Happy Halloween!

What a fun first Halloween for our sweet James :) He had a fun Halloween week. On Monday, James and I went to the trunk or treat with a ward friend Nikki Kirby and her cute baby. Erik had to study for his test which was the next day and Nikki's husband was at school that night so it worked out to be a fun girls night with the cute babies!

On Wednesday, we went to the Selim's house so eat Chili and carve pumpkins! Stina had a delicious recipe for the chili! Eva and Aiden had fun carving with Erik. I played with James. Taylor and Owen murdered a pumpkin on the floor... Owen had some serious stabbing skills. I'm sad that I didn't catch a picture of the final product!

We got an amazing care package from my mom! James got a mustache pacifier and a cute pumpkin book that he ate after I read it to him. He also got some candy which Erik and I took the liberty to eat :)

This picture is just James hanging out on the Halloween blanket I made last year. Glenna aka Grandma Grimm bought her and I matching fabric to sew Halloween blankets so I thought it would be a fun festive blanket to pull out for the season. James and Jack played on it for a few weeks so that was fun!

Halloween night was super fun! We headed over to trick or treat with the Selims. I was a devil, Erik was Robin, and James was a skeleton. James liked trick or treating meaning he stared at everyone walking by and took it all in. It's so cute to watch how observant he is as he gets older. It was fun to show him off and get the candy for Erik and I :) Eva, Aiden, and Owen were very skilled at getting candy. Eva especially loves candy and it's always fun to see her eat it!

James Is Born!!!

James is Born

I am telling this story 5 months after the fact so the details are a little bit hazy. I figured it I'm already forgetting and it's only been 5 months, I should probably write everything down before I forget more.

This was my birthday dinner so I was around 5 months prego
eating Benihana's with my hot hubby!

I was around 28 weeks here. I finally looked pregnant
from the side angle in some outfits... otherwise I
pretty much looked like I had gained a few until like 35 weeks!

35 weeks! 

This was 39 weeks. My belly just popped. I had to go to work at the hospital and none of my scrubs fit... but this was only the situation for about 2 weeks so I never got new ones. Very uncomfortable!

These beautiful pictures were taken to send to Heidi Hanks Ore so she could keep track of my belly growth from Utah! The last few days of work before James made his appearance!


My due date was officially May 20 but at the first OB appointment we went to they told us May 18. May 18 is Erik's Grandma Grimm's birthday and it just so happened that May 18 2014 was her 100'th birthday. So, we decided it was meant to be that I would have the baby on May 18th.

As my pregnancy progressed, I started having a lot of contractions around 31 weeks. At 32 weeks, it seemed like I had symptoms of pre-term labor. I went in and they did some tests and one of them was positive. I was put on bed-rest for one week. It was a long week and I was surprisingly emotional and scared about the whole thing. They redid the test after one week and it came back negative so that was the end of that.

I tell this story because pretty much after that scare I was sure my baby was going to come out any day. So, when he was 6 days overdue (according to the May 18th due date), I was so so so ready to have him!

So, Monday May 19 was the beginning of final exams for Erik. We were both nervous that I would go into labor during his exams. On Wednesday morning around 2 am I woke up with horrible contractions that were spaced regularly apart. They kept me awake until 8am. I really didn't want to make Erik miss his test, and I remembered that Justina had a really long labor for her first baby, so I just waited it out walking the hallways without even telling Erik. At 8am, I fell asleep and the contractions stopped. I was so disappointed, and tired! So, I went to work. The contractions came back on Thursday night/Friday morning, only much stronger. Erik had his last final which was 4 hours from 8-12 and I really didn't want him to miss it. If he missed it, he would have to retake an "alternative" test and it could be harder and we didn't want that! So, at 2 am, again, I walked the halls of my house without waking him up. These contractions stayed until 10 am. Then, they stopped! I was worried that my water might have broken so I finally got the guts to go to the hospital around 3pm and get checked. They didn't know if my water was broken but they admitted  me and said they would induce my labor for safety reasons. Yay! I was so excited that the baby was going to come out but I was really scared about the induction part. I really wanted to experience natural onset of labor  for some strange reason!







So, there in L&D triage, I went into labor without being induced! Yay!!!











I loved my nurse and my OB. She was really nice to me and put up with all of my crazy questions and concerns... (I had a lot of them because the only OB I have ever worked with is in the ICU where those poor moms aren't doing well at all!)

