New Arrival: Bryce Christian Hilton

For those that haven't heard, Bryce Christian Hilton was born at 3:59 P.M. today. He was 8 lbs 14 oz and 21.5 in. Everything went incredibly smoothly and Laura and Bryce are both doing great! Here's some pictures, in chronological order, from today.

Doesn't Laura look good? You'd never know she was 9 months pregnant.

Here's Dr. Spencer with Bryce right after delivery. The nurse was kind enough to take pictures for us, so I (Scott) could help Laura. Bryce was a little messy.

Here I am cutting the cord.

Birth was a bit of a shock, apparently.

Here he is getting weighed.

Laura got to hold him once I was done.

What a cuddly little guy.

Daddy kissing Bryce. We have this pose with all 4 of our kids!

Look at those big eyes. His heartbeat was good too.

They say that babies can't really see at first, but he was looking right at me.

Cute little baby feet.

He didn't like getting cleaned up very much.

He didn't really mind the shampooing.

Drying off under the heat lamp.

That's almost a smile.

Oh, he loves me already.

Here's our new arrival, all bundled up.

I have a few videos too, I'll try to get them posted later. Thanks for all of the help and well-wishes. Also, a big thanks to Dad for sharing his birthday with Bryce! Happy Birthday Grandpa (and Bryce)!

Preparing for Baby

Since our new little baby really could arrive any time now, I am feel pretty good that I have completed so many of my projects for him. (By-the-way my guess is that he will come between 3 and 3:30 pm on Dec 29th). So here is a look at some of my baby preparations.

First there is the car seat and bouncy chair. For those of you who don't know, in the past I usually sell our baby stuff as soon as we are done using is. This was mainly because we always lived in such small places that storing all that stuff seemed silly, plus I usually bought it used and then sold it again for as much as I bought it for (sometimes I even sold it for more that I bought it for, but don't tell). Anyway I am very proud of this car seat and bouncy chair because they are exactly the ones that I wanted, but I managed to get them both for $60 total rather than the over $200 they would have been if I had bought them new at the store. You may notice the bouncy chair kinda zips closed. I think the manufacturer's idea behind this feature was for outdoor use, but I am very excited to know that when my new little baby is in there and his crazy brothers and sister are running around and throwing things (even though they are not allowed too) he will be safe in there.
The next little treat is this car seat cover. It seems like everyone has one of these these days, so of course I had to have one. I just sewed two receiving blankets together and then added ties. There are little blue dots in the brown dot fabric so in person the blue ties are totally cute.

I finally made the bumper for his crib. I cut the fabric out weeks ago, but then just let it sit. So today I decided I better just get it done before he gets here. I painted the trees on his walls last week. I wasn't planning to, but when I woke up last Monday I thought to myself "Wouldn't it be cute if I just painted trees in here." I am planning put his name in blue letters in that open spot, but since we are still totally undecided on the name that will have to wait until later to get that done.This is the cute little branch I painted over the changing table. I really love the little blue birds.

Ok so here is the last picture. I made new cushions for the rocking chair and I am think I may jazz up the lamp shade a little but I am still undecided on that. I am feeling pretty ready for this little guy to get here. We are all very excited to meet him.

Oh wait one last picture. And this is the only one you are going to get.
Me 38 weeks pregnant. I feel as if my hugeness is amazing. I mean seriously how is it really possible that someone can get that huge in such a short time?

Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow

We have been getting quite a bit of snow this past week (in fact it is snowing right now). On Sunday the kids got to get out and help daddy shovel our driveway for the first time. They had a lot of fun and it was nice that we had enough snow that the fact that our yard is just dirt didn't matter. I am not sure how much help they were, but they sure had fun with Daddy and snow.


And yes the people across the street are U of U fans, but they are very nice and we like them anyway.

Gingerbread FHE

Every December we build a ginger bread house as a family. This year Logan decided that we really needed to make a Choo Choo train instead. The kids all ate a ton of candy (especially Logan) and we talked about why we do different things at Christmas and what different thing represent (like the tree, lights, candy canes and stuff). And hopefully they were listening enough to catch that everything we do is to help us remember Jesus.And of course I went to take a picture and the battery died so this is the only picture I got. My kids a silly.

Locks of Love hair cut

Today I took Emma to get her hair cut for real for the first time. Over the years I have trimmed it many many times, but never more than a few inches. Today we cut off 12 inches for Locks of Love. Emma loves her new hair cut and was very excited to give her hair to a little girl who didn't have any. It ended up a little shorter than I was thinking it would and have had to try to not be emotional about it... after all it is just hair, her hair grows really fast, and it will be a lot faster to brush and style which will be nice when the baby comes and I am trying to get her out to the bus on time.Just before the big cut

There is a lot of hair in her hand

She looks so grown up

When we got home I painted her finger and toes and used the straightening iron on her hair. This is the shortest her hair has been since she was like 1.

