For. E. Ver.

Soooo much has happened in the last two months since I blogged last. I always have such lofty goals of catching up and letting everyone know about EVERYTHING that's happened. Then I get to the point I am at now - I give up. I'll just do a couple of things. Haha. So here's a couple of the highlights.

Here is Hazel Rebekah's two month picture for her baby calendar. That's not a crotch shot, by the way. If you look closely, you can see her Tweety band-aids from her shots. She was a trooper. That outfit was one her Daddy picked out so I put it on her for her two month birthday.

Here is the latest and greatest - my favorite so far. Her three month pictures. Thanks to our friend and awesome photographer, Louie Traub (louietraub.com) for taking such beautiful pictures of our daughter. I swear she gets more adorable every day. If you look closely at these pictures, you can see we pierced her ears. For all those who think we are oh, so cruel, just know she was more upset at being stabbed in her legs with a needle for her vaccines.

This is a picture of us as a family who would only be together for the time here on earth. San Diego is one of my favorite temples and since we got married civilly, I wanted to go here to get sealed. We got sealed on our monkey's 3 month birthday and she got to wear her blessing dress again. She filled it out much better this time.

This is our first picture as a forever family. We went back to the temple grounds the next day and there was a cute old couple serving their mission. The Elder offered to take some pictures for us. A huge weight has been lifted off of my shoulders now that we have made this important step in our lives. It was a long wait which we knew would happen since we chose to get married civilly, but it finally happened and we couldn't be happier.

I'm so blessed to have such an awesome husband who works so hard to provide for his family and is the most amazing father ever. He never complains about spending time with his daughter and was my saving grace many times when he told me he would take Bekki (as he calls her) for the night to let me sleep. He's changed lots of diapers and is introducing her to the world of sports by watching football with her. He has taken her many times on some of his errands and though I feel left out, I just tell myself to get over it and try to get as much accomplished as possible in their absence.

We couldn't have been blessed with a better baby. Our little monkey is so good and hasn't had any real problems. We know we are so lucky to have gotten pregnant so quickly and then continue through the pregnancy, labor and delivery with no serious complications. She has been a perfectly healthy and happy baby. She's a good sleeper and a good eater and has the sweetest disposition. She has her moments when she's overly tired, but I'll take those moments too. She is very active and loves to babble and tell stories. She smiles so much - I love her smile! We are finally getting comments on how she's starting to look like me, but I still think she looks more like her daddy. She's beautiful either way.

Our dogs continue to be amazing. Sometimes they bark too loudly when they shouldn't and wake Hazel up. Most of the time, they make us chuckle as they play together and get excited for a cookie or treat. They are great with the baby and will probably become some of her best friends.

Baby Calendar Update

I know I've been a slacker about posting on my blog (thanks for the reminder, Tiffany) so I figured that I would continue slacking on my household chores that need to be done oh-so badly and stay on the computer a little longer. This morning I slept in and cuddled with Hazel and then, while she slept some more, I made some pictures to go in her calendar. Yesterday my monkey and I went to Mesquite to hang out with Shanna and get our fill of the Golden Girls and Dairy Queen, so I took her calendar and filled it in with all her exciting activities and "firsts" that are happening to her. The picture spots have been left blank and I figured I needed to also keep up with those so I don't have an empty calendar on her first birthday. I've been known to do things like that...


The first spot for a picture of her Birth Day. This is my absolute favorite. She's so beautiful and looks very content.



Her birth announcement with a picture of her when she was one week old. Can she really be 8 weeks old already!? There wasn't a spot for her baby announcement, but I put it on here anyway. :o)



I have two little frames hanging on the wall with her handprint and footprint on it. There is also spot for them on her calendar. I was lucky enough to get a very good handprint and footprint before she turned one (haha) and couldn't remember how tiny she was. I love how tiny she was. She's now the size of a newborn and I can't imagine having to birth a baby her size out of me! I got lucky.


For her one month picture, I decided to incorporate the family pictures we had taken. She, of course, is the focal point of this one, and definitely the focal point in our lives. She continues to be such a good baby and I love, love, love her smiles! She sticks her tongue out and if you do it back to her, she will smile and try to talk.

I heart her.

Happy One Month Birthday, Hazel!

I can't believe that my little monkey is one month old! It has gone by so fast. She gets more beautiful every day and I am still in awe that I finally have a baby. Heck, I'm still in awe that I have a husband. He's such a good dad, by the way, and loves his little girl. He helps out a lot, even when I don't ask him to. He's changed lots of diapers and there have been quite a few nights he has taken her and stayed up all night so I can sleep.

