Now that we're home

It is actually so awesome to have Talmage in our home. The boys are totally loving him, and every once in awhile we hear a squeak and we all smile at the newness of having another family member.

Bath time and bed time like normal, grandma getting to come over and help out is a bonus!

Kimball brought me the most beautiful Hydrangeas (my fav) in the hospital, and for some reason, they died in less than six hours!! So, he traded them out for these amazing hot pink roses. I love them and Kimball made me feel special by insisting that he bring me flowers. He has reminded me how grateful he is for me and thanked me so many times for Talmage. He has to know the feeling is mutual-

I c o u l d n o t d o t h i s w i t h o u t HIM!!

Making the trade
Waa laa!

Talmage likes to find his index finger and suck on it. So far, I have resisted the urge to give him a binky. That is mostly due to his ability to quickly calm and be soothed. Just waiting to save the binky until we're pretty comfortable feeding him.

Good night!! Love you!! I shouldn't admit this, but he slept for seven hours his first night home. I could not believe it. I was worried at first, but he's been nursing pretty good today

Grandma MJ Knights came over today on her way back home from working at the downtown family history center.

Grandma Knights knitted this beautiful blue and white blanket. It was a real treat to have her here and get this picture of him wrapped in her labor of love. It is SO soft and beautiful. Just the perfect size for Talmage.

Going Home!

I can't say enough about the wonderful staff at The U of U Hospital!! I got amazing service and had an outstanding experience there. However, it was nearly impossible to rest. As soon as they gave me the 'okay'- I gave them the 'thank you, see you later.' I was feeling really good, and wanted to get back to my boys and be at home. We left on Tuesday at 6 pm. Talmage being just 27 hours old!!First, you need a going home outfit.

So cute. Now we just need to get the clamp taken off of his umbilical cord and the security tag off of his ankle.


Carseat. He looks SO tiny in there. This seat has been waiting a long time to carry you home.

Mom had to get dressed too.

Gotta love the wheelchair ride. I guess we still had too much to carry to the car, so since Kimball's hands were full, I got to take the baby and the joyride.

I got to take a closer look at the beautiful hydrangeas Kimball brought me on Tuesday morning!! I loved them- he's the best.

As we drove away I mentioned to Kimball how it will be weird to not be making my weekly, bi-weekly and monthly treks up here anymore. So happy to be going home with a healthy baby boy, and feeling pretty good myself.

Talmage Jones High

We're sleeping around here because there isn't much rest happening in the hospital.

BUT...come back soon to see pictures and the birth story of our new little one.

Talmage Birth Story -by Kimball

We are so glad to welcome Talmage to our family. He was born on April 25, 2011 at 3:01pm. He was born on the same gestational day as Andrew, 39 weeks 3 days, and is the same weight as Andrew: 7 pounds 2 ounces, and Talmage is 19.5 inches long. We almost named him Isaac, Beckham, Truman, William and Boy #3. We know you just want to see pictures, so here you go!

As Erica explained earlier she got to schedule an induction which meant she got to shower, do makeup and blow dry her hair. Erica was a little scared to be induced but as we were on our way the UofU Hospital called and said, "Erica we have your room ready." She looked at me and said, "Are we checking into a 5 star hotel?" Normally you start this process in a 5 star hotel, not end it there...

We arrived and in the corner of room 2203 was this baby warmer with blankets, suction, a diaper, and a hat.

The monitors were all set up and ready to go, before long they were showing the contractions, Erica's and baby's heart beat.

This is Erica all settled in and looking super hot in a hospital gown. She didn't like this view at first so we got out of bed and went on a half hour walk after the IV & Pitosin got started. The only bad part of the delivery room process was that our nurse missed her IV twice (once on each hand) and had to have another nurse put the IV in. You know the delivery went well when that was the worst Erica had to experience.

She knew she would be spending plenty of time in bed over the next few days so the walk was a chance for us to have an uninterrupted few moments together. As soon as we got back from the walk the Anesthesiologist walked in and administered the Epidural. We specifically asked for this before they broke her water. This was a lesson learned from Andrew. We didn't want to risk going natural again.

During the epidural we got talking about the tatoo'd tough guys who faint... I got a few good looks at the epidural process and felt woozy (specifically looking at a tube sticking out of my wife's back). I fought it off by taking off my sweater, and then decided I should sit down. Erica says I was ghost white and they got another nurse to bring me orange juice. I felt terrible that they turned their attention to me while Erica is getting stuck with a huge needle, and having contractions at the same time.

I can blame this a small part on low blood sugar as I ate breakfast at 7am and this was 12:30. Erica told me to go get lunch so I called ahead and picked up a B&D Burger, fries and Dr Pepper for lunch. Yes I did leave the hospital while my wife was in labor BUT I was only gone 12 minutes... seriously. My only regret is that I ate it in front of her and made her jealous. I did make up for this by taking her there on our way home from our stay. She was ready for real food.

When I got back they "ruptured her membranes" which is the technical medical terminology for breaking her water. The contractions escalated from there and Erica continued to feel them but be managing due to the epidural. After 2 hours they came in once to check her and she was dilated to a 7cm. Another 15 minutes of heavy contractions went by and I told Erica she needed to call in the nurse. She refused so I pushed the button for her. She came in and told us that Erica was complete! Erica was very surprised. She thought she had at least another half hour to go.

