Silly Girl!

Remember this girl?


I haven't posted anything about Clara for a while and the other day she was wearing these ears and carrying around this cat all day. I had to capture it and share. She's as cute and silly as ever! Clara has adjusted pretty well to our little new-comer. She loves to give Ashlyn snuggles (a little bit too hard) and kisses (right on the lips, can't convince her that her head is a better place to kiss) all the time. She's shown a few signs of jealousy by stealing her blanket and binki, but she has shown a lot of improvement just in the last couple of days. She will play with her toys on her own until I'm done feeding Ashlyn, or I'll let her watch her latest favorite show, Dora. I love this girl!

Ashlyn Elaine Gittins

(by Aubree)

On Sunday morning, August 8th, I was induced. My doctor broke my water at about 8 and shortly after they started me on pitocin. I received my epidural at about 11. This time it went so much better than with Clara. With Clara my epidural wore off, and it was just a really bad experience. I was comfortable this time except I hate not feeling my legs, it made me feel almost clausterphobic. My mom got there about 11:30. My doctor got there a few minutes before 3 and after pushing with 2 contractions Ashlyn was here at 3:04 pm! I couldn't believe how smoothly it went. Ashlyn weighed 7 lbs 12 oz and was 21 inches long.

Ashlyn had a little jaundice but is doing really great. She didn't have to do the lights at all. She is nursing so good. It's nice to not have to stress out about that this time. She is sleeping for longer periods during the day and waking up about every 2 hours at night, but she usually will go right back to sleep. So far she takes a binki pretty good which I'm excited about because Clara never really took to one.

Clara is doing so great with Ashlyn. She loves her and wants to help out by putting blankets on her and loves to give Ashlyn kisses. She will maul her a little too much, but for the most part is pretty gentle.

I'm feeling great! It's been a really great recovery this time.

I forgot to upload the pictures backwards, so they're chronologically backwards because I'm too lazy to start over. :) Enjoy.

30

I just want to wish Jeff a happy 30th birthday today! We love you.
I'm being induced at 7 tomorrow morning. Our life will never be the same!

Keeping Busy

Well I have 2 weeks as of tomorrow until my due date. I've had a couple of false alarms including Monday night I was contracting every 2 to 5 minutes and even every minute at one point. This went on for about 6 hours. So I'm hoping that's my body saying, "Get ready, it's coming soon!"

I've been using my nesting energy on knitting projects I've really been wanting to get done before the baby comes. It's kept my mind off of the waiting part, so it's been a nice distraction. I still would like to get more done, but having a baby right now appeals a lot more than getting more knitting projects done.

Of course you have to have baby hats!

This was something I was just trying out. It's a tad big for a hair bow, but maybe I'll make it into a headband for Clara or add it to a hat. We'll see.

This one's kinda fun. It's a baby hammock that you hang up in a crib. Clara's still using the crib but it can still be used for the baby to nap in when Clara's not napping. I wouldn't want to leave a baby in there all night anyway. Looks pretty comfy right?

The rest of these are all baby photography props. Not only do I want them to take pictures of our baby in, but as soon as I have more time, I'd like to start selling similar items on etsy.

Hat and diaper cover.

Another hammock that isn't really as safe and practical as the other one, but it sure makes for a great picture. My flour baby sure seems to be enjoying it. I for sure need to make some adjustments, like making it wider. I didn't have a pattern and this was my first try at it.

Baby cocoons.

This one I made for my friend, Kasey Sanders, who is a photographer. Check out her blog here. In fact if you go to her site and click on babies under view by catergory, then go to the bottom and hit older posts. The first baby on there (Jayda) is using a pink cocoon that I knitted previously for Kasey. Clara's also on the same page a little bit further down.

Pod/Egg.
Of course a real baby is going to be bigger and fill it out more, but you get the idea.

Lookie What I Got!

My super great friend Amelia made this gorgeous diaper "cake" for me and it's just too pretty not to share. The "cake" part is of course made of diapers and it's garnished with flowers, toys, ribbons, binkis, a bottle, slippers, and in the middle there was a pretty little blanket!

Isn't it great? Thanks Millie!

Pluto

Clara has fallen in love with The Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. Whenever she wants to watch it she says "Pluo" which means Pluto and "Goo" which means Goofy. She seems to love these two characters the most. (It might be because they're the only names she can say?)

The last time we were up to see my parents, my mom asked me to go through some old things of mine to see if there was anything that I wanted to keep. I came upon this little Pluto pillow that my mom and I made when I was probably about 7 or 8. (I probably only cut out the material and helped put in pins, I've never been much of a sewer.)



Clara loves her "Pluo" and loves to cuddle him when she sleeps. Isn't this the sweetest thing you've ever seen? It's really fun to be able to pass something on that was from my childhood.

Pregnant Ladies

There have been and will be a lot of new babies born in my ward in 2010. We had 2 born this spring and there are 4 more pregnant including me. My visiting teaching partner is due in about 2 weeks and a girl that we visit teach is due this Wednesday. It's been really fun to experience our second pregnancies together! We all have 1 daughter already and are all pregnant with girls. When I was pregnant with Clara there was a girl I worked with who was a couple months ahead of me and it's just so fun to go through that at the same time as someone else!

Left to right: Kasey- due Wednesday, Stephanie- due the first week in July, and me-due August 12th.

Trip to Ginger's

(By Aubree)

Last weekend we decided to head down to Aurora, which is near Richfield, to visit Jeff's sister, Ginger . We knew it was going to be rainy but we haven't seen her and her family since Christmas and we didn't know when we'd get another chance.

We pretty much just hung out and played games and played with kids. The highlight of the weekend was on Saturday when it decided to clear up and let the sun shine for about an hour or so. We decided it was a good chance to go for a swim in the front yard.

Clara didn't love the swimming pool so much. Katelyn is almost 5 and Hannah just turned one in May.

Hannah tried to show Clara how much fun it was in the pool, but Clara preferred the grass.


Our little dare devil, Katelyn, taking a dive in this shallow pool. She was doing belly flops before this.

Clara and Hannah had a great time playing with the water table.

Check out those legs! Hannah's legs aren't really that big, they just have these gorgeous little rolls that I love!

Soon enough the clouds came back and it got too cold to be outside.


Time to get warm in the bathtub!

p.s. I bought Clara's swim suit this spring and it fit her just fine. This girl grows way too fast!