Work?

I hope this doesn't get to personal, but, does anyone ever feel like all they do is work. I spend my day from 6:00 in the morning to 10:00 at night taking care of everyone else's needs. Changing diapers, feeding babies, bouncing babies, holding babies so they will just sleep already!!! Then there is always the laundry, cleaning the bathroom, making the bed, making dinner, doing the dishes, dusting and the list goes on and on. Then when is there ever time for reading scriptures, praying, or something as simple as brushing my teeth.

I'm a little burnt out at the moment needless to say. Between Carter screaming and Landen being neglected most of the day I don't know if I'm doing it right. And between doctor visits all I do is worry about the next one. And on top of it I'm not sleeping because all I do is worry. I will never regret having children because I love them so much. My kids really are good kids, I just don't know if I'm doing a good job sometimes.

Does anyone understand?

Summer fun and the Orthodontist

Carter got a retainer to get him ready for surgery. We have to tape it to his face every morning and sometimes at night. He absolutely hated it at first, but he has adjusted very well. He kind of uses it as his binki now. It is pretty cute. But since he hated it so badly at first we had to put arm restraints on him. This device is called Honey Cuffs and was created by a mom with a cleft baby. It restrains his arms but still allows him to move and exercise his arms. The picture below is Landen trying to help his screaming brother to feel better.

This is a picture of the first day he had the retainer. You can see all the tape on my poor baby's face. The tape across his lip is to help stretch out the middle section of his lip. If we don't stretch it out, when Dr. Kjar fixes his lip his nose will be pulled down with his lip.

With all the doctor appointments we have in Salt Lake we have tried to make a day out of a couple of them. And, thanks to my awesome Mom for always going to appointments with me!

This is at the aquarium in south Salt Lake. It was pretty fun and Landen enjoyed looking at all the fish.

This is at a pool party with all our Mountain America friends. We are still invited to this one party a year and we love it! It is a really nice pool and Landen loves the basketball hoop.

So..all together things are going really well. We met with the surgeon again last week and he is pretty optomistic regarding Carter's progress. He will probably be getting his lip surgery in the middle of October. And Landen has never been a better boy. On Sunday I actually caught him cleaning up his room all by himself! I didn't even ask him too!! We are so blessed to have great kids!

Portraits

A few weeks ago we got portraits taken of our kids. A wonderful family friend that is a pro took some beautiful pictures of my little ones. You can see all of her work ar lovelaughpotography.com. For those of you that know Joe Belliston, Katie is his sister.

Carter is getting so big and making both of his parents proud! He is still eating like a champ. He currently weighs 11 pounds and is tall for his age. We have had quite a few doctor appointments the last couple weeks and on Thursday he gets his first retainer. It is called a NAM and it is supposed to bring everything together before surgery. Hopefully it doesn't bother him too bad! After the retainer has done its job, he will have his first surgery. We are hoping that means the last week in August.

Landen is getting big too!! It is amazing how time flies. He makes us laugh everyday. We absolutely love love love him!!

W got these taken at Beus Pond. He had so much fun.

Both of my boys together. I love them!!

Smiles and a Helpful Big Brother

We have been getting some smiles out of this little one the last few days. And I got a few really cute pictures of him! He is still such a wonderful baby. We have been so blessed to have him in our family.

I LOVE that smile!

So, yesterday I made a bottle for Carter because he was kind of acting hungry. By the time I got back in the living room he was acting content so I decided to change Landen's clothes. I went into his room, grabbed an outfit and by the time I got back I found Landen feeding Carter. It was pretty cute. He is such a helpful big brother!

Doing Good!

Carter is doing so well! He is eating like crazy (especially lately) and is gaining weight steadily. Last Thursday he weighed 8lbs 6ozs! We will see the surgeon on Wednesday and see how much he weighs then!

Mean Mom trying to wake him up to eat. He is still sleeping a lot during the day so I have to wake him up every now and then.

Cute Landen playing with Carter. Lately he has been trying to tickle Carter. I honestly wonder sometimes if he is excited for Carter to grow up. He just wants someone to play with!

My cute little man! His tiny face looks perfect to me.

Landen is sometimes a comedic genious (as Rob would say). One night he just wanted to walk around the house with just his shirt on his head! I don't know what he is thinking sometimes. But it was pretty funny.

I know this is kind of an old picture but Landen loved to do this when he would visit me in the hospital. He knew right where the drink room was and he would sit just like this on my bed. He knew how to use the remote to find cartoons and just chilled. It was funny!

More Pics...

It is weird to imagine that we are a family of four!

I love how they do the baths now at McKay. The baby never leaves the mom. We did skin to skin for a while which was an amazing experience, then we all moved to my recovery room. That is where they do the bath. I loved it!

So sweet!

He has arrived!

Carter Isaac Green was born on May 24th at 1:48pm. He weighed in at 7lbs 14oz and 21 inches long.

My delivery was short and sweet and wonderful. I was induced and only labored for about 4 hours before he was ready to make his entrance.

His cleft on his lip isn't too extensive but the hard palate will need some significant work. We will be meeting with a bunch of doctors over the next couple of weeks to get an idea of what needs to be done when. For now they are monitoring his growth closely to make sure he is gaining.

Landen is already a cute big brother and askes to hold and feed the baby a lot. He is protective of the new family member too. He doesn't like people he doesn't know hanging around his new brother.

So as for now things are going really well. It is just really really nice to be home with my little family. Thank you to everyone for your love and support. We really appreciate the kindness we receive from our friends and family!

No news is good news???

