Birthday Bliss

Well, for those of you who weren't aware, I turned 26 last week. Jonathan was an absolute saint and let me do whatever I wanted all day. So I went to the gym, got a pedicure (waaaayyy overdue), and then he took me to a fantastic dinner at PF Chang's. I DID eat the Great Wall of Chocolate, for those of you who read my last post, and it was completely worth it. I felt sick for about an hour afterwards but the pain didn't compare with the chocolaty bliss that induced it. I also discovered a new favorite restaurant. You must try Pizzeria Seven-twelve. It's amazing. Check out their website!

My good friend posted a to-do list for her 26th birthday and I decided I would kind of mimic her idea but switch it around to a "13 Things I've Done" and "13 Things I'd Like To Do" list...thereby adding up to 26.

So here we go.

13 Things I've Done
1. Graduated from BYU
2. Ran 2 marathons
3. Married Jonathan in the temple
4. Had 2 babies
5. Gave birth naturally
6. Backpacked through Europe
7. Lived in Hawaii
8. Learned to watercolor
9. Took up photography
10. Learned French & Spanish
11. Learned to play piano
12. Completed a triathlon
13. Took up Cycling

13 Things I'd Like To Do
1. Learn to play the cello
2. Run more marathons
3. Have more babies
4. Live in Europe
5. Own my own business
6. Go on a mission
7. Write a book
8. Go to cosmetology school
9. Travel the world
10. Go to culinary arts school
11. Be fluent in French
12. Open a restaurant
13. Have my dream home

I know some of these are pretty boring but I didn't want to spend all night blogging. I get too little sleep as it is!

More posts to come with pictures of the little ones.

Resolution Jeopardized?

Jon and I have started Weight Watchers. I have about 30 pounds to shed after having Sophie and Jon has some sympathy weight to get rid of too. We have done really well these last 2 weeks and have already lost weight! Jon has lost about 7 lbs and I've lost about 5.

My birthday is tomorrow and we have a tradition of going to PF Chang's for my birthday dinner (it's the only time we can sort of justify it). We usually eat all 3 courses, ending with the Great Wall of Chocolate--my most favorite dessert! So last night I was looking up the different parts of the meal and calculating the "Points", when to my horror, I discovered the terrifying amount of calories and fat in this chocolate wonder. Can you take a guess?

Let me tell you:

CALORIES - 2237 (oh gosh!)
FAT - 90 grams (are you kidding me???)

Well, my heart almost stopped thinking that I might not be able to enjoy this traditional indulgence. But something stopped my panic attack--another menu item. They also have a Great Wall of Chocolate MINI Dessert. Hallelujah! My year will not be a complete disappointment!

THREAT NEUTRALIZED!

We'll keep you posted on our weight loss efforts. I plan on being more swimsuit ready than I have ever been!

January 8th and The Series of Unfortunate Events...

I may be digging my own grave by posting this email only half way through the day, but already I have so many wonderful (sense the sarcasm here) things to tell you all about.

To make it short and sweet, I'll put them all chronologically for you:

10:00 am - I arrive home from Target and carry all the bags to my apartment and proceed to slip on some black ice on the steps down to our door, thereby crushing open the 12 pack of Diet Coke in my right hand, spewing 2 bags of groceries from my left hand, and seriously injuring my pride...and my right elbow. The owner of our complex ran over and said, "Yeah, it looked like your head disappeared from our level much too fast!" To top it off, I said a naughty word amidst my fall which breaks a very long streak of not swearing (I've never had a problem with swearing...but still!)

10:01 am - Jon hears the knock from the complex owner helping me to my door and dashes into our room to put a shirt on to avoid answering the door in his underwear. Mid-sprint, he jams his pinkie toe into the wall and breaks it, leaving it at an unnatural angle (and totally overshadowing my elbow injury).

10:45 am - We proceed to dig out the Subaru from the foot of snow that has recently fallen so we can see if the transmission fluid is low, which by replacing it, may let us drive it to the transmission shop instead of paying to have it towed. The fluid is filled, we have to pay.

11:00 am - Jonah steals pieces of my unattended croissant (this one's my fault) and proceeds to dip it in my hot chocolate (which I left on the floor while I said goodbye to Jon) and manages to dump the entire mug of hot chocolate all over the floor. For those of you that are unfamiliar with dipping croissants in hot chocolate, it's delicious...who can blame Jonah?!

1:30 pm - I remind Jon over the phone that his mom is coming to pick Jonah up in a while to take him to her house to play and to give me a little break. Jon reminds me that the car seat has not been removed from the Jeep...which ruins all plans of cleaning house, napping, etc. for my afternoon.

Lets all hope that the day will turn itself around and in the morning I'll have glorious things to report. I hope you all find this morning as entertaining as I might after I have a few days to mull it all over.

