A Day at the Park

Since the weather decided to grace us with blue skies and sun, and even a little heat, we thought we'd take advantage of it! We really needed to get out and move around a bit, too, and not just at a grocery store. So we went to McCollum Park in Everett, just down the street from our home, pet a friendly dog whose owner was parked next to our van, walked part of the trail and then ended at the playground. I'm so glad the parents/grandparents there were super nice because Aislin was playing with everyone's stuff, from one kid's bike to another kid's stroller! They just looked on her and smiled, waived it off and told me it was okay :)

Life in Everett

We moved yet again just a couple of months ago, but this time we only traveled about 45 minutes south. My parents, of course, are happy as can be because we're getting closer and closer to Kent! We already miss Mount Vernon's beautiful landscape but, on the plus side, the condo we moved into is pretty comfortable since it's only 5-years-old and one story, and spacious enough for our family of four; and being closer to Kent means trips home at least every other week :)
Tim's still working at Microsoft (for a vendor company called Insight Global) and doing really well, and his commute is a whoooole lot better! On busy days he takes his car, but on regular days (and when he wakes up early enough) he just drives to a nearby park-n'-ride and vanpools with other Microsoft employees. The driver is even part of our ward ;) So, even though he still has his late nights when he doesn't get off from work until 9 pm, his commute gets him home by 9:30 (as opposed to 11) so that we still have some time to spend together before going to bed.
Our ward is pretty friendly and super busy! We have a lot of investigators and, for our ward alone, four missionaries. We had heard from the missionaries in Mt Vernon that a lot of work was being done here, and now we know what they meant!
I've also met a few stay-at-home moms so far but a lot of the women in our ward work. It's a hit-and-miss thing. Funny thing is that I do most of my socializing in the Mother's Room these days, and sometimes even in the hallways. It's a cycle, and now I'm back to strolling through the hallways while trying to burp a child in my arms.
Aislin is just as energetic as ever. In fact, she's so energetic that I sometimes forget to breathe when she's jumping up and down in front of me. That's right--I forget to breathe. So I'm thankful for Netflix and all the children's shows/movies that she can watch instantly on the TV. On the other hand, all her jumping and jibbering seems to fascinate her baby brother, and watching the two of them play together fascinates me!
Desmond is at that age (3 1/2 months) where he smiles and giggles easily. I think when it comes to his dad, he likes to hear him make funny sounds; and when it comes to me, he just likes to hear me talk. He had a doctor's appointment last week (not a well-baby checkup, just a follow-up appt for his arm) and he weighed 17 lbs and measured 24 inches. We used to be so surprised by how big he was getting but at least he's growing in inches, too!
We have yet to update our family picture but here are some recent pics and a video of Desmond. He gets camera shy, so the only way we could catch him smiling is if we took a video!

Goofy girl!

Tim was "moo-ing."

@a library playgroup

@the mall

my favorite time of day--naptime :)

Sweeeeet :)

Welcome, Desmond Jay

Desmond Jay Sweet was born on May 31st, 2010, at 5:28 p.m. His due date was June 14, but he thought he'd beat out his sister in arriving earlier than she did (he was 2 weeks early whereas Aislin was 11 days ahead of schedule)! Thankfully I had already reached full term and it was Memorial Day, so my family was able to drive up and meet him the day he was born :)

Now for the labor story! According to my labor nurse, I wasn't really in labor. I could've finished out the early stage of labor from home, and it could've been days or weeks before anything changed, but this is how it happened:
My contractions started coming every 3 minutes for about an hour and then about every 2 minutes the following hour, so we called the doctor-on-call (it was near midnight) and she said, If this is your second child, you need to get to the hospital. So off we went with our little suitcase and Aislin, who was happy as can be to get out of the house.
When we got there, we learned I was indeed having contractions every 2 minutes and was 4 cm dilated. Since 4 cm was kind of the minimum requirement for being in labor, the nurse wanted to check me again an hour later to see if I progressed. At that time she said I had gone to 5 cm (although my labor nurse said it might've just been 4 1/2 at most), which was all the proof she needed to admit me. After that, my contractions reeeeeally slowed down. They had me walk around to get them back up again, but they were still very erratic. It was only because my contractions lasted a long time (in spite of being 8-10 minutes apart) that the doctor saw fit to start me on petocin.
Petocin goes up to level 20, which was what I ended up with after hours of sitting around and waiting for my contractions to hold onto some sort of pattern...but when that didn't happen, the doctor came in and explained that I could go home and let my body do its thing naturally or I could have my water broken--either one being perfectly fine with her; but first she needed to check me for dilation. Apparently I had gone from 4.5/5 to 6, which ruled out going home...so we broke my water!
About two hours later the contractions were grrrreat. It wasn't just back labor this time, it was all-over labor--back, front and even legs! So when squeezing Tim's hand and staring at the hospital floor stopped being effective, I requested the epidural...which turned out to be a total failure until the very last minute! Instead of removing the pain, it just relocated it. I ended up feeling sore under my left leg and a burning on my right hip. After they upped the dosage a bit and the numbness finally kicked in, it was time to push! I could still feel the contractions in my lower abdomen but it felt more like dull pressure, so I pushed as hard and for as long as the doctor asked me to and, about 12 pushes later, Desmond popped out and was placed on my chest :)
Thus was the birth of our second child!