She was even more surprised to hear that the nurse wanted to get the Dr. and push! We had a nice 10 minute chat about what to expect, remembering how to push, and talked about our preference to allow the chord blood to drain into our baby before we cut the chord. This is called pulsating. The only negative is that mom is delayed holding the baby for 30 seconds while the rich chord blood flows into baby.

There walked in 7 women to oversee the delivery. Erica's OB Dr. Branch was in Seattle unexpectedly so we got his partner Dr. Manueck to deliver Talmage. Besides her there was a resident Dr., the attending Dr., two nurses, a nurses aide, and a medical assistant. After she counted all the women in the room Erica looked at me and asked if I felt out numbered. Yes.

Erica did AMAZING people. We coached her up but she did it all. She pushed a set of three 10 count pushes, then rested for the next contraction. The attending decided why wait and asked Erica to push again. Four more pushes of ten counts and Talmage was born to us at 3:01PM after 3 minutes of pushing. Did I mention she did amazing?

Another one of the most beautiful and inspiring moments of my life. Where the pregnancy was nine months of constant contractions, nausea, heartburn and severe discomfort -the delivery made up for in what the nurse called a "picture perfect delivery." Labor is not easy for Erica. With every contraction we're in constant fear of a repeat of Benson. So to have this delivery be so beautiful and simple really makes the whole experience worthwhile.

I'll always be indebted to Erica for brining three amazing children into our family. She sets aside her own personal comforts and sacrifices her body to deliver these bundles of joy. The scriptures speak of joy in your posterity and there is much joy in our home at this time. She continues to show me why she is such an amazing woman and proves again and again that I made the right choice to ask her to be my wife.

We welcomed Talmage by giving him a bath and dressing him in his first outfit.

Welcome to the High Family

Andrew sat up on the bed with Erica and as she passed the new baby over to him he said, "Lu-loo baby" and gave him a kiss on the cheek. We're going to bottle up that memory forever. Melt your heart.

Long Overdue

Yes, this is in relation to the pregnancy. I'm not long overdue, but a pregnancy picture is. I am 39 weeks and 2 days and feeling every minute! My Dr. politely invited me to be induced on Friday when I hit my 39 week mark. I got nervous about forcing nature and declined. Then, at my next appt. when I was 38 1/2 weeks (3 cm. and 80% effac.) I thought that maybe I should go for it. A baby on the weekend would be better for Kimball and schedules and we could 'count' on it. However, the day was booked by then. He then said, Monday the 25th is open....so, I'm scheduled to be induced on Monday, but still feeling SO nervous about pushing nature AND choosing my son's birthday. I had Andrew -on my own- at exactly the same time I'm scheduled to have this one, so I'm sure the baby is well-done by now, but I worry about how the labor will go.

On the flip side, it does sound nice to take a shower, kiss my kids goodbye, drive calmly to the hospital, and get an epidural before I'm in miserable amounts of pain. I still have the option to cancel at any time, but I'm keeping my appt. until I'm absolutely sure.

As for now, I feel quite uncomfortable, contracting a lot, and pretty much like a ticking time bomb. People are surprised to see me still pregnant, but I'm grateful to be full-term. We will flood the blog with pics as soon as he's here- Kimball's on that for sure.

More eggs

Benson has been wanting to dye eggs for awhile. It really is such a fun thing for kids to watch the eggs take on colors, and do some color mixing. Kimball and I only gave them four color choices and by the end they looked like different colors. Both of the boys really loved it. It was pretty difficult for Kimball to watch a mess being made and dye get spilled, but he then decided to embrace it.

My boys look naked here, they aren't really, but within minutes of starting the fun, we decided to strip them down. This is a typical face from Andrew when we say 'smile' because he thinks that he's supposed to make us laugh. He makes funny sounds with his tongue at the same time, and it works- we smile and laugh.

"The damage"- not too bad I say! However we did have several mid-activity wipe-ups. What a fun tradition. Good thing we like hard boiled eggs and egg salad sandwiches.

Easter Egg Hunting

Here we are...at the So. Jordan Rec. Center for their Easter Egg Hunt. There was a crazy amount of people there and even though we were actually there ON TIME it didn't help much.


I pictured a LARGE space of grass, like a field with eggs and such spread out for the kids to run and 'find'. Instead, there was a 20 x 20 foot area with candy and eggs on the ground for the kids to pick up. Within seconds of taking this picture, there were so many kids in this section, Benson didn't have enough space to bend over and pick anything up! Oh well. He returned to me with a tootsie roll, a piece of double bubble, and one other piece. At first he seemed discouraged, but when I cheered he felt like maybe that was good enough. Two of my nephews that were there didn't get a single piece- not a complaint, just a fact. However, Andrew made it out of the masses with about 12 dum dums. He's closer to the ground right. (:

We saw Laura with Luke and Connor there and chatted for awhile. Andrew shared some of his suckers with Connor.
Benson wanted a picture with Luke and "that thing with the huge beak."

Nate and Andi brought Carter and someone shared their candy with him. We were all enjoying being together outside and watching the kids. We're lucky we didn't lose any of them.

After the local festivities, we planned a brunch at Carlie and Jeffrey's home. We headed back there and while we got breakfast ready, we filled some plastic eggs for the kids to hunt in the backyard. That was a total bonus from Carlie and Jeffrey. Brunch was awesome and the kids LOVED being in their huge backyard.

The backyard was perfect for little kids because there were thick areas of greenery for the eggs to hide in, but it wasn't too difficult for them to find. They really had a great time.

Benson, Andrew, Carter, and Noah.

What a great Saturday morning!!