Hiking with Beluga Baby Wrap!

We took a fun little trip to beautiful Park City with some of our good friends last weekend and had such a great time! If you have ever been to Park City you know how insanely gorgeous it is there. We absolutely love all the outdoor activities that they have to offer and one of our favorites is to hike. Before we started having kids Cody and I would go hiking any chance we had, we are both outdoor people and love to be in the mountains! With river I was a little stuck because I didn’t have a carrier for her that I could use for our hikes, so we just weren’t able to do anything that summer it was a total bummer!

I was so excited when Beluga Baby and I decided to collaborate because I had always heard great things about baby wraps but I had never given any a try. I can tell you that I have been so pleased with the beluga baby wrap, they make it easy offering tutorials (here) on how to wear the wrap for different size babies. I feel like I have gotten my life back, because my clingy baby is able to hang out on my chest close to my heart while I get things done around the house and play with his big sister throughout the day! This wrap has completely changed my idea of the newborn! It has made life so much easier!

 

  

My Experience with Owlet!

Hey guys! When river was a baby I remember just grabbing a baby monitor at the store that I never used because the darn thing drove me crazy with how loud it was, it is crazy to me how advanced the technology has come in the past four years! When I found out that I was pregnant with Park’s I knew that I wanted to invest in a better quality baby monitor, but with so many to choose from it became a tedious job! Other than not having boy clothes I had pretty much everything I needed to welcome a new baby home, so I focused all my efforts into finding a good baby monitor. I spent so much time reading reviews and googling baby monitors, it was crazy! I was so fortunate to have my research point me in the direction of the Owlet baby monitor.  With hospital grade technology – pulse oximetry-  that it is designed to alert when your baby stops breathing, it was a no brainer that the owlet sleep sock would be a perfect fit for our family. I am the biggest worry wart, and add the fact that Park’s was failure to thrive I became a nervous wreck!  When you have a new baby you are already not sleeping because you are up with your baby at night to feed them, burp them etc. but for both Cody and I we were also up throughout the night checking him to make sure that he was breathing. As all new parents out there know, having a precious baby stop breathing in the middle of the night is almost always our number one worry and concern.  Having the Owlet has been like having a huge weight lifted off my shoulders and has really given me one less thing to worry about! That is why I recommend this product to every pregnant mother I know, and I have told all of my friends and family and anyone else who will listen about the owlet and how incredible it is! It is definitely a perfect baby registry item! Trust me guys, you NEED this in your life if you have a little baby or are expecting one! The set up is incredibly easy and as I say in my video you can set the whole thing up through your app and they have tutorials to educate you on the product, the proper ways to use it and the technology that is used. It has been so convenient knowing that when I put parks down in the evenings I can just check the app on my phone to tell me that his oxygen and heart rate levels are all where they need to be, it has really given me peace of mind. The owlet has been an amazing little bugger, and I can’t imagine bringing anymore babies home in the future without it. Do you have an owlet? Do you love it as much as we do?! If you are a parent like me, give owlet a try, I can promise you that you won’t be sorry! Love you guys!

 

Thanks Owlet for sponsoring this post!

Parks Bridger Mortensen-Birth Story

We welcomed our precious baby boy Parks into the world June 9th 2016. He is six weeks tomorrow as of 12:55 pm, and oh man, I feel like the past six weeks have been a blur of emotions and blessings! Parks is the happiest little momma’s boy around. My house is a disaster, I’ve worn makeup maybe three times since he was born and my hair? ha well that usually ends up in a braid down my back, but you know what? I’ll take it! I love every single minute with my sweet baby boy and seeing his little smiles, kissing his cute cheeks and hearing his sweet baby coo’s makes every other project I have seem unimportant and so small.