Last night was the first night I felt like I didn't get enough sleep. She has been such a good sleeper - she even slept for 6 hours straight on two different nights! But last night it was as if she had an alarm set for every three hours - on the dot! She must be going through a growth spurt. She got so fussy tonight that I went ahead and fed her after only two hours, which I haven't done before. First I gave her a bath and a little massage to calm her down, then she ate like I've never fed her before. Haha. As I type this, she is making little noises in her sleep - but she is sleeping, so that's good. I should be sleeping too!

She loves to be wrapped up like a burrito so she's toasty warm. She does NOT like to be cold, but she'll struggle and struggle to get her hands out so she can put them by her face. Then she wakes up and cries cuz she's cold. When she's ready to be awake and happy, she loves loves loves to stretch and stretch. And stretch. She grunts when she stretches and pulls the funniest faces. Sometimes it takes her at least five minutes before she's done stretching and waking up. One of these days I'm going to get the video camera out and capture those cute faces.

I can't wait for her to give me the smile that will tell me she recognizes me for sure. She smiles a lot, but most of the time it's as she's waking up or falling asleep and they are twitches that are happening at the same time her eyes are rolling in the back of her head. She has a big, beautiful smile.

I love being a mom and I'm having lots of fun. I love my little monkey.

Hazel Rebekah welcomes her new best friend, Izzy!

Hazel is happy to have her best friend here - finally! Miss Elizabeth Jo was born on Monday, July 6 at 6:28 pm, weighing 9 pounds, 14 ounces, and was 22 inches long.

Here are their first photos together. Izzy makes our little monkey look like a midget!

As promised - more pictures!

I am actually coming back to my blog to update - can you believe it? I just thought I'd put some more pictures on of Miss Hazel Rebekah, seeing as how she's so stinking cute!

Here she is on her birthday - June 19, 2009

One week old - June 26, 2009

Two weeks old - July 3, 2009

Another two week picture

Doctor Visit

Today was the two week check up! Little Miss Hazel Rebekah is now a whopping 6 pounds, 8 ounces - guess my boob juice is working! It took a few days, but we stuck together and figured the whole nursing thing out. She has grown to 20 3/4 inches long and her head is 14 inches around. She growing like a week already and getting cuter and cuter every day.

She certainly did not enjoy getting her blood drawn out of her heel and she let us know it! That was the angriest scream she's ever let out so far. I'm sure it won't be the last one, though, with us as her parents...

We've been blessed with a super good baby. She hardly cries, unless she's hungry and then, wow, does she let us know it! I don't have to set an alarm at night to wake her up to eat anymore - she's my alarm now. We enjoy seeing her smile in her sleep and make all sorts of interesting faces. She still looks like her daddy (especially those grumpy faces) and her dad just adores her. She goes with me almost everywhere I go. She's so used to hearing my piano students that she just falls asleep during my lessons.

Last night her daddy stayed up with her (though she did not stay up with him) so I could get some uninterrupted sleep. I'm usually pretty tired so I don't have a problem sleeping, but I love that she has lots of time with her dad. He's very involved and willing to help out. Well, until it comes to diaper duty. Haha. He has changed diapers before, but is more than happy to pass her over to her mom to get changed. I don't mind.

I am having fun playing mom for real and especially love not having to give her back to someone else. We all enjoy our visitors and she gets passed around a lot since everyone wants to hold her. I love sharing her since I get her when no one is around.

We are also excited for her best friend to arrive tonight! Kaeli and Michael are in the hospital right now getting Izzy out into the world. We can't wait to see her and visit with Michael and Kaeli.

Promises, promises

I promise to put more pictures up and tell the birth story soon. Right now our computer is being dumb and I can't put the pictures on it from the camera. I also need to type up the birth story before I forget all the details. Brody is going to type up his version of events. Both should be good reads. But for now, just know that it's on my list of things to do...

Here is the last picture I got of the little monkey that's on the computer. Grandpa Little was holding her and she was all curled up like usual. When she discovered her knee with her mouth, she had no choice but to have a little taste and started sucking on it. :o)

It's a Girl!

Hazel Rebekah Broderdorf
June 19, 2009
8:36 am

6 pounds, 2 ounces
19 1/2 inches

Pretty much perfect

First family picture

The definition of trim is NOT shave...

Brody and I have two beautiful dogs. Well, not anymore. We are not happy with our recent visit to the Petsmart groomers and have no intention of going there again. Below you will see a nice portrait of our dogs taken one day after Emmitt went in to get groomed at the beginning of May. The guy did a pretty good job. Emmitt is a handsome border collie/Australian shepherd mix who is very vain and knows he looks good. We always get compliments on how beautiful he is and how soft is long coat of fur is. He'll prance around with his nose in the air (the little snob) because he thinks he's pretty hot. Bostyn, of course, is cute as a button, but all we have to do is throw her in the bathtub at home and she's in heaven.


This is what Emmitt looks like now...


