Sophie Mae Jensen

Ashley has been super busy with the baby so I, Daniel (new father) will be writing this blog post. Ashley is the history graduate and me the accounting, so don't expect the same quality of writing. 

This story begins on the coldest night of the year (-15* or so). Ashley was very uncomfortable on Sunday and was ready to have her baby already. All of us had chosen days for when we predicted the baby would come. Ashley thought she would come on the 17th because my family is in a habit of sharing birthdays. The 17th is our niece Bella's b-day. I was the most optimistic and chose the 16th. None of us were right since Sophie decided to come on the 14th. 

Ashley woke up on Monday at 3:00 a.m. and was starting to have contractions and could not stay asleep. I woke up at 4:30 a.m. and didn't not see my wife so I went outside to investigate and found her bouncing on her exercise ball and very much looking like she would have a baby sometime that day. 

 We decided to to go to the hospital at 6:00 a.m. as the contractions came closer together and were about 5-8 minutes apart.These are the pictures of Ashley as she was first admitted to the hospital. As you can see she was very smiley and happy before the really bad contractions came. Ashley was quite the trooper and toughed through a lot of mean contractions until she decided it would be best for her to have an epidural. Before the epidural she had one contraction that was so bad she threw up a few times. She received an epidural at around 11 a.m. and started to feel much better. Ashley took a nap for an hour and a half or so and then we just hung out awhile until she was ready to push. Ashley only had to push for about 5 contractions and 10 minutes before baby Sophie was born!

Sophie Mae Jensen is 7 lbs 8oz and 20 1/2 inches long

Grandma Jensen is soooo happy to finally have a grandchild here that she doesn't have to travel several hundred miles to see.

Sophie has been a very good eater so far and ate for about 45 minutes her first time

 Sophie looks so tiny in her car seat. 

We left the hospital around 6 p.m., the day after Sophie was born and we are very happy to have her healthy, safe, and happy. 

We were excited that my sister Marci and her family happened to be visiting this week. We didn't know if Sophie would make her appearance before they left to go back home. Baby Stella was very fascinated by Sophie and wanted to touch her sooo bad 

I got to give Sophie her first bath and dress her up, and pick out her first bow

Here we are as we are about to leave the hospital with our new baby 

Parenting Practice

 We have been blessed with lots of visitors this year! Shortly after Christmas Daniel's sister Marci, her husband Alan, and their darling 10 month old Stella came to visit. Daniel does so great with nieces and nephews around this age. They just love him. One particular night Stella just cozied right up with Daniel until she was whisked off to bed. She also loves the whiskers on Daniel's face. Apparently they are fun to touch.

Christmas 2012

 We had a great Christmas this year. It was nice for me to have Christmas Eve off and Daniel's sister Erin and her family came out from Arkansas. Christmas is definitely more entertaining with children around. We might have been more excited to see them than they were for Christmas.

 Thankfully Idaho didn't disappoint and we were blessed with fresh snow on Christmas Eve. My parents came over to Daniel's parent's house and we had a great Christmas meal together. The girls opened traditional Christmas Eve gifts of PJs and some super cute slippers. Then we made sugar cookies for Santa and they happily skipped off to bed.

Christmas Day started earlier than we've had in a while, but we still had a great morning. Lots of wonderful gifts were given and baby Sophie got even more goodies. She is all set with the best.

 Daniel had a work party three days after he started his new job and we won a Smores maker. It really is just a cutesy little ceramic thing you put fire in and then you carefully burn your marshmellow. All our nieces got a kick out of it and loved blowing out the flaming mallows. Bella impressively downed two whole smores all by herself.

 After we had our fill of games and excessive amounts of candy, Daniel and I went to spend some Christmas time with my parents. Our gift to them was tickets to the movie Les Miserables. My dad loves few things (Hugh Nibley or anything church-related) more than Les Mis. So I was excited to share this movie with him. We all had a great time.

 The Sunday before Christmas we had "pre-Christmas" with my parents. It was the day scheduled for Spencer to skype home for Christmas so we opened presents and celebrated early. It was super fun to see him. He looks great! And skinny. I am so grateful for the technology that we not only get to talk to him, but also get to see him! His English is getting worse--it's pretty cute.

We had a holly jolly Christmas indeed! We are especially looking forward to sharing next Christmas with our little girl.

39 Weeks and Random Pictures

39 Weeks

I'm feeling rather large. No major complaints, just ready to finish being pregnant. Also, I'd like my baby. Daniel is ready to meet her as well.

 

 We unloaded a couple pictures from Daniel's phone today.

 Back in September we went to the Eastern Idaho State Fair with Mike and Lara. Oh the glorious food to be had! Hand dipped corn dogs, scones, deep fried candy bars, and enormous lemonades. I dream of that food frequently.

We also love to visit Kelsey's baby Ruby who is almost three months old already!

