Guess Who?

My mom kept saying how much Avril looks like I did when I was a baby and pulled out the picture to prove it. Which one is Avril and which one is Mommy? Scroll down and check us out!

Answer:
Top: Avril
Bottom: Alicia

Aren't we cute?

Grandma Parkinson's BDay!!

Amidst all the baby excitement, Grandma Parkinson had a birthday!! She celebrated her 60th bday today. Doesn't she look fabulous for turning 60?

Beautiful birthday flowers brought over by the great grandma and grandpa Parkinson. I think they are orchids? Gorgeous...

Great grandma, Grandma, Mommy, and baby Avril :)

Aaawww, Great grandma is such a natural with babies...

Uncle Jared, the birthday Grandma, and little Avril singing happy birthday!

So cute!
Happy Birthday Grandma. We all love you sooooooooooo much!

Avril Arrives!

On Tuesday, February 24, 2009 Avril Carmel Yarger entered the world at 5:36pm. The 8 pound 3 ounce baby is a brunette and has dark, dark, big eyes. The eyes are now blue, but she remains a brunette. The three of us stayed in the hospital until late afternoon Thursday. She is now eight days old and a handful for us, but we are loving every minute (except maybe the late night and early morning ones). So far she has been a good baby and now is only waking up two or three times a night. She is always hungry and loves her mom's chest. Though this baby is a major blessing, we think we are going to be waiting awhile until the next one for sure.

Despite the evidence to the contrary, she has ten toes. I made sure I counted after seeing these footprints. You'll notice the doctor is Dr. Firth. He did an amazing job delivering Avril after only conducting two prenatal visits towards the end of the pregnancy becuase we came back from California really close to the due date. The delivery was anything but routine, but he insured we came home with a healthy baby.


Here is Alicia, Jared and I in the delivery room around three or four hours of labor. Alicia was super excited to not be pregnant anymore.


Avril's great grandparents stopped by to see the mom-to-be just before she gave birth.

I know this cry very well by now...

This is Avril just after the Apgar test and before she left the delivery room. I know babies can't see very well at all when they are born, but she is totally scoping me out to see if I'll be a good dad.

Another 5 minute old picture of the baby...

And this is the first time Avril got to look at her mommy and the first time mommy got to see baby Avril. However, mommy was pretty drugged at this point so we are hoping Avril didn't get a bad first impression.

Here is Avril's proud grandmother. She now has two grandchildren and couldn't be happier with them.

The smiling Uncle Chubbs, daddy, and Grandpa Bryan pose for the camera in the recovery room.

Avril started to tell grandma to take the picture of her good side, but fell asleep in mid-sentence and decided to wave.

We're a family now!

She was the most stylish eskimo in the whole hospital. This is Avril in her carrier all ready to go home. It was snowing outside so we bundled her up in style.

This sign was displayed on a bridge by our house. It was put together by our good friends the Murdocks.

Amy (whose two-year-old son, Taggart, is now dating our daughter) is shown teaching Alicia how to use the breast pump. However, we later found out that Avril eats so much that the breast pump isn't that necessary most of the time. Taggart is going to have to make a lot of money to support Avril's eating habits. We are really pulling for his train engineering career to work out.

Avril just got to meet her grandma Carme. She was overwhelmed with tears of joy.

Here she is again pretty in pink.

This is definitely one of my favorites. She is pretty good-looking if I do say so myself.

Still cute even though she wasn't the happiest girl at this point.

And she is checking out her fingers and making sure she has ten and that they all have good nails.

Amelia Bedelia is Avril's favorite book. She has heard it two and a half times so far. The reason for the half is she decided she wanted to eat instead of read.

Alicia put this together with some shots she took on her phone. Mommy is quite the creative cat!

Avril was overcome with enthusiasm when we were watching American Idol :-)

P.S. Jesse (me) was the winner of the baby guessing contest. I guessed that Avril would arrive on the 24th of February. Alicia has to pay up now! Thank you all for participating. I think Erka was the next closest with Feb. 23rd as her guess. Congrats to me!

Getting Ready for Baby Avril(le)

We finally got our car seat and we're so excited. Now it feels official. We have something to bring our baby home from the hospital in. Thank you soooo much to our friends who helped out so that we could afford to get this.
I did a lot of research and found that this kind was the most highly recommended from lots of friends and car seat experts. This is the Britax Marathon and it can be used all the way from 5 pounds to 65 pounds so it should last us a loooong time. Yay!!