  If you have followed me for a while you know that I struggled with three miss carriages before becoming pregnant with our precious Parks, I still remember having the absolute WORST anxiety the day they wanted me to go in for my first ultrasound to hear the heart beat because my previous three pregnancies didn’t have a good outcome. I was an emotional wreck going into the hospital that day. We were able to see our sweet baby boy and hear his strong heart beat and all my worries washed away with my tears. Fast forward to 33 weeks pregnant and two days spent in labor and delivery for constant contractions spaced 3 minutes apart. I was so worried that he was going to be born super early and not be ok, I have never prayed so hard in my life over those two days that heavenly father would bless him if he did come. but we were able to get the contractions to stop and I was able to carry parks full term! Thats right he is one of those less than 5% babies that are actually born on their due date!

On June 8th around four in the afternoon I had Cody take me to the hospital because I was having some mild contractions spaced about 4 minutes apart and getting stronger. When I got there sure enough they saw I was having steady contractions and gave me an exam, at that point I was dilated to 4 centimeters and about 75% effaced so they called my doctor and she wanted to have me walk and be monitored for the next few hours to see if I progressed at all. Around 8 that evening they checked me again and even though I was still contracting I hadn’t dilated anymore and had only thinned out to 80%. At that point I was super frustrated and just wanted to go home and be with my family so they discharged me and we headed home for the night. I remember taking a warm shower thinking in my head that it would make the contractions stop or at least dull down when in reality it didn’t do either. I was up all night long with steady contractions but didn’t want to go in for fear of being told I wasn’t in “real” labor so I just waited it out until nine the next morning when the contractions started to build in intensity and length. By the time we reached the hospital and I got all gowned up the nurse came in to check me I was still only dilated to 4 centimeters!! I was 90% effaced but I just wasn’t dilating so my nurse stripped my membranes trying to see if that would do anything and ouch! It did! Within a few minutes I was having some seriously painful contractions that I couldn’t talk through. So by 9:30 they admitted me and put me in one of the labor rooms, at this point I decided it would be best to get the epidural now instead of wait because once I am actively in labor my labors are super fast. My anesthesiologist was the nicest woman ever and made getting the epidural so painless and easy! About ten minutes after getting the epidural my mom and River came to the hospital to visit us and talk to us and at that point I was still feeling my contractions really well but the edge was taken off so I didn’t really think anything of it. My doctor came in and broke my water at noon and checked me stating that I had dilated to almost 7 and was completely effaced and that she expected me to start pushing by two. After she left my epidural slipped and completely stopped working! I called in a nurse at about 12:40 and said how much pain I was in (actually she could see how much pain I was in because I was shaking and couldn’t even talk bracing against the side of the bed.) They called the anesthesiologist back up there to try to adjust my medicine but my contractions were coming so hard and so fast that it just couldn’t keep up with them. All of the sudden I had this crazy urge to push and when my nurse went to check me her eyes got big and she was like “oh my, you are complete and baby is right there”! Luckily my doctor was just in the other room and she came right in suited up and was there while I pushed. I pushed three times and he was born at 12:55! And let me tell you, that little boy has some serious lungs! He cried and cried and cried some more until they placed him on my chest. It was as if everyone else in the room disappeared and it was just him and me, he opened his eyes and looked right into my soul letting me know he knew exactly who I was. it was one of the most beautiful experiences of my life! I cried and kissed him and didn’t want to let go! they finally took him from me and measured him at 21 3/4 inches long and he was 8 lbs and 11 oz of pure chunk! He is our perfect son and we couldn’t be happier to have him here! He hurt like heck coming out (props to all the natural momma’s out there, OUCH) but he was SOOO worth the pain!

The first time river met him was one that I will never forget, she came and sat on the bed with me and immediately started touching his head and cheeks telling me how cute our new baby was. There isn’t a day that goes by that he doesn’t receive at least 100 kisses and face pets from her, she loves him so much and is the BEST big sister! She is always right there wanting to help me when I change his diapers or give him baths, and constantly wants to hold him. It is so sweet to watch him look at her and smile knowing exactly who she is, he will sit and coo for her better than he will most everyone else. I just know that the two of them are going to be best buds soon and I can’t wait for her to be around to help me teach him how to walk and crawl and everything else! We have been over the moon excited about our little family of four and are so so grateful!

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