Happy Engagement!!

{Andy & Carlyn}

My sister Carly got engaged this last weekend!

I am so stoked for another wedding.

Isn't it about time?

Andy had Carly get all dressed up and he took her out to eat.

Then they went to the temple, he sang, they danced and he asked her to marry him.

After that Andy took Carly to his sister's house to pick up something, but SURPRISE! his sister's house was full of friends and family ready to party with the newly engaged couple.

Im so happy for these two!

What a cute couple!!

One Month Older and Wiser Too...

This post is just a couple days late, but can you believe Levi is one month old already?

Wow, time really flies when you aren't getting any sleep...haha

We went to St. George this last weekend for Levi's baby blessing.

I was stressing to the max that he was going to start screaming in the middle of his blessing.

I never really paid any attention to that before. It seems like all the baby blessings I've heard I've never heard a peep out of the baby.

This was also our first time trying out church with him so I wasn't quite sure what to expect.

Well, he did start to get fussy minutes before his blessing so I took him out in the hall to quiet him down a bit. He was ok but I knew he could start up again at any time. Jord came and got him and took him to the front and luckly he didn't fuss TOO much.

I did hear him start to wimper up there though.

Jordan did great and his blessing was amazing.

Don't you love his blessing outfit?! He was one classy individual.

My dad and Janice bought it as a gift for Levi.

Within this last month Me Jo and Levi have all been getting to know eachother a lot better.

{Here are a few things Levi loves:}

-His Mom and Dad of course

-The verticle blinds by his changing table. He could stare at them forever.

-Bath time. This took a little while for him to get use to, but now he loves to just sit in the warm water.

-EATING. He could eat all day if we let him.

-Studying with dad.

-and laying on chests.

-His sling

-Loud white noise. If he is fussy I can turn on the vacuum or hair dryer and it calms him down.

Im hoping that soon he will start to love sleep...

Well, sleeping at night that is.

Last night he did get 4 1/2 hours of sleep in a row (but then only one more hour of sleep and he was done for the night).

UNLV LAW!

{First day of school}

Isn't he so cute?!

This post is a little late, but Jord has started law school.

He has been pretty overwhelmed with it already

(one teacher assigned 500 pages for the first day of class)

but he is handling it wonderfully.

They say that the first year of law school is the hardest so we aren't expecting it to be anything different.

Jord is a smarty so hes got it all under control.

He goes to school from 9-5 and is involved in two clubs.

Even though he is super busy he always comes home and does anything and everything for me and Levi.

We love him.

Levi, Meet Sophie

Levi met his only cousin for the first time this last weekend.

Sophie Rose Waggoner was born Aug. 25 2010 to my brother Mike and sister-in-law Tonya.

Although Levi is 3 weeks older he is still smaller than Sophie

(although it doesn't look like it in this picture).

We pretty much figure he will always be smaller than her given their genes.

The Beginning

Before I had Levi I really appreciated my friends who put up there labor stories. I liked to know how things went down so I could kinda know what to expect.

SO

while I do want to have this documented for my own history, I wanted to put this up on my blog so that others can see how it all went down for me.

{Labor Story}

Wednesday around 4:30pm my water broke. I called Jordan and when he picked up he said "Is it time?" I said "I think so...". I wasn't quite sure since I was on my way to the bathroom when my water broke. I remember thinking "Oh no, I peed my pants!" But then I thought "Duh, I don't pee my pants...My water must have broke!" It was a small gush at first and then it just kept trickling. Jordan rushed home from work and was instantly in a panic. I wasn't quite sure what to do myself and so we called Jacie (of course) and my mom. I hadn't started feeling contractions so we we're sure if we needed to head to the hospital yet. Jace told us to head to the hospital because it was likely we would have the baby within the next 24 hours. We called ahead to let them know we were on our way. Since I wasn't in any pain I told Jord it was ok if he wanted to freshen up a bit and take a shower (he was mowing lawns). After about 15 min we were on the road and heading to the hospital.

It takes around 45 min to get to the hospital from Pine Valley and during the ride down I started to feel the contractions. They started at 6 min apart and by the time we were at the hospital they had gotten to 4 min apart. We parked and I waddled inside (my pants were soaked). I walked up to the nurses desk and said "Hi my name is Whitney Gardner. My water broke and my pants are really wet." The ladies just giggled and kept working. So I said "Uh..What am I suppose to do?!" A nurse finally gets up and takes us down the hall to our room. My contractions were getting pretty painful by now and after she was finished explaining things to me I realized that I wasn't paying any attention to what she was saying. I told her that I was sorry but I had no idea what she had just said. Jordan told the nurse not to worry that he would explain things to me and I went to the bathroom to change.

When we got to the hospital it was about 10 min to 6 pm and they were about to do a shift change. Because of this, we didn't have anyone check on us for another 30 - 45 min. When my nurse finally came in she went into great detail about explaining how the hospital works and how each machine was monitoring me and the baby. All the while I am cringing with each contraction that is coming 3-4 min apart. She hooks me up to an IV and I have to wait until the whole bag drains into my system before anything else can happen. She checks me at this point and I am dilated to a 6 and totally effaced. I told her I was ready for an epidural whenever I could get one.

Once the fluid was in my system she put me on pitocin to get my contractions to be a little more regular. Next came the epidural. OUCH. Ok, it wasn't too bad but I hated that needle going into my back. It wasn't fun. But the side effects were GREAT. I was about to throw-up with the pain from contractions but once the epidural kicked in I was loving life. I let my mom, Janece, Tresa Brown and my sister all come in. We all just chatted like it ain't no thang until the nurse checked me and I was dilated to a 9. We kicked everyone out and Dr. Winward came in. Everyone started prepping for the delivery. It was all so surreal. I couldn't believe that I was about to have a baby.

I got in position and they told me to start pushing. It was a weird sensation. It didn't really hurt (I was on drugs remember?) I just felt a lot of pressure "down there". It seemed like the hardest part was pushing for their 10 second count. But, after about 10 min of pushing baby Levi came into the world. They immediately laid him on me and me and Jo were able to hold our little boy. It was love at first sight. He's perfect.

After he was weighed, measured and cleaned up me and Jo were able to spend alone time with our little one. It was wonderful.

I felt (and still feel) like everything happened so fast.

Even the whole nine months.

My labor - in total - took about 5 and a half hours from the time my water broke.

And there it is. The labor story.

RLG

Reuben Levi Gardner

"Levi"

Aug 4th 2010

10:05 pm

6 lbs 5 oz

{First Family Photo}

Pregnancy Progression

...If I can even call it that...

Yeah, I know... I don't look THAT pregnant, but we're getting close to the end.

My last doctors appointment I was 2 1/2 cm dilated and 70% effaced.

Its surprising to me that ANYTHING is even starting to happen since I still feel pretty fine-n-dandy.

I haven't had any painful contractions or any feeling like the baby will be coming soon.

I guess we'll see though.

...and so starts the waiting game...