Just in case you noticed that our little baby countdown is gone, I wanted you to know it is not because the baby has come!!! In fact I am going to be 41 weeks pregnant on Monday. If I don't have the baby by then I will be induced on Monday morning. So, at least there is a light at the end of the tunnel. But as for now, there is no news.

2 'n Stuff

It was Landen's 2nd birthday on Monday and we had a really fun day. We started out by swimming at the South Davis Rec Center in Bountiful. It was awesome. There were only two other kids there and so Landen could pretty much do whatever he wanted whenever he wanted. He loved it! Then we had family over in the evening. He didn't get into his cake until everyone was gone (can't miss out on anything!), but here is a pic of the event.

Landen is way into basketball lately and this was given to him by my parents. He loves loves loves it. We actually had to take it with us to their house last night because he couldn't bare to part with it.

Another favorite of Landen's is drumming. Ever since he could he has been pounding on everything. His drum sticks were two spoons until Rob and I gave him this electronic drum set. Which he also loves. He goes right for it in the morning and it plays most of the day.

These are just some fun pics of Landen. He has really been into hats the last few days and has to wear one if Dad is wearing one. So here he is sporting Rob's Utes hat.

And the Jazz hat of course!

Rocks are another favorite. We were actually supposed to be looking at the trains at the Union Station.

Finally he notices the trains!

This one is just for fun. This pic was taken at the hospital right before we left to bring the day old Landen home.

Landen trying out the car seat two years later after I have cleaned it for Carter. What a difference!!!

Making the best of things

Since January came to visit in April we decided to make the best of things. Landen and I played in the snow while Rob shoveled the driveway. He was excited to be outside and he loves the snow. So, it was a good time.

It was our garbage day today so Landen got to watch the big truck in action. He was pretty fascinated.

We also had a doctor's appointment yesterday and my doctor did an ultrasound. It isn't nearly as involved as the hospital ultrasound. He basically does one to make sure the baby is head down and to track the growth. But he said the baby is right on track and everything looks good which was great to hear. I have 6 weeks left and I am looking forward to having Carter here. It is a little intimidating because then the action begins, but we are ready for the challenge. We have picked all our doctors and the surgeon and are confident in our choices. Now we just have to pray that everything will go as smoothly as possible. Thanks to everyone and their support. We feel really blessed to have such great friends and family!

What was I thinking!!!

We put Landen in a toddler bed on Monday but first we took away his binki. Maybe if I had done one, waited about a month and then done the other I wouldn't be paying the consequences I am now, but for some reason I felt the need to do them both at the same time. Needless to say the last week has been a very long hard week. It took Landen a few nights to realize that this was his new bed. With that came sleeping on the floor next to his bed. Luckily the last couple of nights have been a bit better. We still have to lay on the floor next to his bed until he is asleep, but he is back to sleeping through the night for the most part.

His bed does look a little more put together now, but this is him lounging for the pic. He really loves playing on his new bed, especially with his "Cars" stuff. It is just the sleeping part we are working on.

Landen getting in on the "helping". As you can see he has taken part of the packaging and ripped it to shreds.

My dad was kind enough to let Landen help drill parts of his bed. I think Landen was in little boy heaven.

Landen and Carter

I really don't think that this kid could be anymore like his daddy. Lately all he wants to do is play dad's real electric guitar, watch and play basketball, or listen to Dave Matthew's Band. That's right, his favorite song is a Dave song. In fact, last night, I checked on the Jazz game (Rob was at work) and when I changed the channel I was immediately yelled at. How dare I change the channel! So, we watched a little more of the game.

Also, for those of you that don't know, we have known for about two months now that Carter will be born with a bilateral cleft lip. We are pretty sure that there is at least a unilateral cleft in his palate, but we will not know for sure until he is born. In the mean time we are preparing and deciding on a surgeon.

For those of you that don't really understand what clefts are and what they look like, a great site to go to is: kidswithcleftsutah.blogspot.com. There is great info at that site. The baby that is front and center on the blog is what Carter will probably look like. But again there is no way to tell until he gets here.

The really good news we got yesterday at our ultrasound is that everything else looks normal and he is growing perfectly. There is nothing else wrong with our little Carter which was a concern for a while. The doctor told us to expect a perfectly healthy baby!

And....

We are having a boy!! Carter Isaac Green is on his way!!

Christmas Fun!

So I let Rob open his Christmas present tonight because he has to work on Christmas day and the day after. So I figured this way he would get some good playing time in before Christmas. Well....it turned out I was wrong! Here's a little tip: if your toddler knows what Guitar Hero is, and you buy it for your husband, buy two guitars. Landen wouldn't let anyone else play the game without a big fit. Needless to say, we will be going to Walmart tomorrow to purchase a second guitar so Rob can play in peace.

Landen chillin' in his baby bouncer (he loves it) with HIS guitar.

He might be a pain, but his is soooo cute! He is getting so big, so fast.

We went to the Christmas Village in Ogden a few days ago and Landen loved looking at all the houses. He wasn't able to move around to much, but he was warm and had fun.

It's a crazy life!!!

Many of you may not know, but Rob and I recently moved. Like last Saturday! We moved 7 blocks north. We are now living just off Monroe on 41st street. It is above ground, big windows, bigger apartment. We love it and Landen points at the windows every morning wanting me to open them. It was kind of a rough process on the poor guy. He didn't know what was going on and he was very nervous about where his stuff was going. But he has adapted and loves the new place.

In other news, we are pregnant. Our new little one is due on May 31st and we are excited. I am very very nervous about having two kids. Landen is busy enough for me, but I'm excited for him to have a friend to play with.