Photo Shoot

Photo shoot four days after Porter was born.

Love this baby!!

Love how sleepy newborns are.

Means lots of cuddle time for me!!

Don't you just want to pick him up and kiss him??

I think he looks really different in this one. His hair looks so blonde...

Love my baby boy.

Our Baby Story

Introducing

Porter Cannon Brough

Born on February 7, 2012

6:30 PM Timpanogos Hospital in Orem, Utah

7 pounds 6 ounces

20 inches long

So I always thought that when I was pregnant I would go blog crazy and post every day about being pregnant and everything I was doing to prepare for a new baby... clearly that didn't happen. But he's here now!! And posts about an actual baby are probably more fun than the prebaby stuff anyway, right??

Maybe not.

Anyway, here's the story.

It all started on Monday the 6th. I was 4 days over due at this time, but wasn't going crazy or feeling too ginormous, just ready to be done.

I went in to the doctor at 9 AM to get my membranes stripped. At this point I was only dilated to almost 3 centimeters. Getting your membranes stripped is not the most pleasant of experiences, but it was definitely worth it for me! Once I got home the contrations started. First just tense and crampy then more and more frequent and clearly not just Braxton Hicks.

Zach came home from school and after feeling things out for a bit we decided that even though I didn't think the contractions were hurting enough ( like I could still talk and breath and stuff) that they were too close together to not at least be real labor.

So we drove to the hospital and got all set up to find out that I was only at a three. So we stayed for a couple hours to see if I could make it to a four but nothing was happening even though the contractions were good and real. So they decided to send me home with some pain killers (morphine and phenergen... I know pretty nice pain killers) to help me relax and get through the night while still contracting.

This was the best thing that could have happened to me. We got home, and by this time my mom and flown in and made it to Provo, and I had SUCH a good night's sleep. And once I woke up and got moving the contractions came back on and we were working towards baby again. These contractions were a bit different though. I don't know what other people's contractions feel like but these ones felt like big, heavy rocks weighing down on my hips and pelvis bones... Anyone else feel like that? Like it was more of bones rubbing pain than whole stomach, cramping stuff.

Anyway. I was scared to go back to the hospital and be sent home again. But once I couldn't do anything but scream OUCHY OUCHY OUCHY OOOOUUUCH through my contractions my mom said that we should probably go in.

We got there and found that I was still at a three... seriously? After contracting all night long? But after an hour of more ouchy contractions I finally made it to a four and was admitted!!

I had never been a patient in a hospital so all of this stuff was new and fun to me. The needles not so fun but still a new experience.

So the got my I.V. in, hit me up with an epidural, and I was in a very happy place. Getting the epidural was totally fine because the anesthesiologist was super cool and talked me through everything. The only hard part was dealing with contractions as all of this is happening. But let. me. tell. you. This stuff was awesome. To me it felt like that feeling when you're sitting on your bum for too long and it gets all numb and tingly... like that but down both legs. I didn't have total loss of feeling, like I could feel when someone was touchy my legs and stuff but when they would come to check my dilation and break my water and put in the catheter I was sitting pretty. One of the best things was not feeling baby squishing my bladder any more.

Ok continuing forward.

They broke my water and started me on Pitocin to try and really get things rolling. I was surprised they gave me pitocin so early since I was already in labor and stuff, but it worked really well and around 5:45 I was ready to start pushing!! Pushing was interesting because I could feel the urge to push (like the urge to poop... TMI?) and I could feel all the pressure and all the pulling and stuff the doctor was doing but I couldn’t feel actual pain. Crazy stuff.


I don’t know how many of you parents used the mirror to watch the baby come out, but I did and I really liked it and thought it helped me focus a lot better. I could see when he would get closer and closer to coming out and it helped me work that much harder. Oh it was so awesome and so much fun to be there with Zach working so hard to get this little guy out. This is the part that I thought was the most like what you see in the movies. Even though I wasn’t in pain, it took so much effort to breath and push and breath and push. And all the nurses and my mom and Zach were cheering me on and then he was out! It was the most amazing and exhilarating moment of my life! My baby boy was out. It took him a second to make some noise, but with that first breath of air and cry, I was in love.

