It's a Wonderful Life

Yahoo, she's here!  It is so crazy to think that yesterday morning she was all bundled up inside me, and now she's a little person on the outside.  Anna Marie Nyholm was born at 1:03 pm, weighing 9 lbs. 11 oz and 22 inches long. On our way to the hospital.  I was so nervous, but so ready at the same time! The C- section went well.  I did freak out with the spinal block, but that's always the worst part for me.  I was really happy that they let me hold her while they were still stitching me up.  They also let me nurse Anna right away in the recovery room. She is just gorgeous and has already brought so much joy.  It is such a blessing to bring a baby into this world and our family.  We are truly blessed.

OK, so there are productive things I should be doing right now (finish cleaning the bathrooms, pack up my bag, finish folding the laundry, etc) BUT my energy level is next to that of a sloth, sooooo I'll blog instead :) Erik and I took advantage of our last date night for quite some time and went to Outback on Saturday.  Yummy! I thought it was so cute when I saw Jackson giving Wyatt a ride on the back of the tricycle.  They were both loving it.  However, Erik (and me?) have insisted on a new "no tricycle in the house" rule . . . poor kids :) (By the way, I hate when I take a picture in a messy room-- oh well!) Grammy sent a really cute St. Patrick's Day package for the kids.  They love the little St. Patrick's cups and plates.  Jackson immediately said it was time for a tea party. I was treated to another surprise baby shower on Monday.  This one was at Erik's work (so I guess technically it was for Erik!).  Tory arranged for Andrea to...

This morning I got my first pedicure (I somehow missed this right of passage my whole life).  While Janet was here she offered to take me and get a "pre-baby pedicure."  We never got the chance, and so before she left she gave me some money to do that.  It's totally something I would never think of doing on my own, but I was excited to have a reason to do it!  I emailed a few girls from the ward to see if they wanted to come, and with 6 of us there, it turned into a fun girl's time out.  I was so surprised when I got there to see they turned it into a little baby shower-- I felt so loved! :) I really wanted to get a picture of all of us there, but forgot my camera.  So, here's a picture of the yummy cupcakes that were brought and the balloons.  I don't dare show a picture of just my feet, because they are soooo swollen.  I tried putting on some sandals this morning and could barely stuff my piggies in!  I'm pretty sure I'm beyond cankles...

Even when they get into the bath with clothes on, or climb into a friend's car seat :)

Saturday, Erik and I took the kids on one-on-one dates again.  I asked Jackson what he wanted to do, see a movie, out to lunch, etc.  All he wanted to do was go to the toy store that I took Wyatt to last week.  Wyatt wanted to go bowling with Erik like Jackson did too!  It was funny and we all had a good time. It really was nice just being with Jackson.  It made me realize how old he is, because we just had great conversations the whole time.  He let me pick the place for lunch (Chipotle) and held the door open for me (after some coaching)-- what a gentleman! This past weekend we were blessed to have Elder Bednar (a member of the Quorum of the 12 apostles of our church) come to our stake conference.  There wasn't a reorganization or anything, we were just treated to some great counsel!  Our area authority, Elder Smith, came too.  It was so great.  We got a babysitter Saturday night, so we could go to the adult session and I was ju...

The Oscars were on last night! No matter what is going on in life, that is always a fun thing for me. This year was definitely lackluster in terms of the frivolity and fun surrounding it however. For the first time in 7 years I didn't correspond our menu to the nominated movies (can you believe it??) I guess it's hard to really get into menu planning if you don't know you can keep it down :) The other bummer was that we don't even get the channel the Oscars are on! Ever since we left Rexburg we haven't paid for dish or cable (well there was a 3 month period in Visalia that we got a great promotion and had it). Anyway, between netflix and hulu that we hook up to the TV, I feel it's pointless to pay. Also, we have a couple of digital antennas that manage to get the NBC and the PBS stations (yahoo!)  Last year in CA, we were able to pick up all the local channels so it wasn't an issue at Oscar time. I actually did debate getting cable just for this, and then I...

I'm sure this blog is going to ramble way too much for its own good, but I don't feel like seperating my thoughts into seperate posts.  Our week has been really busy, but busy with good things . . . I like that.  We had preschool at the house, and it went really well.  We only do a lesson on one of the days (the other day is strictly a playgroup).  It was on the 5 senses.  I loved coming up with things that fit that theme.  Wednesday and Friday the boys also had friends over as well, so they were quite the happy little social bugs! I found lots of pictures on the camera that Jackson had taken during one of his play dates . . . grrr, but still kind of cute. Wednesday was our ward's New Beginnings.  I was so so thankful that Janet had baked the sugar cookies while she was here.  All I had to do was frost and decorate them.  Jackson thought it was great fun to help.  He especially loved helping me make the seven different colors of f...