Sweet Family Update

Since Tim and I are horrible at tracking my pregnancies, I thought I might as well post pics that others have taken of me!
In this one, I'm 21-weeks along. We went down to Kent to celebrate my parents' 29th anniversary, and my dad snapped this one of Tim and me before we all went out to dinner :)

This next one is more recent, taken at a Relief Society dinner just last week. The dinner was in celebration of marriage and family, so our hubbies were invited :) I was 26-weeks.

Our baby boy is very active and I've been feeling Braxton Hicks contractions since yesterday morning--and for the first time! With my first pregnancy, the only contractions I was ever aware of came hours before delivery and they were in my lower back...so when I felt BH contractions while still in bed yesterday, I thought maybe he was just kicking really hard. He was certainly moving more than usual so I couldn't really separate the two sensations, but one felt more like I was being poked from the outside instead of from the inside. It feels...weird and kinda hurts! Just one more trimester to go (although this pregnancy flew by anyway)!

In other news, Tim started a new job at Microsoft last week. After the hooplah with the job in Anacortes, he worked for a tiny local company that was trying to merge with another local company. While the former was so tiny that he and his boss were the only ones that were part of it, the latter was trying to survive an embezzlement issue. Things were not working out. Not only did they need Tim to help them take on their enormous work load, which had him working over 40 hrs/wk without overtime pay, his boss was a horrible manager who couldn't balance his books. He was days late in getting Tim his paycheck, and when he got the new job and tried to give his 2-weeks notice, his boss had to end his employment that same day because he couldn't even afford to pay him for his last five days. Instead, he let him keep his work phone, another cell phone and a server.

The new job, however, is one that Tim loves. It pays well (including overtime), offers health benefits and doesn't have him working with dusty computers at random businesses, like dog grooming places. The only downside is that it's in Redmond and his job doesn't really follow a 9-5 schedule. His schedule really depends on his workload and, although the extra pay from his overtime hours is awesome, it kind of sucks not knowing when he'll be home or if Aislin will get to see him before she goes to bed.

Of course the obvious solution is to move closer to his job, but we just moved here, we just got church callings, we've made friends and have even memorized street names! Usually we don't mind picking up and leaving, but we've never had to pick up and leave so soon...and we're so tired of having to start over again in a new area and a new ward.

Aislin's First Haircut

Yup, we finally cut her hair last night! Cutting her bangs when she was about 10-months-old was absolutely necessary so we never counted it as a haircut, but we weren't in a rush to cut the rest. Her hair was long enough to tie into a ponytail so we thought we could just let it grow out...but lately, looking for ponytail holders--especially before eating--has been a pain in the butt.
So last night, I just went ahead and cut her hair to her shoulders :)
Before:
After:

It's a Boy!!

I wonder if my OB will give me another ultrasound next week just to see for himself, since he had supposed (at 16 weeks) that it was a girl! It was just too early and, according to the technician we saw today, girl and boy parts tend to look the same at that stage.
So, quick side note: I strongly dislike having to drink 16 ounces of water an hour before the appointment, having to wait 20 minutes to be called in, and then having to wait through 10 minutes of measurement-taking whilst my bladder gets squished by that ultrasound-belly instrument. But of course, I was glad to know that all the measurements got a thumbs-up, the baby's spine looks good, and all is normal with him and me :)
We waited through all the measurements before finding out the sex because the baby wasn't in the right position to check the kidneys and genitals, even after I had finally emptied my bladder. I laid back down after coming back from the bathroom and the technician said, "Well, that didn't change anything... You have a stubborn one," to which Tim promptly replied, "Like his daddy!" (Jeeze, already taking after his dad....) But it didn't take him long to find the kidneys, and then the boy parts.
Before he said anything, I really wasn't expecting to hear anything new. I was ready for him to say it was a girl, but when he said, "It looks like you're going to have...a boy!" we flipped. We both looked at each other and started laughing--you know, that shocked/excited laughter that really doesn't sound like your everyday laugh? That was us--giddy and ecstatic all the way back to the car :P
No wonder the girl names we both liked never felt right...