TWO

I don't know when it happened, but suddenly my baby isn't a baby anymore! These last 2 years have gone by way too fast. Even though I hate how fast Asher is growing up, he is more fun than ever right now. Seriously, we just can't get enough of him.

Asher is so funny. He makes us laugh every single day. He is so playful. His favorite thing in the whole world is being chased around, especially by Tim. He also loves to "scare" us or pretend that Greyson is getting him.He loves dinosaurs, tractors, trains, and all kinds of trucks, basically anything you would expect a little boy to love. He always watches out the windows to see the tractors and trucks working outside on the houses being built in our neighborhood. He carries his little tractors and trains around the house all day long. He also loves to play outside and ride his tricycle or even just sit on the porch.

We are blown away all the time by how smart he is. Maybe we are just extra proud parents, but it's unbelievable how quickly he learns and the things he understands. He often speaks in sentences, understands and speaks more words than I can even keep track of, sings songs like abc's, popcorn popping, itsy bitsy spider and twinkle twinkle little star. He talks so cute, it makes me a little sad when he starts to pronounce words correctly instead of in his cute baby talk.

My favorite thing about Asher is how sweet and loving he is. He is always willing to give hugs and kisses and will even say I love you. Sometimes he will just walk up to me and say "Kiss, Mommy" and give me a kiss and a big hug. He is great at saying please, thank you and excuse me. If Tim or I ever get hurt or seem upset he will always ask if we are okay and give us hugs. He is wonderful with Greyson. I never have to worry about Asher hurting Greyson (on purpose, at least, sometimes he loves him a little too much!). Although, Asher has tried to ride Greyson a few times but luckily we have been able to stop him before he actually does! He constantly tries to share his toys with Greyson, talk to him and kiss his head. I am confident that they will be great friends!

We have been so blessed to have Asher in our family. Even though he definitely has his 'two year old moments', we couldn't love him more. Even when he is being a handful or throwing a fit he's still pretty darn cute! We are so lucky and grateful to be his parents, he is one amazing little boy!

Greyson is one month

This first month has gone by so fast! In so many ways it has been a lot easier than I expected to have 2 kids. I am so grateful for that! I suppose already being used to getting up early and having no time to myself has helped this time around :)

Greyson is a wonderful baby. He is so sweet and cuddly, I love this newborn stage. He is a great sleeper. He has slept at least 3 hours in a row at night since he was born. Most nights I only have to get up with him once, sometimes twice. He has seemed to have some tummy troubles, which makes him uncomfortable sometime, especially in the evening. We have had a hard time finding a good formula for him, but after trying a few I think we are making some progress. I'm hoping what we have him on now will be a keeper.

I can tell he is getting big! I am not sure how much he weighs now, but at his 2 week check up he was exactly back to his birth weight at 8lbs. They measured him at almost 21 inches, which makes me wonder if they measured him incorrectly when he was born. He was only 19 inches at birth, and I don't think he has really grown 2 inches already but who knows! Either way, he is super adorable.

Asher loves Greyson. He constantly wants to pick him up, show him his toys and kiss his head. It's super sweet. I am pretty sure these two will be great friends. It will be so much fun when Grey is big enough to run around with Asher.

Somehow we ended up with two of the cutest boys ever! Seriously, do they come any cuter than this? I don't think so! Also, I swear we have a photo of Asher that looks exactly like the 2nd one of Greyson in the bassinet! I'll have to post some comparisons of the two of them.

Greyson's birth story

Our sweet Greyson joined our family on Friday, May 17, 2013. He has been such a sweet addition to our little family and we could not be happier to be a family of 4.

Warning: This is a birth story, so if you don't want pregnancy/labor details, you may want to skip a couple of paragraphs. I'm putting it all here for my own memories.

My original due date was May 28, and I was scheduled to be induced on the 21st if he hadn't arrived yet. We had pretty much been planning on him coming on the 21st. We didn't expect him any earlier than that since Asher was not early at all, until I had my last appointment on Wednesday. I was dilated to a 4 1/2 already so we realized there was a really good chance he could show up earlier than we expected. After that, we tried to make sure we were as prepared as we could be, just in case, and finished up all of our last minute prepping by Thursday afternooon.