Celebrate me home

Since my family came to Utah for Thanksgiving, it was our year to spend Christmas with Jon's family. We decided to make the holiday more "vacation-like" and stayed at his parents' house. It was a lot of fun spending the days in our sweats. It was Jonah's first Christmas where he actually somewhat grasped the ideas of opening presents, Santa, etc. It was so much fun to watch him! He had such a great time playing with all of his cousins.


Here is Jonah with Mamou.

One of Jonah's most favorite things is bikes. He LOVES bikes! We made sure Santa knew this and Jonah loves him for it.

Baby Sophie has had a nice streak of blowouts and happened to have one at Mamou and Grandpa's house so I took advantage of their perfect-sized sink and bathed her in it. She enjoyed it quite a bit. And NO, I didn't use Windex on her...even though I've heard it has some amazing cleansing properties when used in unusual situations.

This is also Jonah's first winter playing in the snow. We went out and got him some proper snow pants and boots and he just loves it!



Jonah also loves to play the piano. He pulls the chair over and climbs up and turns on the keyboard. He thinks its so neat! Unfortunately, he also knows how to turn on the songs and even more unfortunately, A Whole New World happens to be the first song to come on. Jon and I have had it stuck in our heads for the last week now....uhhgg.

We love the Christmas season and are so grateful for our Savior and all He has done for us. What a wonderful time to reflect on the birth and life of Jesus Christ. We hope you all had a lovely Christmas and we wish you all a Happy New Year!

This lotion feels slimy...

Sophie loves the bath...as long as she doesn't get cold. After her bath the other day, I was putting her lotion on and decided to rub the excess into my own hands. Without looking at my hands, I realized the lotion felt a little slimier than usual. When I looked down, I realized that Sophie had deposited a nice little surprise on my hands and I was rubbing it all over! Hahaha...sneaky girl!

Here is a picture of us before church last week. Look at my cute argyle kiddies! Thank you, Mimi, for Jonah's handsome sweater!

This was taken during tummy time today. Sophie didn't last long but Jonah sure had fun spreading the blankets out and lying down with Baby Sister!

And finally, today was our 4 year anniversary! It's fun to see how much our little family has grown in that time. Here are a few pictures of our wedding day!

Santa's Little Helper

Jonah has been quite the little helper lately. Among some of his favorite things (fans, Christmas ornaments, cameras ("Smile", he says), vacuums ("bantums")) are also brooms. He often pulls the broom out and sweeps, not only the hardwood floor, but also the carpets.

He's doing better with Sophie around. He knows her name and for the most part keeps to himself but sometimes tries to share his toys, binkies, etc. He enjoys lounging in the bouncy seat when it isn't occupied by his sister.


Sophie is a wonderful baby. She mostly cries when hungry or tired...typical baby behavior. We sure love her! She's filling out quite nicely (as you can see by the cheeks!).

A Very Green Thanksgiving

This year was our year to be with my family for Thanksgiving and since I was due to have a baby so close to the holiday, my family decided to rent a condo at Thanksgiving Point (how appropriate!) for the week so we could all be together. It was so nice to have everyone here for the weekend! The condo was huge and well furnished so there was plenty of room for everyone. Jon and I stayed at home since we need to have all the baby supplies handy but hung out at the condo with everyone during the days.

Jeff and Audra brought Guitar Hero over and there was a pool table at the house so those activities occupied most of the boys' time while the girls made various shopping trips.

We took family pictures (long overdue) which turned out sooo cute!

I am so grateful for my awesome family! How wonderful it is to have such neat people for brothers, sisters, and parents. I can't say thank you enough to my parents for everything they've done for us this week. They have taken such good care of me during this transition period!

Here are some pictures of our holiday!






You can see that I'm already enjoying the dressing part of having a baby girl! I made these leg warmers out of socks. Cute huh?

A New Bush in the Yard

On Tuesday, November 18th at 6:52am, Sophie Suzanne Bush joined our little family! She came about 2.5 weeks early so we were surely surprised! She weighed 7lbs, 9oz and was 20in long. She is healthy and strong and beautiful! We're so excited to have her here.

For those of you that want the whole labor story, here it is. If you don't really care, you have my permission to just scroll on down and see the pictures!

At midnight on Monday night my water broke. I wasn't sure if it was indeed my "water" breaking so we decided that we'd go to bed and wait to see what happened since I wasn't having any contractions and it wasn't quite as obvious as when my water broke with Jonah. So about an hour and a half after going to bed, I woke up and it was clearly my water that had broken. I still wasn't having contractions but we decided that we'd better get to the hospital since I needed to have antibiotics in my system for 4 hours before she arrived (Group B Strep).

We got the hospital at about 3am and they said they'd let my labor progress on its own for a while to see if it would pick up. By that time I was having contractions about 7 minutes apart. The doctor came in about an hour later and said it was looking good and he'd let me keep going to see if it would continue to get stronger. About 5 minutes after that, he sent a nurse in with pitocin...I guess he really wanted the baby to be born before his shift was up. We were pretty mad that he didn't give us a chance to continue on our own but we went ahead with their plan.

