Levi and Paisley Jo

Levi and PJ's second time meeting.

We sure do love the McDonalds!

Halloween

Hope everyone had a happy halloween!

We sure did.

Levi was a puppy and I was a black cat.

Jordan? Animal control.

Thats what you decide to be when you don't want to dress up.

This year was probably one of the best halloweens I've had in a long time.

Mom and Aria came up for our ward's trunk or treat / chili cook-off on Wednesday.

It was my first trunk or treat and it was really neat to see what everyone decorated their car as.

Aria loved it as well. She was the cutest fairy out there.

Thursday night we headed down to St. George and on Friday we got together with my dad, Janice, Carly, Andy, Mike, Tonya, Grandma Tutu, and Sophie to make some Gingerbread Haunted Houses. That was a blast.

Our Haunted Church.

Dad's graveyard. Please notice Car's scary face in the back.

Mike and Tonya's Scary House.

Carly and Andy's Haunted house/ graveyard.

On Halloween (Saturday) we went to my mom's house and chowed down on junk, carved pumpkins, took Aria out trick-or-treating and watched a scary movie.

Love Love Loved it.

Can't want until Levi can go trick-or-treating!!

For Sale

For Sale.

Im selling some extra nursing covers that i've made.

This is what they look like:

and these are the different materials:

I can make any others if you'd like.

They are $25 bucks.

Email me: [email protected]

Aria & Levi

Me & Levi took a mini vaca to STG Wednesday - Friday this last week.

We wanted to get down there to see family and Jordan needed some good studying time to finish a big paper so we headed down.

It was sooo nice to be down around family again, to have some extra hands to help and play with Levi, and also some great babysitters so I could get out of the house.

One of my best helpers was Aria.

Boy does she love Levi.

She calls him her baby.

And Levi loves Aria.

He is so entertained by her.

The nursing cover is something that gets a lot of attention from Aria.

I tell her that Levi needs to eat and then he stays under there.

She is always trying to sneak a peek.

So I asked Aria if she wanted to get under the cover and eat.

She got her sippy cup and hopped on my lap.

It was hilarious.

She stayed under there until she was done with her drink then lifted it up the top of the cover and said "I'm done Whitney."

She did not want to get out.

She was so content just sitting under the cover.
Oh I sure do love that child.

Our Budding Bud

I can see them; Levi's little teeth buds.

10 weeks old and teething.

Im sure it will still be a little while until they poke through, but now I see the proof.

Chunky Monkey

Look who is 2 months old!

What a little chunkster.
Levi has decided that this is the best way to sit.
He loves to be able to see everything around him.

I feel like he is getting so big already!

We had a doctors appointment today and found that he is up to 10lbs and 21 inches long. He is finally startig to fill out his newborn outfits.

He also had to get his shots, but my little brave man only cried for like 5 seconds before he was fine again. The doctor also told us that he thinks he might be teething soon since his gums look swollen and he is drooling A LOT. Yay, how fun. Not.

Levi's sleeping has seemed to have gotten worse the past couple days. Hopefully this won't last very long. At night he'll sleep for maybe 3 hours at first then wake up 2 hours after that and then be in and out of sleep until 7 am when I've decided its time to "wake up." I've come to accept that this is how my sleep is going to be for a while and it makes it easier to handle.

Mr. Levi has started to "talk." It is the cutest thing ever. He'll just look up at me and starting cooing. We'll carry on a conversation for a good 5 or 10 minutes. I absolutely love it.

Twins

Aren't my boys so precious?! We were able to get through another FULL three hours of church yesterday and it was marvelous {given I did spend a lot of time in the mothers lounge}. It was nice to feel active again. Not to mention going to relief society since Ive been in primary for the past two years.

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...

Mon's Bridal Shower

Great times with great girls!

Gardner Family Assembly

Gardners, ASSEMBLE!

This last weekend was the Gardner assembly in Pine Valley.

No, not a reunion. An assembly. Of Gardners.

Nothing can be better.

We played games, went on a haystack ride, had a team building activity, learned some life skills, had a book review, a family business update and ATE ATE ATE.

Boy did we eat.

Yum.

We had loads of fun, like we do every year.

I sure do love them Gardners.

Birthday BOY!

25 Years Old!

Happy Birthday to Megan and Janece too!

Birthday activity.

Meg, Mike me and Jo all went golfing at the Ledges.

Also, All of St. George celebrated JJM's (Janece Jordan Megan) birthday with fireworks.

Quite the show, Thanks STG.

Little Update

Yep, still pregnant.

Here is my 32 Week shot.

This photo doesn't do my belly justice.

Its getting BIG.

I can't believe I've started my 8th month already...

Still crafting in Pine Valley

Here are some pillows I made for the baby's room out of scraps from the baby quilt I made.

Here was my Fathers Day gift to my dad.

I made a cute pink one for Janece.

Welcome Home Elder Pierce!

Isn't that so presh?

Cattle and Crafts

{Cattle}

Cattle Drive 2010.

Stats:

40 cattle

5 cousins

105 degree weather

2 days

0 injuries

1 rattle snake killed

Me, Holly and these guys all came out the last day for breakfast.

It was too hot to stay for very long.

we were wusses.

Me & Jo. Arizona strip. 30 weeks pregnant and sweating.

{Crafts}

I don't know if its the nesting instinct that is taking over or the fact that I'm living in Pine Valley, but here are the few projects I've finished in the past couple weeks.

Hand stitching around all the appliqué's on the baby onesies I made during conference this year.

This doggie puppet washcloth for the babe.

This diaper stacker that goes with...

this baby quilt I made.

Im pretty satisfied with the crafts so far.

I'm ready to start something else now.

Anyone have any suggestions?