Playing "house" with our new arrival

Joshua Steven Monson was born Wednesday June 17, 2009 at 2:47pm. He was 20 inches long (including his rather severe conehead) and weighed 8 lbs 3 oz.

This is me after the epidural was given, as indicated by the fact that I am smiling. Contractions started Monday night at 11:17pm. After 5 hours of labor, they died down a bit going on about every 30-60 minutes. It was frustrating to think that the baby would be coming on Tuesday when in fact, he decided to hold off for another day.

We went to the hospital at 9:30pm on Tuesday night after a good celebration of Quinn's birthday at the Sandy Aquarium and then ice cream at the Gibbons household. When we got to the hospital, frustratingly enough, the contractions pretty well stopped. They sent us home, after giving me a sleeping pill. It was about an hour later (midnightish) when my contractions became severe. Steve was very worried about me because the sleeping pill was honestly making me delirious (enough so that I didn't know who he was a few times) and he monitored my contractions for about an hour an a half before he drove me to the hospital again--2:30am.

My water broke in the hospital and they were quick to give me an epidural soon afterwards. I slept soundly for the next 6 hours. It was a beautiful thing.

Joshua took 3 hours to push out (absolutely exhausting) and the doctor ended up using foreceps. Because he was face up, he ended up with a much larger conehead than most.

Joshua was also very pale when he was born. They worried that he may have had a pinched umbilical cord, so I didn't really get to see him for 4 hours after he was born.

This was the 15 seconds that I saw him after birth.

Our family!

Proud daddy.

This is his going home outfit. It was the smallest newborn outfit that we had and it still drowned him when it was on.

The car ride home had the desired effect.

We've had lots of visitors: Kevin and Kristen, Emily, Shauna and her kids, Elise, and Mark and Ada all made it to the hospital to help us welcome him to the world.

Happy Fathers Day Steve!

And now we wait...

Here was our Memorial Day picnic. Matt and Emily had the same idea we had, so we all joined together and had a big picnic. Quinn seemed to like the food.

Mikayla is just a doll. I'm pretty sure she gets cuter everyday.

Watermelon was a hit.

And Matt and Emily found some really good sandwich meat. It was fun to get to a park and eat on a big blanket.

Thats what it has felt like lately---waiting. I'm ready to play with this baby! I'm fully aware that everyone says "The baby is easier to take care of in there than out here." Thats okay.

Bring it on.

In the meantime...

I made curtains and a cute little pillow for our glider in the baby's room. The curtains took a while, since I didn't have a blueprint, but I'm excited about how they turned out! The curtain rod is made of PVC pipe, two little ends to go with it and a couple of bent hooks. Total for the rod was $3. Very worth it!

One of mine and Steve's best friends, Greg Sorenson, had a birthday bonfire up in the canyon. It was fun to get out and see a bunch of our friends that we haven't talked to in a while. During a rare moment of boredom, we made goldfish s'mores. Its a lot tastier than it sounds! I also tried roasted Starbursts for the first time. Interesting. We took a picture together, but we both blinked really badly because of the flash.

I introduced Steve to my favorite pie--lemon meringue. SO good!

I think Steve liked it too.

Here is the latest picture of me taken today. Don't mind the no hair done and lack of makeup. Also ignore the fact that I look like I haven't slept in a while. I really do sleep just great! :D I guess I won't be saying that for much longer. Two days until the due date!!!