Milestones: 4 Months Old!

He always wakes up so happy!

Austin is now four months old and just had his four month checkup/shots yesterday. He is such a smart baby. As soon as the doctor walked in he knew exactly what was going to happen and totally freaked out on us.... poor guy :(. Just like last time, he cried for a little bit after the shots and then fell asleep by the time we got to the car. This time I was smarter and gave him the children's Tylenol BEFORE the after-pain set in and he did much better. He was a little grumpy and his legs hurt when you accidentally bumped them but overall he was pretty good. I enjoyed the extra cuddles too :). Josh was a little disheartened when Austin didn't want anything to do with him last night. I felt bad about that and had to explain to him that his son still loves him and that he just isn't feeling well and when you don't feel good you want your Momma!

At four months he is:

-25 inches long
-15lbs 4oz
-his head went from the 25th percentile to the 75th percentile!
-learning how to roll over but hasn't figured out how to get his arm out from under him once he does.
-loves to smile and laugh but refuses to do it for the camera. It's so frustrating!
-no longer taking long naps (sad). He is now a power-napper so we do our best to get things done in the 20-30 minutes we have!
-talking up a storm in his own language. It's so cute because he talks himself to sleep at night and we love laying there in bed listening to him.
-learning how to scream whenever he gets super happy. There was even a day when he lost his voice because he had been screaming so much! It's hilarious! He suddenly gets all this energy and just can't hold it in!
-still breastfeeding like a champ!
-starting to get really attached to Mom and has a hard time letting strangers near him. He instantly looks around to make sure I am there when they come near him.
-loving football time with Daddy. While I am at work Josh sends me pictures of the two of them chillin' in front of the TV. I can't believe he actually lays there and watches it! I think we have a future football player on our hands ;).
-changing almost daily. It seems like he looks different every time I look over at him! I went to Costco the other day to print off pictures and I couldn't believe the difference over the last 2 months!
-having fun with Dad at night playing games with his blanket while Mom is in the shower. Josh will put the blanket over Austin's head and then pull it away really fast and Austin thinks that is hilarious! He has even learned how to do it himself!
-lot more interactive and has fun playing on the floor with is little plastic keys and toy radio.

Pictures over the last month:

Saying his prayers :)

3 1/2 months

4 months: Can  you see a difference?

After his 4 month shots... poor baby :(

Getting cuddles from Mom after his shots

Little Rocky! bath/shower time is so much fun :).

Helping Mom bake brownies in our PJ's on a lazy Sunday afternoon.

I LOVE this outfit! He looks like a chubby guy who is getting ready to hit up the gym!

Giving Mom kisses

Our Austin.... oh how we love him!

Time Out For Women

I got to go to Time Out for Women in St. George for the first time this year and absolutely loved it! I was worried about having a baby there and not being able to pay much attention to the speakers (which was half way accurate) but I still felt the spirit and was able to hear some pretty amazing people give some pretty great talks! It actually was nice having Austin as my excuse to get up and walk around and look at the cool exhibits and stuff to buy while I listened to the talks.

 My family made a "girl trip" out of it which was the best part of the whole trip! My Mom, Briana, and I got a hotel room together and I brought Austin's bassinet so he wouldn't have to sleep on the floor (yuck). We wished we had gotten the room for an extra day because we weren't in it much and the heated indoor pool would have been a lot of fun, but now we know for next year!


I had a lot of fun catching up with my aunt Tammy and cousin Lara who drove down from West Jordan.

All the girls wanted to hold the baby

My Grandma Wiegel lives in St. George now so after TOFW we went over to her house and got to eat ice cream and talk with everyone. It was too hard trying to catch up during the conference so it was nice to have the ability to sit around the living room afterwards and chat.

Austin loves Great Grandma Wiegel! He couldn't stop smiling at her!

Waiting in line at the concession stand during one of the breaks. Yay for pretzels and diet coke!

So..... as my best friends from high school who went to France with me know, I tend to fall in love with giant paintings and then buy them without thought as to how I am going to get them home. What can I say? When I love it, I buy it! So here is the newest addition to our art collection :)... Let's just say it took a lot of effort and ingenuity to get it home.

Trust me, it's much larger in real life

Hanging out with a bunch of women that I love during a whole weekend of feeling the spirit of Christ was exactly what I needed! I can't wait for next year! And what was Josh doing that weekend you ask? His Dad came to visit and the two of them got to enjoy a whole baby-free weekend full of football, buffet lunch, and the movie theater! He can't wait for next year too lol!

