Christmas in Missouri

Grandma and Grandpa Salmon, Mom and Dad Smith, Carley Charlie and Nate Rice

This year Charlie Nate and I were able to fly to Missouri for Christmas. Nate was very good on the plane, thank heavens! Although, while we were there, he got colic, yuk! Now he screams every night from about 12-2 AM. I am very exhausted! Christmas was fun, but very hectic since there was about 26 people at my parents home for about 4 days. My parents were great and helped out lots with Nate. We really appreciated that, they even took care of him for a whole night so that Charlie and I could get some much needed sleep. Thank you Mom and Dad. Charlie and I enjoyed visiting with everyone and showing off our little boy. Even though he can be a handful we are still very proud parents and love him so much more than we ever thought we could. Nate also got to meet his great grandparents too, so I posted a 4 generation picture on here.

Charlie and I unfortunately both got colds while we were in Missouri, and are trying not to get Nate sick. Hopefully we'll get over this soon. It was just too cold in Missouri for us, the high the day we left was 35, and when we got to Florida it was 82 degrees! What a change! Florida is so great in the winter.

Well we hope that your Christmas was great too, we really enjoyed ourselves and the chance to see our family. All of my sisters and there families were able to come too, that was a wonderful opportunity. We hope you all have a wonderful new year!

One month birthday

I can't believe Nate is already a month old! Boy does time fly. We went for his check up today and he is 20 1/2 inches long, that is 2 inches in one month! He also now weighs 7 lbs. 3/4 ounces. So that is almost 2 pounds in one month! The doctor says he is doing great. The doctor also thinks that he has acid reflux, so she gave us some medicine to see if that will help his tummy feel better. Hopefully it works.

Lately we have been doing really well with sleeping at night. (knock on wood) He gets up every 2 1/2 to 3 hours and eats, then goes back to sleep till about 7:00 in the morning. If you lay him on your chest, he'll sleep longer with you.

We are very excited to go to Missouri for a week, we leave tomorrow. We are flying and are praying that Nate does well on the plane, it is a 2 1/2 hour flight, but no lay overs! Wish us luck. We hope you all have a very good Christmas! We'll up-date you after our trip and tell you how it went. Happy Holidays everyone!

Christmas Angels

Today after Sacrament, my friend Jessica and I decided to take some pictures of our babies together. Her baby is Lillian and was born on Nov. 15, weighing 7 lbs 13 oz ( I think) so she is kinda bigger than Nate, but only 5 days older. So here are the pictures of the little angels. Everyone at church thought they were just so cute sitting there.

Also we went to Grandma and Grandpa Rice's today after church and got our picture taken with them too.

Visit from Aunt Angie

So as many of you know, my sister Angie came to sunny Florida for a visit. While she was here she ran me ragged! We went shopping about every day, all day. Good thing Nate was such a wonderful little boy. He slept about the whole day while shopping, then he would be awake at night from 6-10 give or take, then sleep the night away, only waking up to get changed and eat in the 2 and 5:00 hours. Angie was great and took the 5:00 feeding to let me sleep a little more. That was wonderful. Of course the day Angie went home was the night I needed her. Nate got a tummy ache and wouldn't sleep very well at all. Also yesterday he was awake about the whole day. So I didn't get any sleep then either. Last night we gave him some gas medicine and he slept somewhat better, getting up every 2 hours or so. That was okay, but I am hoping that he gets back to his schedule tonight.

I took him to my old work today and showed him off. Everyone loved him and thought he was just so cute! They think he looks like me, so I guess I must be cute too! We are looking forward to flying to Missouri on the 21st. We will be there till the 28th and will get to see Aunt Vicky and her family, Aunt Becca and her family, Aunt Angie and her family, and of course Grandma and Grandpa Smith. They are all anxious to meet him, except Angie, since she already did.

Also this week...Nate took his first shower with mommy. After spitting up all over mommy and then messing his pants something awful, Charlie and I put him in the shower with me. Boy was he slippery, I think rubber gloves should be used for holding him next time. Also, Nate has about grown out of his premie onesies. He still fits into the pants, but the onesies are too short for him now. That about covers this week, here are a few pictures of Aunt Angie's visit! Oh, and I am back to my pre-pregnancy weight, but would still love to continue loosing!

Fatten 'em up!

