4 Months Old!

Benjamin is now four months old! It is crazy how fast they grow up. We went to the doctor on Wednesday and he got some more shots. I wanted to cry. I wish they would make later appointments so Michael could take him. I hate seeing him get shots. Anyway, here are his stats:

Weight: 15 lbs. 8 oz. Percentile: 58
Height: 25.5 inches Percentile: 67
Head Circumference: 41.7 cm Percentile: 31

He is doing so well. He loves his jumper and exersaucer. He is grabbing things now and will sometimes play with a rattle for a minute or two. He tracks people really well. He loves to watch Shadow. They are going to be great friends when he gets a little bigger and can play with him. He loves to squeal and he kind of gets a little bit of a giggle going, but he has only fully giggled a couple of times last month. Hopefully he starts doing that more often because it is really cute. I'll try and be better about giving updates about what is going on in our life.

Nauvoo Vacation

Last week my parents drove out here to pick up Parker and take him home since he is done with school...sort of. He still has to finish his internet class. Anyway, they started their journey on Thursday and arrived here Friday about 12:00PM. Michael came home from work at about 1:00PM and we all jumped in the van that we rented and headed to Nauvoo for some historic vacationing. The journey to Nauvoo was only supposed to take 7 to 7 1/2 hours but we used my parent's GPS and it took nearly 12 hours to get there, so we got to Nauvoo about 2:00AM Saturday morning. Apparently the GPS was set to shortest distance so it was taking us through dirt roads and all kinds of weird things. It got really frustrating. We asked my mom about the settings and she said they were all correct but the next day when Michael was looking at the GPS he found that the settings were all weird. We went to all kinds of shows and looked at all the houses and buildings. It was really a cool experience. Here are some pictures of our adventure.

We started our trip by going to the early temple session on Saturday morning. The Nauvoo temple is beautiful.



These are the graves of Joseph, Hyrum, and Emma.





This is the Mansion House where Joseph and Emma resided for a short time.



Benjamin got tired so he decided to take a nap while we were touring Nauvoo.



Garrett decided to climb trees so Parker had to follow suit. Garrett got up a lot easier than Parker did. Parker, you need to work out a little more.





Michael and Benjamin are ready to cross the plains.



Oxen ride. Those are big animals!



Garrett and Parker doing the stick pull. I could have told you Garrett would win.



This is "Sunset by the Mississippi". We went to an outside stage and the performing missionaries and the senior missionaries put on a little skit type thing. It was cute.



Benjamin is really enjoying the long car trip.



On the way home we stopped by Adam-Ondi-Ahman and Liberty Jail.







The Liberty Visitors Center is built around the reconstruction of the jail. They had a recording of journal entries and such about what was going on in the jail and the revelations received.



This is the RLDS Temple across from the Independence Visitors Center. We are in the Missouri Independence Mission so we saw a couple of sisters that had served in our ward while we were in the visitors center. One of them even took us on the tour. It was cool.

2 Month Dr. Visit

Weight: 12 lbs. 6 oz. Percentile: 55%
Height: 24 in. Percentile: 77%
Head Circumference: 39.2 cm Percentile: 23%

Easter Sunday

So Easter Sunday was amazing! We went to stake conference, which I didn't hear much of because Benjamin was fussy, and then we came home and we blessed Benjamin in our home. It was a beautiful blessing. We have an amazing little baby boy. We had family in town for the blessing and we also had some friends over. The Beehler's, Chase's, Booth's, Cotton's and Doc Scott all came over to support us. We have so many good friends here in our ward. We are really lucky. Here are a few pictures from the blessing. We didn't get one of just Benjamin so one of these days I'm going to dress him up again and get a closer piture of him.

Benjamin is 1 Month Old!!

My little baby boy is now one month old! How quickly it goes! He is so precious and he has started to smile randomly and it is so cute. I haven't really been able to get it on camera because it comes and goes so quickly. He is such a strong little boy. Ever since he was born he has been able to move his head around, although it is very floppy. I can't wait until he can hold his head up by himself. He is doing really well. We went to the doctor today and he is developing like he should. Here are his stats:

Weight: 9 lbs. 9 oz. Percentile: 38%
Height: 22 in. Percentile: 62%
Head Circumference: 32.4 cm Percentile: 28%

Benjamin's Doctor Visits

3 Day Check-up

Weight: 6 lbs. 7 oz. Percentile: 11%
Height: 20 in. Percentile: 54%
Head Circumference: 34.8 cm Percentile: 25%

2 Week Check-up

Weight: 7 lbs. 9 oz. Percentile: 17%
Height: 21 in. Percentile: 59%
Head Circumference: 36 cm Percentile: 25%

Little Benjamin Michael

Tuesday,3 March 2009, little Benjamin Michael was born. We were at the hospital at 5:30 AM and got checked in and they got the pitosin started at 7:20 AM. I started having contractions almost as soon as they started, but I didn't feel them for a while. They broke my water a few hours later and soon after that I received an epidural. It seemed like forever until I was dialated to a 10, but it finally did happen. So they called my doctor and let him know and he said to start me pushing. I couldn't really feel anything below my belly button so when they said to push I pushed even though I didn't feel the contraction. I could feel the pressure of the contraction in my ribs so they kept me from being completely helpless. I pushed through three contractions, so about 15 minutes of which I pushed for like one and a half minutes, and then they had me stop because he was crowning and the doctor still wasn't there. So we waited for like 20 to 30 minutes for Dr. Jackson to arrive since Benjamin was doing fine just waiting. Benjamin decided he didn't want to wait though and the contractions alone started pushing him out and we couldn't wait for the doctor. So they told me to push and I barely pushed before he was completely out into this new world where Mommy and Daddy were anxiously waiting to meet him. He is the cutest baby ever! :)