Lent-Negative Change

Hey! To the newcomers, welcome to our family blog! It's not much, and that's probably my fault, but ever since reading this article, I have been thinking a lot about all the things in my life that play a bigger role  than they should, and which of those things I could go without.  I thought about a few things.  Sugar. Junk food. Fast food. Dr. Pepper. (notice how you can put all those things in your mouth?)  Well, I didn't choose any of those things.  Why? Because I've gone without one or more of those things for a long period of time already.  What would be the point if it was easy?  So I chose something that consumes a lot of my time and energies every day.  Social media, specifically Facebook and Instagram.  Hence this:

I know you have already seen it, but here it is again.  But really, contrary to popular belief, I don't know how to read a smoke signal, so please don't do that (especially if you're in Idaho).  I chose social media as my "negative change."   As embarrassing as it is, let me tell you why.  It was really easy to access Facebook and Instagram from the apps on my phone.  And that's what I would do.  Constantly.  Every hour.  Whenever I was bored.  Whenever I woke up with the baby in the middle of the night.  Before I got in the shower and after I got out.  I would say I accessed these sites at least 20 times a day.  Sad.  I didn't post to Facebook often because I didn't want anyone to know how often I was on there.  I posted to Instagram more regularly because, I mean, who can resist pictures of this cutie?

Anyways, I just thought I'd jump on here and say hello! And upload these for your viewing pleasure:

Man, we make cute babies!

Life with the Babe

Good morning everyone! If you look carefully, you will notice it's early, early in the morning. Thats because babies need to eat like every two hours or else they scream their heads off. Huh. And some babies take like 40 minutes to eat. Or else, you guessed it, they scream their heads off. Tanner is one of those babies. Tanner is almost 2 months old! I can hardly believe it. He weighs 8.14 lbs and is 21.5 inches long. According to babycenter.com, that means he is below the 5th percentile in both categories. I dont know if I believe that though. He is now in size 1 diapers and is starting to fit in some of his 0-3 month clothes. In the past two months, he has had the opportunity to meet his great grandmas and great grandpas, grandmas and grandpas, and almost all of his aunts and uncles (except uncle parker and uncle connor) and his cousins Lucy, Jack, and Jane. We got to skype with Parker and Connor (my brothers who are both on missons) on Christmas day, so he got to meet them that way. Connor is in Denver and Parker is in California. In the past two months we have pretty much has someone helping us all the time. My mom came down for 17 days when he was born, then after she left, Brennen's parents came down. After they left, we got a week to ourselves before flying to Idaho for Christmas. Tanner was such a good little traveller! We flew Southwest, which means we had to fly into Salt Lake and then drove up to Idaho. He slept through most of the flights and driving! He loves to fall asleep in the car and sometimes is asleep even before we leave our apartment parking lot. But, if he's not sleeping in his carseat, he usually doesn't like it. He is now 2 months old and is smiling and talking more! He gets the most smiley right after eating and when I'm changing his diaper or when he is in the bathtub. He isn't a great sleeper - it takes a lot of effort to get and keep him asleep. Sometimes I haveti lay him down in bed next to me and try not to fall asleep while I just cuddle him. We have discovered that he is now more aware that he has limbs, but can't seem to control them well, even while sleeping. If he moves around too much he will wake himself up, so he has to be held. Well, I can hold him every minute of the day, so he gets swaddled and i put a rice pack on top of him for pressure. He is sleeping better at night - in stretches of 4-6 hours. Naps are trickier though. That's about all we have been up to!