Thursday night, just before midnight Asher woke up crying. I went to his room to help him back to sleep and ended up falling asleep with him in the rocking chair. I woke up about an hour later thinking that my water broke. I ran to our bedroom to wake up Tim. We gathered all of our stuff, took Asher to my sisters, and headed to Riverton Hospital. We got there around 2 am. At that point I was having contractions every 5 minutes or so. While in triage, the checked and determined that my water had not broken, but that I had actually lost cervical fluid due to the contractions while I was sleeping. Since my water was still in tact they weren't sure they were keeping me but after being there for about an hour my contractions were about 3 minutes apart and pretty painful. I was so happy when they finally admitted me into a room. I received my epidural around 4 or 5. After that, Tim and I tried to get some rest for a while. Things were moving pretty slow after my epidural so I was given some pitocin. I was surprised how long things took to progress. Since I wasn't having any pain though it was actually nice to have some time to rest. I hadn't slept at all that night other than while I was holding Asher. I was in labor for about 12 hours, about the same as with Asher. Once it was time to push though he was here in less than 10 minutes. He was born at 12.15pm.

He was so perfect and handsome already. He weighed in at exactly 8lbs, and measured 19 inches long. One of the first things we noticed was that he was loud! And that he looked just like Asher as a newborn, only with brown hair instead of blonde. We were able to spend quite a bit of time cuddling and nursing him before moving to our room. 

Our stay at the hospital was not bad at all. It was pretty quiet and we had a lot of time to cuddle with Grey. He did have a difficult time nursing and we realized that he was tongue tied. His tongue was clipped Sunday morning. Unfortunately, it didn't help with his latching but I'm glad we did it anyway. It should help prevent speech delays caused by the tongue tie. Asher came Friday afternoon to meet him, he was not that interested and was way more into checking out the room than Greyson. Asher stayed at our house Friday night with Tim's dad and on Saturday Tim was able to go home to be with Asher. By the time they came Sunday morning Asher was much more interested in Greyson and was excited to take him home with us.

We came home Sunday morning and were able to relax a little with out cute boys. Asher loves Greyson. We have been so pleasantly surprised at how well Asher has transitioned to having Grey around. We love our boys so much. It has besn so wonderful to have Greyson with us. It feels like he has always been a part of our family!

A few more house photos...

We have countertops!

Dining area

Bathroom light

Stairway chandelier

Family room

Our House

We have been patiently (or not so patiently) waiting to move into our new house for a few months now. It is finally SO close! We should be moving in just about 3 weeks from now. It's hard to believe the time is really almost here. We are so excited, we love it more and more each time we walk through and see the progress.

I mostly just took photos of the outside of the house up until now, since the inside didn't look like much until it was painted and things started coming together, but here are a few photos from along the way :)

Master bath shower floor

Almost finished on the outside

My favorite room in the house so far, I love my white cabinets!

Desk area in kitchen

Master bath shower and tub

Kitchen backsplash

Countertops

Cabinet sample for kitchen island, bathrooms and front door

Stone for outside pillars

January Photos

Bye bye binky!

We are so proud of our Asher! He has always loved his binky. I have been dreading taking it away for months. Our original plan was to be down to naps and night by 18 months and gone for good by 2. Since we are having another baby though, right before Asher turns 2, we felt like we needed to work on it now.

We took it away on Thursday, Jan 10 before bedtime. We had a few rough days after that, especially naps. Asher usually naps for about 2.5-3 hours everyday. Without the binky, he was only napping for about 45 minutes. By Saturday I was ready to throw in the towel. I think it was harder on me than on him! I decided I would stick to it a couple of more days and see how things went before giving in to the binky. On Sunday, Tim pointed out that Asher had been chewing on his hands way more than usual, I figured he was missing the binky but Tim suggested that he might be teething. He was right! That night before bed we noticed a molar poking through. Talk about some major mommy guilt! I felt awful that we took it away right when he was teething, and probably needed it the most. Once he had some tylenol and a teething ring he was much happier! In no time he was back to great naps and going to sleep easily at bedtime. He has been perfectly fine without it, I am starting to think he didn't care about the binky being gone at all! I am so proud of how well he has been doing. And hopefully it's long forgotten by the time the baby comes!

I have been feeling guilty lately, like we are forcing Asher to grow up too quickly. With the baby coming not only did we need to take care of the binky, but he will also be moving to a toddler bed soon. Asher is such a little boy these days, though. He learns new things all the time and surprises us daily with the things he knows and does. I still feel like he is my little baby though, and I want him to stay that way a little longer! It makes me happy that he did so well giving up his binky. Hopefully the toddler bed goes just as well!

Here are some cute recent photos of our boy!