Graduation 2012

 He did it! Kudos to my spouse for graduating! In retrospect, I have to say that my major was never on the same level of difficulty as his. He picked a tough one, but it will pay off in the end. It already has--he starts his new job tomorrow! He did awesome.

 I didn't get a lot of pictures unfortunately, but it was your typical graduation ceremony. It was good closure to our time at BYU-Idaho and in Rexburg. We've cleared out of Rexburg and somewhat settled into my parent's house while we wait for baby girl. We've found an apartment/town home that we really like that just might be where we will be moving in a couple months.

Life without school seems like a foreign concept to us, but we are really looking forward to it. Lots of changes in our immediate future. Kind of crazy. So, graduation took place Friday (which also happened to be the first snow we have had in a long time). Saturday I went to work for the last time [sad day] and Daniel and his dad finished up cleaning up the apartment and moving everything to Idaho Falls. After work we had a delicious dinner at the Sandpiper. I think Daniel was more excited for dinner than the whole graduation ceremony.

Baby Shower

 My darling Mother and Mother-in-law and my pal Kelsey went to town on planning an adorable baby shower for me and baby Sophie. I always feel so overwhelmed when people show so much love and kindness at these types of things. The fact that it was for my unborn child made all the more emotional. I did, however, manage to not cry--although I was close.


The theme was "My Favorite Things" so Mom made all my favorite treats....
Homemade Caramels, Cocoa Bean Cupcakes, Fruit dip, and homemade Snack Mix.

 For someone so tiny, Sophie sure merits large presents. :) I received the largest packages I've ever seen. It was so fun though. A huge thank you to everyone who came and/or sent gifts. We were sufficiently spoiled and I felt enormously more prepared after this. We didn't have much to begin with.

Lara~Everyone wants to make homemade wipes now. :)
Marci and Erin~ I cannot tell you how happy I am you picked a stroller for me! I couldn't decide, so I am so pleased you did it for me. And I love it!
Dianna~The diaper genie is awesome! What a great extra convenience.
(Wish you all could have been there) :)

Kelsey E. & Alexis snatched up Carter and Ruby as soon as they could. Who could resist?

 I may have been upstaged at the party by Lara's six week old baby boy Carter and Kelsey's four week old Ruby. They were kind of the life of the party.

Marva (my mentor from my time working for Corporate Deseret Book) made it for a short while--She was in town for the opening of our new store. I was super happy she could come.

 Mom had me play her own made up game called "Fill the Diaper Bag." Kelsey asked me questions about babies {how many diapers they use a day, when they start teething, how much they sleep, etc}and if I got it right {which I didn't the majority of the time unfortunately--some of those were tough questions!} then I got to pick an item out of a basket to help fill my diaper bag. It was pretty cute. And it was fun to hear answers and suggestions from all the awesome moms that came to the party.

Lori, Nancy, Kelsey, Alexis

 One of the items for the diaper bag was a homemade book of pictures of Spencer so Sophie can get to know him. He is very concerned that she loves him when he gets back from his mission.

Grandma checking out the pictures of Spencer

 Baby girls seriously get the cutest clothes ever. I have to laugh though, because if an adult wore some of the stuff we put these babies in it would just be outrageous.

Mom and LeAnn

The amazing quilt my Mom made for Sophie (and a matching one for baby Ruby)

Everyone had a laugh looking through my baby book

Audra, Kelsey, Lara, Norma, me, Mom, Alexis, Kelsey, LeAnn

We had too much fun chatting and hanging out so we didn't get to the craft Mom had planned. She had all the fixings for making adorable headbands, but that's okay. She and I have got together a couple times and just had fun making them whenever we have time. This baby better love headbands because she will have just a few....

34 Weeks and Good News

I feel like I am starting to look more tired too....

Here we are at 34 weeks. It's finally starting to feel close...almost scary close. I prefer to just not think about it too much.

Daniel has one week left of school! And starting next Monday, he has a job! It all seemed to happen so fast. Two weeks ago he interviewed with this company Brad Hall and Associates--they are an oil brokerage type of firm (once we figure exactly what they do, we can try to explain it). He felt pretty good about the interview, but said he wouldn't be shocked either way...The following Thursday (over a week later) while we were getting ready Daniel said he had dream that he got the job. I was surprised when Daniel showed up at at my work hours later to get the car and tell me he had a second interview. Needless to say, hours after that he came back while I was still at work to tell me they offered him the job and he had accepted it.

I cannot expressed how truly amazing this blessing is. To know that the Monday after he graduates Daniel starts his career, is more than I could ask for. We have many friends and family members who are struggling to find work. It is nice to know that we don't have to stress making a major move with a teeny baby. All this waiting and not knowing what was going to happen to us after graduation has easily been one of the most stressful things I've had to deal with in a long time. I'm supremely glad its over. Now we can focus on preparing for baby. Did I mention that's only six weeks away?