Austin's First Halloween

We had such a blast this Halloween thanks to our little guy. He made the most adorable baby cow! He even had a little tail! My mom and sisters came over to celebrate with us and we all had a blast. Once Josh got off work we put Austin in his outfit and took him trick-or-treating for the first time. I have to give the kid props, he knows how to work it! He sat there in my arms holding his little Hersheys chocolate bar looking as adorable as possible in his cow outfit and people were literally dumping whole buckets of candy into his bag because they couldn't get over how cute he was! We all benefited from this of course ;). Josh and I took turns holding him because after a while of carrying a baby around the neighborhood your arms start to get tired. I just have to say, we moved into the best community! Everyone totally got into the holiday spirit! The houses were all decorated and even the adults were dressed up in the most elaborate costumes! It made us all realize what lame-o's we are because none of us had dressed up for Halloween in years. Next year though!

Austin was having so much fun that he fell asleep in Dad's arms as we were circling the block back to our house. We came home with all of our loot and ate our homemade pumpkin bisque I made in the adorable pumpkin shaped bread bowls my mom had bought and then watched Beetle Juice per Josh's request and pigged out on candy. He had bought the movie weeks ago and was dying for Halloween to come so he could watch it and relive his childhood. That guy makes me laugh so hard sometimes ;).

Austin getting his costume on

Gotta have your hat!

Too stinking cute!

Look at my tail!

Dad had a lot of fun :)

The gang (minus Josh who is taking the pic) out trick-or-treating

"Trick-or-Treat!"

"And I'm spent..." Sweet little guy had too much fun ;).

Sweet dreams little cow

MMMmmm pumpkin soup

Since the night was such a fun success, we have decided to make it a tradition! It's awesome how much fun having kids can be!

Torn

I have a long list of things to write about and catch up on in the blog, but right now I have a lot of feelings that I need to express somehow. I don't expect this to make sense to anyone but me because, SURPRISE! I'm the only one who can hear what's going on in my head! So right now Austin is watching Baby Einstein and I have a few minutes to think. Here it goes:

I feel torn. My heart is so full with love for my husband and my baby and my family and my job....basically my life! Yet I feel like I don't have enough time to love any of them enough. I never knew how much mothers give of themselves until I became one. I never knew the pain of coming home from work at 3am after working 30 hours in 2 days with 4 hours of sleep in between, and hearing your baby cry out for you. Why does it hurt? Well basically because I'm tired! I'm SO FREAKING TIRED! And I want so badly to go grab my son and hold him and love him back to sleep..... but there is breast milk I pumped throughout the day that needs to be put into bags in the freezer, and then of course there are the bottles and breast pump pieces that need to be disinfected, and there is my insane OCD side that won't let me sleep until I know that my house is put back into order and everything is clean, and there is the fact that I so badly need a shower after dealing with blood and body fluids all day, and if I have to go back to work the next day there is a lunch that needs to be made. So after I do all this and hop out of the shower as fast as I can so I can run to my baby's side, I realize that I haven't eaten since noon and there is no way it is happening now. Oh yeah, and what about sleeping? I find myself telling that person in my head that it's okay, you don't need sleep because there's this amazing chemical called caffeine you can load up on tomorrow! When I am lucky, Austin eats and then goes back to sleep easily which allows me to drift off into slumber for a couple of hours before he wakes me up again. But on the not so lucky nights (like last night) I spend hours rocking him and feeding him and singing to him until we both pass out and I wake up wondering how long I have been sleeping in the rocking chair for? I feel guilty. I feel like Austin needs a better mom. He needs a mom that has the guts to stand up for what she believes in and can say "screw you" to the world and quits her job on the spot because she knows that her baby is the only thing that matters. But I can't. I can't do that to my husband, and financially I can't do that to my family. I just can't....

Speaking of my husband, he's probably getting neglected the worst out of everyone! He has been living off of TV dinners and we literally go from Sunday to Wednesday night before we see or talk to each other (in person) because of our work schedules. He informed me the other night that it would be really nice to have a wife who cooks so he can come home to a home cooked meal once in a while and a piece of me died inside. I wanted to cry but I held it in because I have been doing that too much lately. I used to be that woman. I LOVE to cook and I LOVE the feeling it contributes to the home. But if I am having a hard enough time trying to get breakfast and lunch in, how am I going to make dinner? There are other sides of marriage that have been lacking lately, but it is too personal to delve into here so I will keep that part in my head. So all I can do is say, "Sorry Josh. You are my world and I love you more than anything... but I don't have the energy to be the wife you deserve."

Oh and what happened to friends and church and socializing??? Gone. All gone. I have friends from college who call and leave messages but I rarely have the time to get back to them. I have a best friend who lives in the same city as me and hasn't been feeling well, but do I have the time to go take care of her? Nope. And I honestly can't tell you how long it has been since I have gone to Relief Society and attempted to make friends at church. We sneak out after sacrament and take advantage of the Sunday afternoons we have to spend together before the week starts all over again.