My contractions immediately got stronger and faster and within about an hour (around 5:30am) I was 5 and 1/2cm dilated (from a 3 when we got there). At around 6:30 my contractions were almost unbearable and at one point I told Jon that I needed to push during the contraction. He called the nurse in to check me and I was at an 8. She started setting the room up for the baby's arrival as I feverishly worked through each contraction. Jon helped me breathe and the nurse helped apply counter pressure (which helped and killed at the same time). After about 15 more minutes I was at a 10 (and screaming during contractions...hehehe) and they said I could go ahead and push. After 1 and ONLY 1 push, our little girl arrived!

I successfully delivered her naturally and feel that the recovery was different (easier) from with Jonah's birth. People have asked me to give a comparison of the two births and for now, suffice it to say THEY WERE COMPLETELY DIFFERENT. I can't say which I'd prefer at this point.....give me a few months to forget how much it hurt!

My mom has been here the last few days to help out and it has been wonderful. She's such an amazing mom!!! Jon has also been absolutely wonderful and has been my rock and support through the transition. Jonah is fairing well and has only bonked Sophie once so far. I'm going to start keeping her high and away from him so as to completely eliminate temptation. He knows her name and sometimes tries to share toys with her so I'm sure he'll come around eventually.

Here are the promised pictures! We'll be taking lots more in the next few days so I promise to keep posting them. We also have some video I'll be posting in a few days.

Here I am, braving the hospital food. If you can't tell, this is meatloaf...mmmmm!

Sophie had jaundice and we ended up having her under some "bili-lights" for two nights to lower her biliruben levels. Good news, though! Today after having her foot pricked, yet again, her levels were such that we no longer have to have her under the lights and we no longer have to take her to get tested! We didn't get her picture under the lights but just so you can all see what they're like, I've included a picture of Jonah when he was under them. The contraption is a suitcase with UV lights in it. It really is the most annoying thing because you have to cover their eyes and try to get them to calm down without being bundled up or covered with anything but a diaper.





You can see the two different methods for covering their eyes...neither is really that effective. Quite a pain in the butt, actually.

Baby Shower Fun

My dear sister, Laura, threw the most splendid baby shower for me last weekend. She held it at the boutique she works at called Dear Lizzie. It is the cutest place ever and the atmosphere was perfect for a baby shower. Dear Lizzie has a little bistro in the back where we sat and talked and ate!

When we planned the date, I didn't think anyone from my side of the family would be able to attend because its so close to Thanksgiving when everyone will be coming out here anyway. But I was very, very pleasantly surprised when I walked out of the bathroom and found my mom and Annie sitting there at the table. I doubled over and just bawled my eyes out---I'm sure the pregnancy hormones had everything to do with it!

Here are a few pictures of the festivities! You can see my belly...it is just so huge. I think it looks like I've stuffed a basketball in there. My next doctors appointment is tomorrow and we'll find out how close I am to being ready to deliver. I'm hoping she'll be early (safely early) and really think she won't be able to wait until the 5th of December.

Thank you to all my dear friends and family!!!

I'm taking guesses on when she'll arrive. Leave your guess in the comments!!!

At Exactly Midnight

Well, I'm happy to report that Jonah is doing much better. It has been quite the fight each day to give him his medicine but we've gotten it down and it is indeed working!

I, on the other hand, am not feeling fantastic tonight...or this morning. You'll notice the time of this post. Well, I'm having issues sleeping. It's amazing how during the day I can lie down and be asleep in a matter of seconds but at night, it's a different story. I've been lying in bed for 2 hours now with no sign of sleep. Grrrrr. It doesn't make it any easier when Jon gets into bed and immediately starts snoring (not his fault, but I'm a light sleeper and hate earplugs). So tonight I decided to hit the couch--or the computer, until the couch sounds appealing.

So what I really meant to post about was the fact that at exactly midnight (we know because we checked) our radio stations began playing Christmas music. Can you believe it?! We knew it was coming but when we actually heard it...weird! We decided we might have to boycott those stations for just a bit longer since they refuse to play more than 10 Christmas songs over and over.

Halloween was fun! Jonah strolled around Jon's work and immediately grasped the idea of taking candy from strangers and putting it in his bag. He dressed as a giraffe this year and was adorable! My favorite part of the costume was the butt because it was huge and just swayed back and forth when he walked. We went down to Springville to trick-or-treat with Jon's sister and our nieces and Jonah had a blast. We weren't sure he'd get it but soon enough he was mimicking his cousins and saying "tick-a-t" or something to that effect. I forgot my camera so I'll have to post pictures tomorrow. For tonight I'll show you the best Halloween costume I saw today...it just made me laugh!!!!

The best part for me was the red frosting on his eyebrows. Ahhh...I'm still giggling!

I guess I'll try to get some shut-eye now. Nighty-night!