Bentley's 2 month

Bentley's 2 month appointment went well today. He is healthy which we are grateful for.

Here are his stats:

Height: 22.5 inches   29%

Weight: 11.1 pounds   32%

Head: 15 inches  10%

All of his percentages have increased this month except for his head. So he may be small, but he is at least going in the right direction for the most part.

Bentley has not been the easiest baby, he is not sleeping through the night yet and doesn't sleep much during the day either. He seems to be pretty colicky and wants to be held a lot. I have tried getting him on a schedule, but it seems to go differently every day. He also doesn't do great with a binky, but will take it occasionally which is helpful as long as you are holding him and putting it back in his mouth when he spits it out every 30 seconds. He'll get there someday.

Despite him being a bit more difficult, he is fun to cuddle and is great at giving sweet little smiles and even giggles. When I can make him smile and laugh at me it melts my heart. He is beginning to really focus on lights and sounds around him. It is fun to see him start developing and hopefully within the next few months he will start sleeping better and his poor little belly won't be so gassy.

 His first nap in his new bed. We had him in a basinet while Jayda was still using the crib.

All aboard the potty train!

This past week has been a big one for our little 2 year old. She transitioned into a big girl bed and started potty training. This was a step that as parents we weren't quite ready to take, but little miss thing had other plans. She started telling us that she needed a diaper change immediately after she had gone to the bathroom. We would also find her in the morning stark naked. She just hated having a wet diaper on. So we moved her into my old day bed and let her get used to that for a few nights. She has loved the bed and we have not had any issues with it. I was really afraid of this transition but for the most part she stays in her bed and is really good.

Conference weekend was the perfect weekend to start the potty training because Bryce didn't work Saturday and with me going back to work we would have no time that both of us were around enough. The first day was hard. She had five accidents and didn't quite understand the process. Day two started out with an accident but then she finally got it and was a little scared at first but was really excited when she got to pick out a candy from the bowl. In the next day or so she was able to pee on the toilet almost every time and by Tuesday she was 100% accident free. She is amazing! This was my number 1 fear of parenting and has not been as traumatic as I thought.

I don't believe it's because we did anything special, I know it's because she was more than ready. She is a smart little cookie and we are VERY grateful that this has been a smooth transition.

The next test for her is going to be how she handles being at a daycare all day. :(

Our sweet little thing likes to line things up evenly on desks, window sills, etc. We found her on the stairs just hanging out with all of her toys neatly in a line next to her.

 Her potty chart is now full of stickers!

 Waking up from her first night in her new bed.

Liberty Park

Liberty Park is one of my favorite places to visit in the summer because of all the ducks and geese you can feed. The last 2 times we have driven into Salt Lake to try to feed the ducks have been unsuccessful so we were happy to see that there was actually water in the pond and that there were no crazy hippy fests going on! We took Jayda for the first time and she is just like her mama. She loved it and was fearless.

What a great way to spend some family time together on Bryce's only day off that week.

Newborn photo shoot

Newborn pictures are my favorite thing. I searched the internet a lot and found a photographer who was cheap and that had really great pictures so I was really excited to schedule a photo shoot with Ashley at Miles of Memories Photography. She took these pictures in her home and we are really happy with how they turned out. The only thing I wish is that babies looked like newborns a little longer, they change so fast that you have to get their pictures taken within the first week or so and I was still really swollen even in my face. It's not about me though right? Right.
Jayda didn't want to have her pictures taken so we were lucky to even get these two pictures with her and her brother.

2 week stats

Bentley had his 2 week appointment today. He was able to get rid of the blue light last Thursday and the Dr says he is looking good. I think these 2 week appointments are probably just as much for the mothers as they are to check on the babies. I have all of these fears (probably irrational) that were nice to be able to talk to a doctor about and have them pacified. Newborns are always a little scary, but with the whole jaundice thing I have been extra paranoid.
Bentley seems to be pretty opposite of Jayda in his features so far. His nose is a little bigger, his chin is a little bigger, his cheeks are MUCH smaller, his ears are shaped differently and are pinned back more and his hair is lighter. He is also on the small end of the spectrum where Jayda was on the larger end. His 2 week stats are:

Weight- 7 pounds 12 ounces 23%
Height- 20 inches 18%
Head Circ- 13.8 inches 13%

This is Benltey's alien machine. It had to be plugged into an outlet at all times so we spent a lot of time holding him and watching movies.

Bentley smiles a lot and we were lucky enough to capture this one on camera. He is a lot like Jayda in that way so hopefully he will be a happy kid like she has been so far.

A Family of Four

We officially became a family of four on Sunday night August 7th at 3:19am. Bentley weighed 7 pounds and 4 ounces and is 20 inches long. I started having contractions at 8:30pm. They were much more painful than the ones I had with Jayda and they were every 3 to 4 minutes. We waited for about an hour and then decided that we definitely needed to go to the hospital. We dropped Jayda off at my parent's house and checked into LDS at 11pm. They made me wait for an hour to see if they were going to keep me. When that hour was up I had progressed from a 3+ to a 4+ so luckily I got to stay. My contractions were so painful I would have cried if they had sent me home. After that I got my epidural and Dr K broke my water at 1:30am. Everything went very quickly after that. I was progressing so fast that Bentley's heart rate would drop down to 90 each time I had a contraction and they were having a hard time finding his heartbeat so they put oxygen on me and stuck a heart rate monitor in his head. This made me very nervous but I tried to stay calm so it wouldn't affect him even more. In 15 minutes I went from a 6 to an 8 and then within the next fifteen minutes I pushed 3 times and that was it. He had his cord wrapped around his neck but Dr Kasteler was really calm about it and just quickly slipped it off.

The cute nurse on the left was 9 months pregnant herself and was supposed to be on bed rest. She was also working her first graveyard shift, poor thing.

Jayda loves her little brother and likes to hold him and know where he is at. She has adjusted extremely well and has acted like having a brand new baby at home is completely normal. We have been really grateful that the transition so far has been relatively easy for her. She is such a sweet big sister.

Just like Jayda, Bentley was borderline for jaundice when we left the hospital so we tried to give him some sun to help his levels. Unfortunately when we took him back two days later his levels had jumped from 8.8 to 17.4 and he had to be put on blue light phototherapy. We brought him back on Friday to check him again and hopefully get rid of the machine, but he had only dropped to a 16. I am grateful for the machine, but it makes things a little difficult when he has to be plugged into an outlet for the majority of the day. We are keeping our fingers crossed that on Monday he will be better.

We have had lots of visitors at home and at the hospital. I haven't been good about taking pictures of everyone, but we have really loved having everyone visit and are grateful for the meals and all of the support we have received.