Baby Update:
Thank you for all the baby guesses on the blog. So far everyone is winning, since she hasn't arrived yet. HOWEVER... you may want to reconsider your guesses since my Dr.'s appointment yesterday. Just one week ago she hadn't dropped yet and I wasn't at all dilated.
THIS WEEK.... She has dropped all the way down and is in position for delivery. I am dilated (only 2 cm, but better than nothing), and the lining has thinned. Doc says these are the 3 things to look for right before going in to labor. I was also having LOTS of contractions yesterday. I even had one that the Doc felt while I was sitting there.
He says its looking good and it COULD BE ANY DAY NOW!!!! Woo hoo! I am so excited and getting soooo nervous now. This may be my last post before she comes... who knows?

Happy Valentine's Day!!!

My first thought for a gift to get my amazing husband was a little girl. Since that fell through, I had to resort to plan B, a homemade Valentine (below). Inside were coupons for lots of little things that I knew he'd appreciate :) I also got him a custom-made wrist band from Reminderband.com with a little saying that's important to us. Jesse always wears wrist bands when he plays sports. He will not play a single game without one. He still wears the same wrist band from when he won the football championship game in high school. It used to be red. It is now pink. I think its time for a new one :)

My gift from Jesse was not one, but 26 gifts! He did one gift for every letter of the alphabet. I also had to guess each gift by the clever poems he wrote describing each one. What a creative husband I have. I feel so lucky :) Valentine's Day was such a treat.

We went out on a date to Golden Corral. Believe it or not this picture was taken BEFORE the meal, not AFTER!! It looks like I ate a lot but I'm actually starving in this pic. I did get lots of people at the restaurant giving me looks and asking me when I was due. I guess its pretty obvious now... finally!

I also have to put in a special thanks to my cute friend Lindsey for recommending the movie Fireproof to us. We watched this movie with my parents and it was soooooo good.... definitely not the greatest acting, and a little cheesy but it has the most incredible message. If you have not seen it, go rent it. You'll laugh, you'll cry (I mostly did the 2nd one), you'll love it! :)

GRAMMY night w/ GRAMMY & GRAMPY & Baby VOTE!

Last night Grammy & Grampy Parkinson (Gayle & Spencer) hosted a Grammy party!! Brownies and milk hit the spot... Avrille especially enjoyed them. She has a sweet tooth already... or should I say sweet gums... I hope she doesn't come out with teeth!!



Jesse (deer in the headlights look), Ali, Shelby, Ginger, Jordan

Be sure to tune in to our couch dance performance below... I especially like Shelby's moves.



BABY Update:
Today I went to the wonderful Dr. Firth. It was my first appt with a new doctor, and I felt so much more informed than with our normal Dr. who I can never understand when he talks. I found out that everything is going well and progressing as it should.
My hopes for an early delivery were somewhat dashed when I found that the baby is still sitting high and has not started migrating down yet :( But who knows? Anything could still happen!


BABY GUESSES:

Ok, so Jesse and I already have a bet going on when the baby will arrive. Please comment your guesses for:

1. Date/ time of arrival
2. Weight of baby
3. Length of baby
4. Do you like the spelling Avril or Avrille better? (we go back and forth, so it was Jesse's idea to request the help of friends on our blog)

The winner will receive recognition and praise on our blog... Woo hoo!

I've Arrived in Utah!

My dad flew down to the Burbank airport and I picked him up late Friday night. We arose early the next morning to start packing up the Mountaineer for our trek to Utah. When asked if I had a lot of things to pack, I ignorantly responded.. "not really, I doubt it will take that long." As seen in the pics below, maybe I was slightly off in my judgment.

My dad and I ended up leaving Santa Clarita a little after 11:00 am. Although we had everything ready to go, we had to make a quick stop at the post office which turned in to the complete opposite of quick since Saturday is a busy day, especially when only 2 employees are working. We needed to close out my PO Box and return the key. After over a half hour in line, we learned that I get my $1 key deposit back for returning it and closing it out. Yay! A half hour wait for a dollar! :)


We arrived in Logan a little after midnight, Utah time. As you can see in the pic, it is clearly not dark outside... we put off unloading the car till the next day since nobody really felt like it after midnight, and after driving for 12 hours.


This shot shows how stuffed the car was. It was filled to the brim... we barely fit everything in but we made it!


Of course I needed to visit the grandparents after I arrived so here they are with my gorgeous mother, as well as the mother of all lemons! No, that is not a grapefruit...the Maxsons gave us a bunch of lemons to take with us to Utah and my mom wanted to show off this gargantuous-sized lemon to my grams and gramps.


And here are Avrille and I, relaxing on the couch at my grandparents... the camera adds 10 pounds, you know, so I look a little big here.


Aaah, reunited at last, Jesse and I :) Here I am getting a foot massage, that I'd been missing out on for the past month!...just one of the many things I missed out on while away from my cute hubby.


And its story time now. We gathered round as my mom read us a story that her friend had written and given to her as a gift. I'm so glad I made it here without any babies popping out. Now I get to just prepare for the baby to come and spend time with my family. :) Sounds good to me!