Hello everyone! Today Nate got to go the the Dr. for his 2 week check-up. I can't believe it has already been 2 weeks! We are very pleased to say that Nate has fattened up in the last week. He gained a whopping 9 1/2 ounces and weighs in at 5 lbs 11 1/2 oz. The Dr. and Mommy and Daddy are very happy about that. He has started to sleep a little better at night, he can go 3-4 hours (if he wants to) but we still have hard nights sometimes too. Sat. night he was up from 12-4 am and that was terrible, but last night was a very good night.

Charlie and I took Nate for a walk today, it is about 73 degrees and sunny here. Nate slept the whole time, but Charlie and I sure enjoyed ourselves. Tomorrow Angie is coming and we are very excited! We will take some pictures of Nate and Aunt Angie and post them on the blog. Here are some pictures of the little cutie! The one in the blue top with white pants is from today, the rest were taken throughout the week.

Baby bath time

Dr. Edwin Hayes who delivered Nate!
Daddy's first diaper change!

Hello everyone! We gave Nathaniel his first bath the other day. I was kind of scared to so his Grandma Rice helped us out with it. He cried, but not that much really. Here are a few pictures of bath time. Also we have a picture with my OBGYN Dr. Hayes, we really liked him. His office even sent us flowers in the hospital. Also there is Daddy's first diaper change, his is pretty good at it considering he hasn't been around babies much. This morning he took care of Nate while I slept. He fed him, changed a poopy diaper, and his clothes. What a great job daddy! Also Tangent, our dog, has made his claim on Nate. He comes to get us when Nate cries or fusses. Also he likes to sleep by his crib sometimes. He love Nate, but since Tangent is so big we have to be extra careful with him. He likes to try and lick Nate's toes.

Nate hasn't been wanting to sleep too well at night. He wants you to hold him all night. So last night he slept in the bed with me for a couple of hours and then we moved to the couch to feed him and he slept on the couch with me for another 4 hours! If that is what it takes to get some sleep, we'll do it! Hopefully he'll get better about sleeping in his bed! So Nate got another bath today and when I went to take off his diaper, his umbilical cord fell off! That was quick! We also showed him off at the bank where I work. Everyone thinks he is just such a cutie! We sure think so!
Tangent sleeping in Nate's room

Cutie Pie Nate
Nate's first bath



All clean after my bath! What a handsome boy!

Nathaniel's debut!

Nathaniel Wade Rice was born Nov. 20, 07 at 4:22 am. He weighed 5 pounds 4 ounces and is 18.5 inches long. Check out the hair! He really is such a cute baby. He is pretty good too, doesn't fuss much, hopefully that will stay! Charlie and I couldn't be happier. Enjoy the pictures!

Induction Date!

My doctor decided that since the baby is so small he wants to induce me. We go in at 6am on Tues. November 20! It is exciting but now I am nervous. I think reality has finally set in. I just thought that I'd post a few pictures of my tummy and also my ever expanding feet! My shoe size is normally around a 5 1/2 to 6 and I am into size 7 right now. Sometimes the skin is so tight that they hurt, I am looking forward to this ending for sure! I'll keep you posted on what is going on down here in sunny Florida! Oh, by the way, I am progressing pretty well and they say I may not make it till Tuesday, but we'll see. They told my cousin Crystal that she would go early and she was 5 days late! Wish us luck!

This is after I elevated them and had ice on them for about 30 minutes! They never go down and they have looked worse than this. Hope I don't have this with every pregnancy!

Pregnancy up-date

So today we went to the doctors. I gained 8 pounds in the last 2 1/2 weeks, for a total of 28 pounds so far. I was doing really well, but something happened in the last couple weeks. Anyway, he confirmed that Nate has started to drop, yeah! Also we have an ultrasound tomorrow to see how big he is. My belly has been lop-sided for a few weeks now, so I was asking the doctor if the part that is sticking out more was Nate's butt, he confirmed that he thought it was. I guess he likes to stick his butt up all the time, b/c the right side of my belly always sticks out more than the left. Everything else is going well. I do still have swollen feet that are the size of bricks I feel like. By the way, this picture was just taken today, I feel huge!

On Monday Charlie and I went to the hospital for a tour. Our maternity ward is really new and very nice. Everyone has private rooms, which is a new law in Florida! They are nice and big too. They each have a glider rocker and a chair that reclines into a bed. We didn't get to see the actual delivery room b/c they were all full or still needed cleaned. We really liked what we saw. I will be there for 48 hours after the baby comes.