He is heartbroken and his dad is furious. Brody and I might get into fights now and again, but I know I've never made him this mad. I am certainly glad I am not the one who pissed him off in this situation or I wouldn't have gone home for a few days. They butchered our beautiful dog and made him look like a sick, mangy stray who has gotten in one too many fights. Emmitt's entire demeanor has changed. He hid under the piano the first night he was home and wouldn't even play with his favorite puppet toy he usually goes ballistic for. I miss his beautiful mane most of all.

I wrote a very detailed letter explaining what had happened and printed out a lot of before and after pictures and took into Petsmart. Long story short: they refunded our money (which we were also overcharged by a lot and without so much as a phone call asking our permission), but the store manager tried to blame my instructions as part of the problem in the same breath that she said her groomers didn't handle the situation right. When I said "general trim," I did not give the idiot groomer permission to shave five inches of long, silky hair off of our dog.

Girls: How would you feel if you went in for a trim of your nice long hair and they cut your hair up above your ears? And left patches of long parts and other patches of shaved sections? NOT HAPPY, I tell you!

The next step is the regional manager of Petsmart. This happened on Tuesday. It's Thursday and we're still upset, especially since the store manager handled it the way she did. The Petsmart grooming salon has lost our business as well as some of our friends' business. They better hope Emmitt's shiny coat grows back. Time will tell. But we want the regional manager to know how poorly the situation was handled and Brody wants nothing more than to have the groomer fired.

On a happier note, at least we're going to have a baby soon! That'll pretty much be awesome.

Updates? What's an update?

Ya... I've been slacking quite a bit on my blog. Oops. Sorry! I know you have all been waiting in anticipation, checking your computers five times a day and wondering what the heck we've been up to... right? Haha. I'll just tell myself that.

A lot has happened since my last post, or even the post before! Last time I posted anything that actually happened with our lives, I was halfway through my pregnancy. Well, I'm getting ready to pop soon. Less than three weeks! I can't believe it. I've made it to full term (37 weeks) and am getting excited for the baby to get here. Not as excited for HOW the baby needs to get here, but it's a little late to back out of that one.

I'm going to make this post very short, just so I can say I've posted something! I'll update more later. Hopefully not much later.

Here's my latest picture that you can compare to my 20 week picture a couple of posts down. 17 weeks makes a big difference!

Seriously...

...we have a lot of friends. How awesome is that? If I don't check for updates almost every day I have to spend an hour trying to catch up on everyone's awesome lives! I love reading what everyone is up to, especially when I don't get to see everyone.

Blogging is fun.

And I will update mine soon with more fun pictures of my growing belly...

Hitting the Halfway Mark!

We've made it halfway! Woot woot!

I was 20 weeks today and had the BIG ultrasound appointment. Even though I told Brody I was going to keep it a secret from everyone, including him, I didn't want him to miss out on such a big occasion so I told him when it was so he could come with me. I'm glad he was there; after all, he IS my baby's daddy, no matter how many times he tells people we don't know who the father is.

We have a lot of awesome pictures of our little alien baby, but it is late and I will have to scan and post them another day. We also were able to take video of the first part of the ultrasound, which I will also post later.

My favorite thing was seeing how much the baby was moving and watching him (for all intents and purposes, I will refer to the baby as "he" rather than "it" because Brody is hoping for a boy, but we did NOT find out what it was) yawn and stick his tongue out at us. That was pretty much awesome. I know he's part of my side of the family if he stuck his tongue out at the camera! Haha.

The technician was nice enough to do a gender check (while Brody and I closed our eyes) and took a picture, which she then sealed up in an envelope just so we could have it. I asked Brody if he was secretly mad at me for not wanting to find out and he said yes, so it's really not much of a secret anymore. I know his family is mad at me as well. My family doesn't care. I think my parents are just glad they are still getting more grandkids! I am just excited for more motivation to get this kid out of me when the time comes. I told my sister I would have to think back to this day when I was having contractions and remember how excited I was to see our baby's cute little nose in a profile. You'll get to see it soon enough, but for now, it is time for bed.

I love my baby.

And my baby's daddy.

IT'S A BOY!

Haha. Tricked you. I don't know what's in my belly, but I know what's finally out of my sister's belly! After 60 1/2 hours of labor and finally going in for a c-section, Cooper Joseph Driscoll came into this world! I'm too impatient to wait for my sister to update her blog (oh, and she's kind of still in the hospital and dang tired), so I'm updating mine to tell everyone I'm an aunt for the 5th time. Tyler, Emily, Trey, Ryan, and now baby Cooper. All nephews and one niece.

Fun times.

Cooper Joseph Driscoll
January 23, 2009
9:32 am
8 pounds, 1 ounce
22 inches long

More updates...

Wow. Two days in a row. Can you believe it? I almost can't.