We have lived in our new house since August, and I am just barely getting the decorating done (well, almost done). And what about cleaning the house? My sweet mother does random chores for me while she is here watching Austin and I feel so guilty because I know I should be doing it myself. Our master bathroom toilet is growing some weird orange fungus..... I know, TMI. But it's true! And there is no way I am going to ask her to clean it because I am so embarrassed!

I gave up on Pinterest because all it does is depress me. I get so excited to do all the crafts and bake all the food I see on there, but that excitement soon dies down once I realize all the work it takes to buy the ingredients/supplies. I read all the blogs out there that you perfect moms write and I feel so jealous. I feel jealous that you somehow find time to put on makeup and jewelry every day. I feel jealous that you are out there exercising and taking care of your bodies! I feel jealous that your children are growing up with homemade blankets, quiet books, and dolls that you made for them and that every holiday you make a new decoration for your house. And that reminds me... shouldn't I be reading more to Austin and helping him become really smart with all the time I am putting into expanding his mind? Yeah, I think I put that on the list months ago. Maybe tomorrow.

I guess you could say I am surviving. Let's just hope that is enough.

On the bright side! Yes, thank goodness there is a bright side ;). With all of this stress and lack of time, I am now 12 pounds lighter than I was before I got pregnant with Austin. That makes 46 pounds lighter than I was the day I gave birth to him. I am only 1 pound away from the weight I was on our wedding day and this morning I pulled out my size 4 pre-marriage jeans and I slipped right into them! I was so depressed the day I realized I no longer fit in them and sadly put them away in my cedar chest for that joyous day when I could wear them again. YAY FOR TODAY!! Who knows, at the rate I am going, maybe I will be buying size 2 jeans soon!

Please don't read this and think that I am on the verge of suicide or that I am ridiculously unhappy because that is definitely not the case. Like I said earlier, for a lack of better words, I just feel torn.

I have to go now. Austin is no longer interested in learning how to count to 10 in multiple languages.

Josh's 29th Birthday

Everything is different now that we have a baby. It is almost impossible to go anywhere and you really don't even want to try because it just takes too much effort. So we were very grateful for our lovely babysitters (Jura/Adrien & my Mom) who helped us make Josh's birthday so fun!

We started off by going out to dinner at Texas de Brazil on Friday night! Josh is such a carnivore so he was in heaven. I loved all the salad and sushi options they had and the lobster bisque was to die for!

It was so nice to be able to relax and eat for once without a little one hanging on me and crying for attention! Thank you so much to my best friend Jura!

 

 

Then on Saturday morning we took this little man to Logandale to have a sleepover with the grandparents! He had a lot of fun with everyone but I don't think I could go through that again. I missed him way too much!



Last picture with the baby before we left him for his big sleepover!

 

 

After we dropped the baby off, we headed to the Aliante Hotel and had the first night all to ourselves since Austin was born. It was so much fun (I'll spare you all the details) and it was so nice to just be us again. But seriously, by midnight I was lying awake missing my baby.... and I almost drove out to Logandale to get him. I'm glad I didn't though because my Mom said he did great and slept like an angel.

The birthday boy in front of our hotel.

 

It is so crazy to think that this is Josh's last year of his 20's and that we are parents with our college degrees and a mortgage to pay. We are getting so old! lol

Milestones: 3 Months Old

Our baby is three months old! People weren't kidding when they told us to enjoy it because it goes by way too fast. I see him changing daily and it makes me so excited but also sad because our baby is growing up.

At 3 months Austin is:

- Smiling constantly. He is such a morning person and wakes up with a big smile on his face that doesn't go away until nap time.

- Cooing and telling us all sorts of big stories in his own language. It is hilarious and the best part is when he laughs at himself because he thinks what he is saying is so funny!

- Not so big on nap time anymore (dang it!). Let me rephrase that, not so big on nap time whenever Mom is home. I've been told he sleeps just fine for Grandma. Either I'm just so interesting that he can't imagine sleeping when he could be watching me all day, or he is worried I might leave him (since I am a working Mom) and wants to constantly make sure I am there. Since he sleeps just fine as long as I hold him, but wakes up the second I put him down... I think it's the second one. This breaks my heart if that assumption is right.

- He loves watching this Baby Einstein movie about Jonah and the Whale. It is amazing because as soon as he hears the music from the movie, he immediately whips his head around and can't tear his eyes from the TV. His favorite part is the little red crab that pops in and out throughout the movie.

