Live Nativity

At the beginning of December (I know, I'm behind. Time to play catch up) we went with my family to a live nativity up in Alpine. My mom had heard that it was a really good one and she got everyone tickets beforehand (it's a good thing she did because it ended up being sold out when we got there!) and we all met at a church in the area. We waited in a very long line for a trailer ride up to the nativity area where there are no roads. We ended up waiting in that line for an hour, and I was holding Crew the whole time because every time I tried to put him in the stroller he would wake up and fuss. When we finally got up there, we met a shepherd who told us a little bit about what it was like back in Bethlehem in the days when Christ was born. Then we saw several animals, which the kids all really loved. After that we saw, to our dismay, another line. We had never been to this nativity before so none of us knew what to expect. We didn't know there was going to be a first line, a trailer ride, or another long second line! We waited in the second, slow moving line but we still weren't able to see anything coming up in the near future for the nativity. Finally, Jon and I had to leave because the baby had to be fed. Not too long after the rest of my family left too (without having seen the nativity) because it would have been at least another 30 to 60 minutes before they got to the nativity and with kids in that cold weather during dinner time, nobody was prepared for that. But despite not being able to see anything besides one shepherd and some animals, I found myself being very humbled by the whole situation. While it was annoying to be standing in those lines that no one had told us about for so long and not seeing anything, I was still carrying my little barely 1 month old baby. Carrying him for nearly 2 hours made me tired, and as it got darker and colder and I had to hug him closer to my chest to keep him warm, I started to feel a little more appreciation for Mary and what she went through, carrying her baby among those smelly animals, walking through the grass and mud, trying to keep him warm and protected. I wonder if she knew how much suffering her baby would have to go through someday. If I knew my baby would have to go through so much, I don't think I could ever let him go! I would want to hold him close to me forever to protect him from the world. Even though it was kind of a pain to go up there and wait in those long lines for nothing, It was really a sweet experience for me too and I'm glad I went. Since I was holding the baby, Jon took some pictures:

Pretty Mountains while waiting in line for the trailer

Long line, pretty sunset

Sheep

Camels

Family waiting in the second long line

This is the only one of me. Fuzzy, because it was getting dark, but I'm glad I have it to remember the experience.

I think it must be a special blessing from Heavenly Father to a mother every time He sends a baby down right around Christmas time.

Merry Christmas!

Here is our Christmas Card for the year. It's a miracle we even got around to making them! So much baby, so little time. But I'm so glad we did. Merry Christmas, everyone!

1 Month

This perfect baby turned 1 month old on December 2. He is the sweetest baby, and it seems like he does just as much to try and make us happy as we do to try and make him happy. We just adore him!

Happy 1 month, Crew!

November Photo Dump

Here is the November Photo dump. I've actually taken a gazillion pictures of Crew, but I narrowed it down to a couple of favorites so you don't die of all my mommy blogging. You're welcome. ;)

My family decorated our apartment for when we got home from the hospital

Pretty sunlight on the mountains!

First Family Picture

He looooves fetal position

Milk Dribbles

He also loves sleeping with his hands by his face.

One of the only times he was actually happy in the swing

Like Father, Like Son

Second Hospital Stay

When Crew was just 10 days old, he was feeling really warm to me. So we checked his temperature and he had a fever. We took him to the doctor but by that time his temperature had gone down (go figure). Still, the doctor didn't want to take any chances and had us admit him to the hospital. Poor Crew had to have a spinal tap, an IV put in (which was the worst experience for him since they couldn't find a vein and when they did they just blew it so they had to bring in an ultrasound machine to find one and he was just miserable!), and get lots of blood drawn. They kept us there for 2 days while they did a bunch of testing. Everything came back normal though, thankfully. It was probably just a little bug. It was still just a horrible experience for all of us.

Hooked up to so many monitors and arm cast for the IV.

We had our first milk mustache in the hospital

Crew's first snow also happened while we were there.

I am so glad that whole ordeal is over! It was the worst feeling to have poor little Crew screaming so much because of all the things they were doing to him and not be able to help him. I'm so grateful he is better!

Newborn Pictures

Here are a few pictures from Crew's newborn session. We didn't get very many pictures (or at least not very many good ones) because the photographer kept trying to make his hands and feet exactly perfect and he kept moving them so she wasted a ton of time moving them back when it didn't really matter to me. Oh well. At least we got a couple good ones. These were taken when he was 5 days old.

So serious.

Obviously he was losing patience with the photographer here

Isn't he perfect?