James was born at 5am... he was so cute. I had some bleeding but the doctor did a procedure to make that stop and there were no other complications. I was so tired when he came out I literally could not keep my eyes open. It was still so amazing to see him. I looked at him and I knew he was my baby. Seems like a silly thing to say I'm sure but I was scared when I was pregnant that I wouldn't think he belonged to me... But he did belong to me and I loved him immediately so so much!

I do have to mention that I hated my second nurse... a little to bossy for my liking. And... she told me they didn't have zofran by mouth which I knew was a crock! So, I argued until I got what I want and then I got a new nurse :) I didn't fire her... luckily she just got reassigned for no particular reason.

The next day was exhausting but so fun. I was on cloud 9 with our cute new family. It was so great to spend time with our new little guy and so much of my family came to visit. James was healthy and strong! There was a short scare over his blood pressure but it was quickly resolved so that was good.
Also another nurse was annoying because she told me I was starving my baby because my milk hadn't come in but luckily she was wrong. (PS I love the nursing profession.... full disclosure I'm probably not an easy patient to have haha...)


Overall, I am so happy to be a mom! And have a great husband to raise this cute little guy with. Love being a mom!

Wedding

We got married in the Mesa, AZ temple on March 10, 2012. It was an amazing ceremony performed by the brother of one of the senior missionaries brothers. He was also one of the seventy that had come to my mission and spoke to us. It was a beautiful ceremony and then we had a reception in Peoria. We went on our honeymoon to a cabin in the woods in Port Angeles, WA. The next week, we had a reception in Salt Lake City. It was super fun!

Here's the link to the rest of our pictures!

http://ellejphotography.com/blog/2012/04/27/erikjessicamarried-lds-mesa-temple-wedding-photographer-elisha-j-schabel/

and here are the pictures that Brandon did for us!

https://picasaweb.google.com/103084868296978402440/ErikJessicaSBridals

Engagement

So, Erik proposed to me at the Red Butte Gardens. It's a really pretty Garden that sits above the city with a great view. He used to go there with his family when he was a kid. He brought a camera to take a picture of us on his favorite bench where he proposed. He said he wanted to come back to that spot every ten years to take another picture of us. I thought that was a very sweet sentimental thought. He took me to eat at the Roof restaurant and we just hung out down town after. It was a great night!

More about our dating...

We both love running so we have done a few races together. We did the Halloween half marathon with our good friends Andrew and Jenessa (Who just got married!). The picture below is of Andrew (blue) and Erik (red) in their running gear... they actually made it into a magazine for their costumes!

 Super fun night out snow boarding. Erik and I both grew up snow boarding. We went out for a night run. I was a little rusty but Erik was still so fast! It was a fun night together.

 Our first Christmas together... My roomates and I made a cute Christmas tree out of the odds and ends we found in our house. Then my roommate Shelisa made Erik and I do a photo shoot in front of the Christmas tree hahaha...

 Another fun running trip... Erik kept getting all of these gift cards from Ultradent because he was such a good employee and he was bringing their lab results off of the charts. One of the gift cards was to Walmart, so we went on a run in the snow to Walmart and bought a bunch of silly stuff... then we walked back to my house and had a blast :)

 

Dating in a nutshell

Since I didn't have a blog when Erik and I were dating, here's a brief synopsis of our dating. There was a singles ward re-organization that took place in Salt Lake that made it to where Erik and I were assigned to the same ward. We were put in callings that made us work together. We had a lot of fun together and he was basically the best guy that I had ever met. We both love being outside, camping, and being in the mountains so we have done a lot of that together!

 This was the first time we went to a cabin together. It was such a fun night. We stayed up late watching movies and then Erik never fell asleep because the clocks and flies in the cabin drove him crazy! It was the first time I learned he hates un-synchronized clocks! The sounds of the second hand going off at different times drive him crazy haha. I love his quarks!

 

This was our good friends Annie and Devin's wedding. I was able to meet a lot of Erik's family friends. It was very fun!

A trip to the natural history museum. Glenna, Erik's mom is the head of collections there. We actually ended up having our reception there. So fun and pretty!

One of our trips to St George! Every year my sister and I have tried to go to St George to do a race or shop! The year Erik and I met, we decided to take the trip with Erik. It grew until we ended up with all of my siblings in St George at Eriks family's vacation house. It was a really fun trip!