Tanner's Birth Story

I'm sorry for neglecting our little corner of the internet, but that's just about how exciting our life is. Haha. That is, until we had a baby! Tanner William Larsen was born on November 18, 2014 at 5:02 a.m. weighing 6 pounds, 6 oz and was 19.5 inches long. If you remember, my due date was December 2, so he was exactly 2 weeks early and quite the surprise.
Sunday, November 16th was a pretty normal day. This was the day of the Phoenix Temple dedication , so there were no regular meetings, just the dedication.  Later that afternoon, brennen and i went for a long walk at the nature preserve near our home. That next morning,  around 1 am, I started having some cramping in my abdomen. I wasn't really worried about it and didn't think much of it until it stared coming and going and keeping me awake. They weren't super bad, but they didn't go away, were lasting about 30 seconds and we're 7 to 10 minutes apart. I called my work to let them know I wouldn't be able to make it in, and spent the day timing contractions. All day I had no change in the frequency or duration,  so I just figured I would go to my doctor's appointment the next morning and ask about it. Since I hadn't gotten much sleep the night before, we headed to bed around 9. About 10 minutes after I laid down, my contractions got worse and closer together. I monitored them for about 10 minutes.  They were about 30 to 45 seconds long and 3 minutes apart. We decided to head to the hospital so they could check me out. When we got there, they monitored my contractions for about an hour and then checked my cervix. I was 100% effaced and dilated to a 4! The nurse called my doctor and I was admitted around 10:30. I received that blessed epidural at 11:30 and they checked me again. I was dilated to a 6! They told me to get some rest (haha, ya right!) and left us alone for a while. At 2 am, the doctor came in and checked me again. I was still at a 6, so she broke my water and propped my leg up on th e peanut ball. If you have never heard of the peanut ball, it's exactly that. It looks like an exercise or yoga ball that got cinched in the middle. It seems silly, but 20 minutes later, I was fully dilated and started pushing at 2:30. Let me just say this: pushing is hard. Especially when you can feel nothing down below. About an hour and a half into pushing, I started to feel some pain in my right hip. Basically for some reason the epidural stopped working in that part of my body and i could feel every. Single. Contraction. It was no fun. I told my nurse, but she just acted like I was crazy and had me keep pushing. So, I used it to my advantage. I could actually feel when I needed to push, and it wasn't when she was telling me to, and after that, it actually went a lot faster. Tanner arrived at 5:02 am, and the rest is history!  Childbirth is no joke. It was as hard as I expected it to be, and my labor was actually not as bad or as long as I expected, but it was still hard and totally worth it.

Ketchup

Oh. My. Gosh. Has it really been 7 weeks since my last post? You guys, I'm terrible at this stuff. Terrible. Well anyways, if you follow me on Instagram or Facebook, you pretty much know what's going on in my life. Nothing. Bit, since it's been a while, here's an update.

Baby Larsen ' s 20 week stats:
Size: about 6-7 inches, about the size of a mango or small cantaloupe.
Weight: a little over half a pound- about 10 oz
Gender: it's a BOY!
Movement: little dude's a freaking acrobat! He was trying to do backwards summersaults and was standing on his head the whole time at our last ultrasound! The tech was not impressed. He is constantly wiggling and moving around.  I can especially feel him when I'm trying to go to sleep because I am so still. The other night he kicked so hard I could see it from the outside! I tried to let Brennen feel it,  but then he stopped because I moved.
Cravings: food in general. I just seem to be always wanting something to eat. I gained 9 pounds in 6 weeks, and it definitely wasn't all baby!  So I'm trying to cut back on my portion sizes and not eat when I'm bored because the more weight I put on, the more I get to take of again after he comes. Don't worry, I'm not starving myself or anything,  just stopping when I'm full.
Weight gain: since we're on the subject...I'm like 114 right now. Thats 12 lbs more than my previous pregnancy weight. I'm packing on, and it's scary because I've never been able to gain weight before and now there's nothing I can do about it until he comes. I dont know how easily it will come off, so I'm trying to not gain any more than I absolutely have to.
Sleep: getting more and more uncomfortable since now I can't sleep on my back anymore. Sleeping on my side is getting pretty old. I will be fine until about 4 a.m. and then I only get little snippets of sleep.

We are so excited to be having a little boy! For a while I was 99% sure it was a boy. I didn't even think about having a girl. Well, turns out mother's intuition was right! He is most definitely a boy! since I became pregnant, my desire for shopping has really lessened.  But once I found out the gender,  that desire came back with a vengance! I've already got a few outfits, plus a bouncer and baby carrier from a lady in my ward. Our next door neighbors have a little boy about 2,  and they are moving to Puerto Rico for graduate school and have offered to give me a ton of stuff they can't take with them. We are so blessed to have people around us that can help us out! Ok, enough words, time for pictures!