Trunk or Treat

This year Charlie and I decided to go to our wards Trunk or Treat/Chili cookoff. Sorry we don't have any pictures, but Charlie made a chili that we took to the church. When we got there there was about 20 chili's. Guess who won...Charlie! We were so excited. When we go to the line, ours was already almost gone! Charlie hardly got any of his own chili. We had lots of people ask us for the recipe. It was very simple really. Anyway, we were kinda bummed when all we got was a thing of candy for the prize...like we need candy. I think we should go to Becca's ward next year, they give better prizes. Anyway, our family must be really good chili makers huh? Good job Brad and Charlie!

Nate's bed!

This weekend we got the crib put together and put the bedding on...this is what it looks like so far. We are so excited! The more baby stuff we have, the more real it seems. We should be getting the dresser in the next couple of weeks, then we can take a picture of the whole nursery and show you what it looks like. Since we rent, we can't paint, but I say that is a blessing b/c I don't like painting anyway! The animals on the bedding have different kinds of materials like the lions mane and the giraffe and hippo. It is really a cute set.

My baby shower

My old work had a baby shower for me on Friday. I still keep in touch with them, they are pretty nice people. So we went to Long Horns Steak House for lunch. I got a bouncy seat, the bottle set I asked for, a cart cover (what a great invention), clothes, diapers, pacifiers, and other odds and ends. It was very fun, but I forgot to bring my camera to that one so I didn't take any pictures.


On Saturday my mother-in law and sister-in law gave me a baby shower with people from church. There was about 20 people there and they all loved the party favor candy bar that I posted last time. I got some more outfits, (Nate will never go naked, at least not till about 2 years old!), a monitor set, blankets, a plastic book that you can put your own pictures in for baby to look at, a boppy, some hot green swim trunks that I love (they are bigger though), a johnny jump up, bowls, cups, spoon/forks, lots of good stuff off the registry. Charlie's wonderful parent got us a 3 drawer dresser that has a changing table on top. It is very nice. We still haven't put the nursery together, but when we do, which will be soon, I'll put some pictures up. There was like 3-4 church outfits for Nate which are soooo cute. I am going to love dressing him up for church! Also Charlie got a basket from his parents, b/c everything is for the mom and not the dad, and it had things to do together with Nate. There are nurf football, basketball, and soccer balls in it. Books, crayons, matching pajama pants that his mother made and a CD of children's songs. I thought it was a very cute idea. Thank you to Mom and Dad Rice and Shoady for a great baby shower and gifts.






















The sign is to put in the yard when Nate is born. We thought that was a cute idea.
So I have run into a few people who think that I a about to "pop"! I didn't think that I was that big, what do you think? That is why I put the 2 pictures up top. I am feeling pretty good for the most part, I get heartburn here and there and really have to watch what I eat. Also my back gets tired, especially the 3 hours at church. Hopefully the next 7 weeks goes by quickly! You probably think I am a dreamer...I am!

Gotta love graphics!

So, my mother-in-law and sister-in-law are planning a baby shower for me in a couple of weeks. They came up with the cutest idea for a party favor. The picture below is wrapped around a Hershey's candy bar. I think it is so cute. You may have to click on it to blow it up. A special thanks to Charlie, Shoady and Juan (Shoady's boyfriend) for making these! I can't wait for the shower for people to see them. Also below is Nate's first picture, at least where you can tell he's a baby. We are so excited to have him come into our family, you couldn't tell could you?! We are down to 59 days, not that anyone around here is counting. We are very excited to go home to Missouri for Christmas and show him off to all our family and friends. We are very proud parents and he isn't even here yet!

Check-up!

So, we are down to 10 weeks left till baby Nate is here, or round about that! We are so excited, can you tell? I went for my check-up this week and it went something like this...AWESOME! See we had thought that I might have the gestational diabetes b/c my sugars have been high and last time my uterus measured at 29 weeks and I was only 27 1/2. But...this week he said that my sugars are still boarder line, which means that I still have to be careful what I eat, but that he won't make me take that 3 hour glucose test again, unless I have sugar in my urine tests. Which I was totally thrilled about since I got so sick from the last glucose test. I am now back to measuring at a normal rate but I am anemic so I have to take more iron pills. So all in all the Dr. gave me a great check up and we are thrilled! Here are some pictures that I had taken last night.




So Saturday Charlie and I got up and did some yard work, then worked around the house to get a few things done. I sure to get tuckered out after what I think isn't very much work. Sometimes this is annoying to me because I don't seem to get as much done in a day as I used to and think that I still should. But hey, whatever, my house doesn't get that dirty with just us and the dog. We haven't been up to much else around here. We are just waiting for the baby to come, then Angie will visit, then we'll go to Missouri to visit. I am very excited to see my family since I haven't seen them in a year, except Becca.