Crazy Little Logan

Logan is a funny kid. He is so silly and crazy that I think sometimes people miss how totally brilliant he is, but he is. He is so good at following directions and knows so much, you just have to listen.

For his birthday he got a shape sorter that he is really good at, but that is not why I think he is brilliant. When he is playing with it I can ask him any of the shapes, the colors, or the numbers on the shape and usually he will get it right. Then tonight I was showing Scott how Logan can find the shapes and Scott asked Logan where the hexagon was (there was no hexagon). Logan picked up a few shapes then got up and left the room. Then a moment later Logan returned with the hexagon and he explained that it was in his old room.

It was kinda like the time we were watching the BYU game and Guy yelled "Where's your wheels Logan?" to the game (Logan is a BYU player). So Logan got up, dug through a box and brought Guy a wheel. At first non of us dumb adults realized that Logan thought guy was talking to him and he was just getting him his wheel.

Anyway I just wanted to get it out there that we don't just love Logan for his looks... the boy has brains too.

Logan's Birthday Party

We had Logan's birthday party on October 25th. He had a fun day and I was so glad we could give him a day all about him. We started the day with buttermilk pancakes, sausage, scrambled eggs and juice. After breakfast we let Logan open an after breakfast present. He got a building set. He loves to build things.

Later Grandma, Grandpa, Eric, Jake, Kevin, Dan, Ludy, Tom, and Great Grandma Leavitt all came over for a party. Logan fell asleep just before everyone came over, so we had to wake him up. We ate first and then it was time for presents and cake. We took too long to get to opening presents and Logan got a little upset and started crying while we were singing happy birthday. But then we got him his present and it was all good again. He was spoiled with a camping set, dinosaur, tool box, train set, more trains, books, and a bag full of sea creatures.

After presents it was time for cake. I had plans to make the

most amazing blues clues cake you have ever seen, but I

really just couldn't invest the time into it. That first week

after Alan came home was kinda crazy around here and it took all I had just to keep us on track. So instead Logan got blue clues paw print cupcakes. They are one normal cupcake

with 4 mini cupcakes and look like Blue's birthday cake. For the big people I made Peanut Butter Cup Cake. It was good.

The rest of the evening the kids played with Logan's new toys while the rest of us played Wii. All in all I think Logan had a pretty happy birthday. I can't believe my Baby Logi is now a big boy. Happy Birthday Baby

Still waking up

Enjoying his cupcake

Opening presents

Playing with Tom

Being a dragon playing in his new tent

I must be nesting or something

Despite the fact that I am tired, huge, uncomfortable, sick, and a little overwhelmed taking care of the kids sometimes, I can't stop cleaning and organizing the house. Now please don't think for a moment that that means that my house clean or anything, because it is not. But I have made a lot of headway on my long list of projects.

For now the boys room is done. I still want to re-do the light house lamp, make new blankets for the beds, and make some art for the walls, but I feel like all of that can wait until I get a lot of the other rooms more done.

Originally I was going to get new furniture for the boys, but then I decided there were better places to spend money so instead I painted the beds to match each other and added the extra changing table as a shelf.

This bed moves Logan out of the crib.

Alan REALLY wanted to have a green bed in his shark room and I aim to please. There are actually green dots in the pattern on the sheets and curtains. (Kathleen - I always thought that bed would look good green)

Most all the toys are in the play room, but the boys get to have the train set and dinosaurs in their room.

Halloween fun

I happen to really love Halloween and love doing Halloween things with the kids. We had plans to go to Gardner Village, check out a pumpkin patch, go to the school Halloween carnival, and go to the ward Halloween party....and of course trick-or-treating. But since we have a recovering Alan boy and we are all sick we had to amend our plans.

So all pre-Halloween festivities were cut out. On Halloween the kids and I made mini-pumpkin pies for lunch. I also made pumpkin cream cheese cookies with the left over pie filling. Then after a lunch of pumpkin treats and eye balls (grapes) we carved our pumpkin. We thought the kids would have fun sorting the seeds out of the bowl of pumpkin guts... they didn't. The silly kids

quickly realized they didn't like touching the orange stuff.

Scott carved the face of Jack the Pumpkin King (at Alan's request) without a stencil or anything. I think he did an awesome job. Then we got in costume, went to red box to get Monsters Vs. Aliens, and picked out a jack-o-lantern pizza for dinner. There was a lot of debate about trick-or-treating this year. First there was the question of whether or not Alan could handle it and then there was the issue of germs (ours and theirs). Just think for a moment about how many sick kids have reached their hands into the candy bowl before you did. That may sound a little OCD, but we really need to keep Alan as healthy as possible. In the end we did go out for awhile and had Alan ride in a stroller between houses. Logan, the little chicken, was scared of everyone's pumpkins and refused to get out of the stroller or go up to anyone's door. I think he still had fun despite that.

Happy Birthday Mom

Things have been a little crazy around here lately, so I have to repent that this is all I did for my Mom this year for her birthday. But at least I did it on her birthday. We Love You Mom!!!