This baby has changed our lives forever! My heart has grown like ten sizes and Zach and I are so grateful that we are all safe and healthy and together. This experience has been one of the most beautiful moments of my life. I love this little boy and my husband Zach so much and I'm so excited to be a mommy.

Loving life!

Things I'm Excited For

There are a lot of things coming up that I am super duper excited for!

1. Thanksgiving!

Zach and I are going home on Tuesday and we cannot wait to escape the cold and see our families.

2. Baby Shower!

While we're home I'm having a baby shower at my house on Saturday at 10:00 am if you want to join us. I can't wait to start getting baby stuff and rearranging my house so that it will all fit somewhere. I'm still on the lookout for the perfect white crib. I really like these ones from babies R us.

Which one would you vote for?

3. The end of the semester.

While this semester has been really great I'm excited for it to be over. I've had amazing classes that have really pushed me and helped me grow and my professors have been awesome. But with the end of the semester comes christmas break, and a little later baby brough!

4. Christmas

nuff said

5. Our baby boy!!

I've just reached the third trimester and I have a feeling that February 2nd is gonna get here before we know it... hopefully.

6. And the last one that won't be here till next year is...

Hunger Games!

Check it out

Homecoming

We had a bunch of fun this weekend at the Homecoming game. It was pretty chilly but we are true cougars now so we stayed and cheered on our team!! woo hoo!!

And we've been meaning to put up a belly picture for a while

so here ya go! Right now I feel like I just look kind of chubby

and not so pregnant, but give it a few weeks and hopefully

I'll stop making people feel awkward when they can't

tell if I'm prego or not.

Have a great week!

It's a Boy!!

Thought I should finally put up our babies first pictures.

We had soooo much fun at the ultrasound!

My favorite part was seeing the baby move and feeling it at the same time.

The picture above is the original and the picture below has

my drawings all over it to help explain.

And we are so excited that he's a HE!!!!

Our baby boy is already so cute. Can't wait to meet him in February.

Getting ready to Get Ready for Baby Brough

I love the look of this nursery I found on ohdeedoh.com through Pinterest. I think I'm going to try and go for light yellows and grey for the baby's room with accents of either blue or pink (to be decided in about a month, yay!).

But I wanted to show you the sweet rug in this room! The owner said it was a super special gift from an aunt or something and it's from, of course, Anthropologie. Which means it's gonna be way too expensive to put in a baby room, or any room of mine for that matter. Then I came across this other inspirational blog with the coolest project ever!!

Vintage Revivals has some seriously awesome stuff! And can you believe that she created this rug herself from two separate rugs?! I couldn't believe how great this rug turned out. So I'm hoping that maybe someday I can make my own rug patterned after the one above with the rug creating genius of the one below. Time will tell... Actually I guess D.I. will have to tell because that's probably where I'm going to get my rugs from.

So dang awesome.

Organized Clutter

Zach and I have recently decided that we're going to stay in this apartment for at least another semester sooooo I've decided to spruce some things up before school starts. Sometimes it can be really hard to make a boring, yellowy walled, student apartment look cute and feel like home, but here's one way that's super easy!! I've been seeing a lot of awesomely (?) organized bookshelves and wanted to try my own hand at it, and this is what I got. I actually Love it:)

I added the mirror and frame and flowers recently.

And we always had a clutter of books on top because

those are the ones we are currently reading so I just stacked them...

I know, I'm a genius to think that one up.

Then I gathered together the book that

had similar coloring and stacked those ones too.

I was surprised to see that I had any

that went together at all. I have to say that it

was way more fun than

putting similar heights together.

Then I found some fun nick knacks that I'm always

trying to stuff in some corner or side table

and placed them on top of my stacks.

(The wooden flowers we got on our honey moon to Costa Rica.

So glad to finally have a place for it:)

oh! And this little cup had my ring

in it when Zach proposed. :) Such a cutie.

Any way, thats my latest! And I didn't even have to go

out and buy ANYTHING! But I love how it turned out.

Hope others like it too.