We had a baby!

Our beautiful baby girl was finally forced into this world on June 26th! I was almost two weeks past my due date, so they decided to induce me. After 28 hours of labor, she was finally born! And let me tell you... about 15 of those hours were probably the worst of my life... but I'll get there.

This story is a little gross, but really not so bad. Read on if you dare...

My mom flew in the night of the 24th to help us out because Daniel's paternity leave was supposed to be over by then. Well... it hadn't even started! My doctor had scheduled me to be induced on the 25th, so at least she got to be here for the birth. We checked into the hospital around 1 pm and they hooked me up to some pitocin. For the first few hours I was like, "this isn't so bad, maybe I don't need an epidural!" We were having a good time watching the world cup and hanging out with all the doctors (because we were the only L&D room watching the world cup...).

After a few hours of soccer and a nice nap I was starting to feel it a little more... and then a little more, and more and more and more until I told Daniel that I just couldn't do it and we should just go home (maybe around midnight). Because that made sense. They checked me and I was dilated enough for an epidural, but Abby's heart rate was dropping with each contraction, so they wanted to wait a while before putting more drugs in my system. And I hated them all. The hours stretched on and her heart rate was still dropping with every contraction... I was NOT having fun and I'm pretty sure I said mean things to everyone who came into the room.

Sometime around 7 am, Daniel went to get breakfast and he missed all the fun! My contractions were seconds apart and I had mentally checked out from all the pain. The doctor came in and told me they might need to do a C-section because of how she was reacting to the contractions, they prepped me for it and had me sign some consent forms. Then I started throwing up and that caused my water to break and they lost their read on Abby's heart rate so every doctor in the world showed up right then and so did Daniel. Afterwards he told me he was never worried, but I was in so much pain and throwing up so much that I was pretty sure I was dying. And I kept saying I couldn't do it and I wanted to go home. It's a good thing one of us was rational right then! They had to put some internal monitors on her head and THAT was super fun... but they found her heart rate again.

After a couple more hours like this, someone (I still don't know who... and why it took so long to think of...) had the brilliant idea of turning the pitocin down. And guess what? It WORKED! Her heart rate leveled out and I got my epidural just in time for the US to play Germany! We watched the game, they came in and checked me again and it was time to push, I pushed, and she was born at 3:44, just in time for us to watch the 4 o'clock game! So she's obviously going to be a soccer star.

It was a very painful day, but worth it for this little cutie!

She's cuter now, I promise. Here, I'll show you:

This is her model pose. She's pretty good at it :)

What have we been up to?

Turns out I'm bad at blogging. But everyone already knew that.

We've been busy here at the Cox home! Which will not be the Cox home for long. We're moving! To Southern Pines. It's like... half an hour from here. Daniel will still be at Bragg. Did I trick you? I tricked you, I know it. We found an area nearby that we LOVE, so we're going to buy a house! I can't believe we're old enough to do that... so there will be another update on that when everything is finalized!

We're also STILL having a baby. I'm bragging to anyone who will listen that I can still touch my toes from a standing position. It's pretty sad that I now consider that one of my major life accomplishments... But anyway, we'll have a baby in the next couple of weeks! We also can't believe we're old enough to reproduce. And they're just going to let us KEEP her... no tests or anything. Suckers.

Harley is still great (except for when she eats the plants in my garden which is always). She just turned one last week and she's really the best dog for us. She loves to play, but she's also extremely mellow. She has graduated to sleeping in our bedroom (on her bed by the dresser, NOT in our bed--ew) and she weighs a whopping 55 pounds! We don't think she'll get much bigger.

We went to the beach last week with some friends--it was a blast. Even though at least four people tried to push me in the ocean because they thought I was a beached whale (ok maybe that didn't really happen). We took our dogs and Harley had a great time playing fetch in the water. It took her a bit to stop being scared of the waves breaking, but eventually she was swimming around like a champ! We got some awesome seafood (and hush puppies!!! I missed those so much...) after our day at the beach and it was just a great day!

Daniel is still playing army every day. Oh wait, he's not playing any more--he's actually in the army. He leads a team of medics and it sounds like they have some good times together. He got to learn to give an IV, which I thought was terrifying, but he thought it was pretty cool. He keeps jumping out of airplanes in the middle of the night and sleeping in fields. I always thought he was a little strange...

So we're doing pretty great out here! We're cleaning up the house and getting ready for baby (still nameless--we're hoping she just tells us what her name is when she gets here) and enjoying life!

And here are some pictures:

Beginning of the third trimester to two weeks ago (week 36). The only pictures I took. Whoops!

The lovely coffee table Daniel refinished for our living room! Much better than the ugly black one I got from Walmart...

My stinky husband :)

Sometimes I feel crafty. And I'm a dummy, so I got home buying for dummies. I don't feel like as much of a dummy any more.

Harley enjoyed playing fetch at the lake.

She always thinks she needs attention... silly pup!

There was a review of the 82nd--pretty cool to watch! Daniel is towards the front, I didn't think to take a picture until they had passed.

The lovely ocean (and my not-so-lovely feet)

My creepy husband. I love him.

Happy Anniversary!

It's been two years! Can you believe it???

Oh what a happy, cold day!

Well a lot has happened this year! Let's take a look:

My mission president and his wife came to visit from Argentina!

Daniel's little sister got married!

My little sister got married!

Daniel commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant in the Army!

We moved to Texas!

We got a puppy!

We got a new (to us) car!

We moved to North Carolina!

We finally got that plus we've been waiting for!!!

I now get the best parking spaces!

And our tiny puppy is now weighing in at a whopping 45 pounds!

If you were to look at my phone, you would think the only thing that happened this year was Harley. She's the most well-documented puppy in the history of the world! But we sure love her and we can't imagine how boring life would be without her. I doubt we'll ever love our human children as much as we love her! (I'm joking, of course... sort of...)