- His favorite color is red. Anything red draws his attention which is possibly why he likes the little red crab in the Jonah and the Whale movie.

- He likes music (like the Mozart that is played throughout his movie) and falls asleep to the acoustic guitar. Every time he gets fussy in the car, I play a song that has the acoustic guitar and he calms down immediately.

- And, as always, he makes us laugh daily with his silly faces. But this is nothing new :).

  

As soon as Josh comes home, these two are inseperable

We love sitting outside on the porch, enjoying the gorgeous fall weather

Bath time is always fun

One of the many silly faces I mentioned

Taking a nap at Great Grandma Helm's house

Eating lunch at the Henderson Farmer's Market

love my little family!

The Leaves Are Changing

Well, they would be if we had some trees out here in Nevada. There's just something romantic and comforting about fall. Suddenly the temperature cools, the pumpkin cookies and spiced drinks pop up everywhere, and I find myself wanting to be at home snuggling in a blanket, or making up a pot of homemade pumpkin bisque.

But that's not all that's changing.

Take Josh for example:

He Got A New Job!!! He loved working for NAHAC and had a lot of friends that he was sad to leave. But when a big opportunity presents itself, you can't let it slip away! Especially one that offers more money, better title, and job security (working for the federal government is pretty scary nowadays since dumb-a** got re-elected). We are pretty dang proud of him and I feel so lucky to have such a hard working husband for our son to look up to.

Josh also got a new calling in Church as a Stake Employment Guide. I'm not sure if that's the official title, but it sounds close. So every Thursday he will be helping people try to find employment in this terrible economy. I feel this is the perfect job for him since he has had so much experience in this area, and he is such a compassionate person.  

And then there's me:

I feel myself changing constantly, depending on what day it is.

On Mondays, Tuesdays, and Saturdays I am Nurse Ashly. That is truly what some of my patients call me and I smile every time they do. I don't know why, but it just sounds cute to me and it makes me feel so grown up. On those days I am saving lives, playing therapist, dealing with doctors who think their butt is gold, and trying to get enough sleep at night to go back to the hospital and do it all again!

The rest of the week I am Momma/Wife Ashly. I don't know how well I am doing in either of these two areas because I feel like there is just so much to do all of the time. But both of my boys seem to always have a smile on their faces so I must be doing something right. I spend my days/nights taking care of our beautiful baby boy which includes: playing, feeding, bathing, snapping cute pictures, going on walks, and changing lots and lots of diapers. While he is sleeping (if I'm lucky) I clean the house, plan meals, eat a meal (Austin doesn't like me eating because it takes attention away from him so I find myself going hungry a lot lately), catch up on errands, and prepare for all the company we constantly have coming over. I try to get some "me time" in each day so I watch a TV show, go to the gym, or hang out with my Sister Sadie when she has a day off. When Josh comes home we watch football, eat dinner (lately I have been cooking new recipes but for a while there we were eating a lot of take-out), and talk about our days.

I would have to say I have it pretty good and besides the lack of sleep, I don't have anything to complain about. The hardest part of life lately has just been trying to juggle my three different identities and trying to be the best I can be at all three of them, let alone trying to keep my own personal identity which makes four. I know Josh feels the same way and we try to help each other out the best we can so that neither of us feel like we are losing our minds.....at least not too much anyway ;).

And of course, Austin:

I feel like every time I look at him he looks bigger. He has learned to smile and is constantly making us laugh with his adorable little expressions. He has fun watching football with Dad, and enjoys his walks with Mom. He has even gotten used to Grandma Porter watching him while we are at work and has a lot of fun with her too! She is always sending me cute pictures of the fun stuff they do together and it makes me so happy that he is getting to know his Grandma so well. I have always been extremely close to all of my Grandparents and I am so happy that my son is getting that experience too. For a little while Austin was learning how to only wake up twice at night, but lately he has fallen back into his old ways of waking me up every two hours. I'm not sure why, but it seems to have something to do with his tummy not feeling well. Maybe the stress of working has messed with my breast milk? Or maybe it has to do with him drinking out of bottles more now that I am working and getting too much air when he eats? Whatever it is, I hope it ends soon because I am dying here and husbands are pretty useless at night since they aren't the ones with the ability to breast-feed.

Having ourselves a 49'ers kickoff party

Watching football with Daddy

So dang cute in his Kaepernick jersey!

Duck Down!

Kiss me I'm Irish!

We've caught on to his tricks. This is his "fake cry" face.

Hanging out at the mall with Aunt Sadie

He loves cuddling with Daddy when he gets home from work

Wearing his Utah onesie for the BYU/UTAH game! Of course, Utah won ;)

Cuddles with Aunt Briana

Stealing the show at Sadie's birthday party