Today was the first day in a long time that I was going to be able to fall asleep after kissing my husband goodbye at 4:30 in the morning. Lately I have been wide awake after that kiss and lie in bed wishing I could go to sleep. Then, around 6:00 or so, I crash and sleep in until 8:00 and end up not getting much done. I was fading back into my slumber when the bedroom door opened and Brody told me his ipod was stolen out of the truck. SUCKY! He figures he must have scared whoever it was away by starting the truck from inside because they didn't get much more than a few things. There was a lot of time and money put into that ipod, though, so he is not a happy camper...

Speaking of unhappy campers, I'm pretty sure that's what my sister is after being in labor since 9:00 Tuesday night! Poor thing must be exhausted. It's just after six now, so she's been in labor for over 57 hours. My mom got there yesterday and has been with her ever since. She went in to the hospital for the fourth time and finally got an epidural last night. Then I got a text that said, "I love epidurals! :o)" Around five this morning she got another one. Cooper has now missed our dad's birthday and is going to have his own. For everyone's sake, that baby just needs to get here NOW!

The last update is in response to some of the very quick comments that were posted from my post yesterday. I thought I made it clear how stubborn I was going to be on the whole finding out/not finding out the gender issue. I don't want to find out! I just wanted to know what everyone else thought. (Isn't that just what people want to hear? Tell me your opinion, but I'm going to do just what I want to do. Oh well. My family is used to that.)

I think Brody has finally accepted that we will find out if he have a son or a daughter when the baby joins us in this world. I haven't told anyone exactly when my next appointment is. Not even my husband. Not that I want him to miss the ultrasound - that's too exciting and he was there for the other two so it's not like I'm trying to keep him from experiences all the joys of the pregnancy (which is only fair since he's definitely dealth with the joys of pregnancy that are pretty much the complete opposite of joy). But I have some questions I need to ask about my appointment before I tell him.

So the verdict is no. We're not finding out. It's not like we have a lot of space for the baby anyway and he's barely gonna have a spot in the spare bedroom. If he's lucky. He doesn't get his own special baby room yet. Haha. (Saying HE is not a slip of the tongue - I just call the baby a he all the time, but we really don't know if it's got two legs or three yet.) We'll just be glad to finally have a little baby and I pray it doesn't take as long as it's taking my nephew to get here!

Belly Updates...

Just for fun I decided I would put a picture of my sister and I side by side (that was a pain in the BUTT since I don't understand html codes) to show our baby bumps at the same time. These are our 16 week pictures, mine from January 12, 2009, and hers from August 7, 2008. I am 18 weeks today and need to get another picture soon. Lindsay is obviously much bigger right now and back at the hospital for the THIRD time after being in labor for a day and a half. She is only dilated to 1 cm and she and Chris are pretty darn tired.

We (our family) kept teasing her yesterday and telling her that she should just wait until our Dad's birthday (which is today - HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DAD!) so Cooper and his Grandpa would have the same birthday, but we weren't actually serious! Now we're hoping she'd just hurry up and have that baby today for her sake and for the fun of them having the same birthday.

My mom is in the car, driving up to help Lindsay this weekend and see her newest grandbaby. I talked to her early this morning and she said she'd rather Lindsay hurry and have the baby and not wait for her to actually get all the way up to Quincy. Mom was the same way with Lindsay - contractions very close together for a long time, but not dilating. Poor Lindsay. And poor Chris. In about 5 months or less I will know how they are feeling.

I am so excited to go see her next month and hold that cute, little baby boy while she takes lots of naps so she can feel more rested. I am also excited to see their new house. My baby bump will definitely be bigger by the time I go in four weeks and Lindsay is excited to rub my Buddha belly.

I swear it just popped out even more the other day! It's so weird. I just stand sideways in front of the mirror and look at my funny shaped body and smile. Some people say I'm not showing at all. They are all crazy! I may be small at this point, but I'm pretty sure that ever since puberty, my boobs have ALWAYS stuck out farther than my belly. Promise. Now, it's the opposite. Even at my fattest, I don't think I've ever been this big around!

Hopefully Cooper will join us in this world today and Lindsay can get some rest. I'm so excited and have to refrain from calling her every five seconds to see how she's doing. That's the last thing she needs right now and I trust Chris to do his job and take care of her.

It's official - I look funny!

1/4/08 - 15 1/2 weeks
(And I'm standing up as straight as possible
and thinking about trying to suck it in!)

I am no longer trying to suck my stomach in. It's just too hard to do - even just thinking about it makes me tired. For the longest time (well, duh, not too long since I'm only three months along) I just felt like I was getting thicker and, at the same time, also tried to convince myself that it was just wishful thinking. Of course, as my sister is about two weeks from her due and tired of being big and pregnant, I also try to remind myself that I need to be patient in waiting for a cute prego belly. I gave up long ago on the weekly photos like Lindsay did, cuz, quite frankly, I did not start off with as nice a stomach as she did, so this is my first official belly picture and maybe I'll do them more than once every three months.