bottle.  He could fit his hand in just fine, but after he closed his fist around the candy he couldn't get his hand out again.  It was fun to watch.  He was really determined to get that candy and he eventually yanked so hard that his hand came out and the candy went flying every where.  

I love this boy's smile!!!

-  Micah finally attached to something to sleep with: this blanket.  Now he loves to take it with him where ever he goes. 

This picture also shows his favorite pass time: making messes.

-  Micah regularly wakes up around 3 am and I will hear him just chattering away to himself.  He rarely cries, although some of his conversations get pretty loud.  After 10 minutes or so he will go quiet and I assume he goes back to sleep.
-  Micah is an early riser - he usually gets up between 6 and 6:30 am.  He still takes a morning nap and an afternoon nap most days.  His afternoon naps are usually pretty short (1 1/2 hours at most) and I have found that he naps the same amount of time in the afternoon whether he takes a 1 hour morning nap or not.  If I try to keep him awake during the  morning this is usually what happens:  he falls asleep as soon as he sits down to eat lunch at 11:30 am. 

Well, there is a snap shot of what Micah is like at this age.  I love this little boy and am so glad he is in our family!

Easter Eggs

 This year we were going to go to visit Grandma and Grandpa B. for Easter but the weather stopped us.  On Thurday (the day before we were going to leave) the weather man was forecasting 9 inches of snow for our area and up to 20 inches in the higher elevations.  After our last experience of getting stuck in the snow, in the middle of the night we decided not to risk it.  The storm only actually dumped 3 or 4 inches of wet (didn't stick to the roads) snow but we postponed the trip anyway.  We had still had fun dying Easter eggs and finding them.

Micah was not very patient.  He would throw the egg into the dye, then watch it for a few seconds, then stick his hand in and grab it again.  We ended up with a couple of cracked ones.

Silly Conner

 Silly Micah

 Silly Alan

 Micah busy coloring on his egg with crayon

 Reed showing Alan his design before dying it.  Alan and Conner were both patient this year.  They let their egg sit in the dye until it was dark enough before they took it out.

By the next afternoon all the snow had melted so we braved the mud to find eggs outside.  Micah had a hard time figuring out what he was supposed to be doing.  First he went to the garden and started filling his bucket up with dirt:

When we pointed out the eggs that he was supposed to find he gathered up a few and lined them up next to another egg he found in a brick.  He ended up throwing a few of them into his bucket so some of the eggs were very cracked at the end.

Oh well, at least he was happy!

Conner was a good little egg finder this year.  We played hot and cold if the boys got stuck and couldn't find any.

This is the only picture I got of Alan this year because he was so fast and always on the move.  He figured out that the plastic eggs had candy in them so he ended up with most of those while his brothers found the real eggs.  Then we split up the plastic eggs at the end.

Our 3 cute little egg hunters:

 

Afterwards we found our Easter baskets and the boys had fun eating lots of chocolate.  Alan was also very excited to get new dark socks for church and Conner was super excited to get a new white dress shirt that has a pocket in the front, just like Alan's and Reed's.   Micah was especially excited about the candy - he didn't want to wait for us to take off the wrappers.  He would stuff a bunch of chocolate into his mouth until he resembled a squirrel with his cheeks puffed out.  In the picture below he put the package in his mouth and laid like that while he watched a movie

Playing in the Rain

Last week we had a really warm day and then a thunderstorm in the early evening. The rain was brief and warm and I let the kids run around in the rain and splash in the puddles. They had a blast!

Micah wasn't too sure at first. He hates to get his head wet, so when he first felt the rain drops hitting him he would duck his head down and freeze. Then he would try to cover his head with his hands. Then he would slowly make his way over to our porch. But then when he saw his brothers running around having fun he had to try again. He finally got so that he would just run through the grass while the rain hit him, although he always kept his head down. In the pictures below it had stopped raining and the kids were just running through the puddles.

You can tell it was warm since no one is wearing shoes.

Alan got out his umbrella and that was a huge hit.

So much fun to run in the rain!