So now we're getting ready to spend the holidays with my family in Idaho! Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, and I'll be back to the blog when we learn the gender of the baby next month!

NC Happenings

I know, I know, I'm the worst blogger in the history of the world. Actually, I'm going to go ahead and give that title to my sister-in-law. She made a blog and then NEVER posted again... I hope she's still alive...

Anyway, we made it to North Carolina! My lovely east coast! We've been here for just over a month and I'm just getting around to write any sort of post about it. And it will likely be a very long time before I post again, so you're just going to have to re-read this post over and over again to fill your lives with joy (for now).

We're living in a small town outside of Ft. Bragg. Daniel is a medical service officer on post and if you have any more questions about that, you'll have to ask him. Or leave them in written form and I can ask him and then respond. All the other wives around here know about ten thousand more acronyms than I do (acronyms are the way you can determine how much someone knows about the army) and they want to know more about his work and I say, "paperwork... medics... he was a business major..." and then they stop talking to me because they think I'm an idiot. It's pretty great.

So here we are in our little starter home (that I'm not going to post pictures of because I'm still unpacking and cleaning from our camping trip) enjoying life as adults! Well, not REAL adults since we don't have kids. But Harley is like a kid, so we're pseudo-adults.

I mentioned a camping trip. That's because we went camping! For my birthday (and luckily it was Veteran's Day weekend) we headed to Carolina Beach and camped... on the beach! Harley had a good time smelling (and eating) everything and we enjoyed some time relaxing and being together. Daniel works 12-14 hour days, so any time he has off is great.

I'm helping out with the 2-3 year old kids at church and Daniel helps with the 12-13 year old boys, so we basically do the same thing on Sundays.

Here are some pictures from our camping trip!

Our sweet setup on the beach

Harley thinks she's a people... and we love her!

I'm so Texan right now...

Today was craft day on the Cox farm. I headed over and made these beauties with Jenna. We saw them a while ago online and thought they looked easy enough and our craft-impaired selves could actually pull them off. We weren't disappointed!

We started off with some 11x12ish boards from Hobby Lobby. Then, of course, we painted them. And who wants new things if they actually look new? So we took sand paper to them and rubbed some of the paint off. We're so vintage.

Then we made some cutouts of Texas with hearts over Austin. Not only is it where they're from, it's so conveniently located on the map to look all artsy for this project! So that's a win-win. And also something I never would have thought to consider while deciding where to live... so now I know!

Then came the nails. Thousands and thousands (maybe millions--who knows?) of nails. Death by nails. After driving so many into that tiny heart, it made me wonder if it was all worth it. But it was. Of course.

And then the string! Jenna beat me on the nails, but I had a much easier time with the string.

 And after tying off the ends, we were done! I didn't actually take a picture of Jenna's finished product, but I promise you it was beautiful. But here's mine, and I'm quite proud of it!

And I know what you're thinking... "Crafts?? I came here to see pictures of your gross leg!" Well don't worry; here they are:

Last Wednesday

Today.

So the swelling and bruising has gone down a lot, but it's still pretty bruised right on the spot where the boat hit me. Also, this injury explains why I'm stuck inside doing crafts.

Mid-Summer Update

Well it's been a while since I've updated, but a LOT has been going on! Let's see if I can remember everything...

In June we got the heck out of Provo! We thought we might miss it, but we really don't yet (oops?). We headed up to Idaho to stay with my family for a bit before Daniel's training started. And since he's now addicted to relay races, we ran the Bone and Back with my friend Jordyn (http://jordykates.blogspot.com/) and my uncle Scott (and the rest of our team). It was a fun day, but I was definitely not in shape for it and I was feeling it the next couple of days.

I only had this one picture... If you really want to see more, there might be some on Facebook.

The next week, we headed up to Priest Lake in northern Idaho and it was warm for once in my life! We had temperatures in the 90's and 100's and the lake felt so great! My dad also bought a couple of wave runners and the whole week was a blast, relaxing and playing whenever we felt like it. Unfortunately, I only took this one picture the whole time. If I get my hands on any more, I'll put them up.

Unfortunately, we missed out on this particular Anaconda opportunity...

Then I cut off my hair!!

13 inches!

Right after Priest Lake we picked up our u haul trailer and made the looooong drive down to Georgetown, TX (just north of Austin). We had a fun detour along the way through Dallas where we picked up this little beauty! She's a German Shepherd/Rottweiler mix and she's going to get a LOT bigger!

Her name is Harley

She's the cutest thing ever and the first grandchild on Daniel's side of the family! haha.

So now Daniel has started training in San Antonio, but I get to see him every weekend. Luckily his training is only two months long, so we get to head to North Carolina together at the end of September. But his family is nearby and we're doing lots of fun things together. Daniel's dad has a boat, so we get to go out on the lake quite a bit. I learned to wakeboard the other day! I'm not very good. Ok, I'm not good at all. I can barely stand up! But it's a lot of fun and a great way to get out of the Texas heat!

Daniel's brother and I were matchy matchy!

The beautiful lake at sunset

I got up eventually!

But most of my time was spent here...

I dare the entire internet to find a cuter picture than this. Not even staged!

I'm living in Daniel's grandparents' house for now. His grandpa has been up in Idaho helping with BYU-I's engineering program all summer, but they'll be back in a few days to keep me company. But for now, this little cutey is keeping me company:

She loves to play with the bigger dog

9 week picture!

And I felt like there weren't enough pictures of Daniel in this post, so here's one from last Christmas when he decided to torture the goat:

So that's what we've been up to! Hopefully I'll update at least one more time before the big move!

The Old North State

The news everyone has been waiting for (trust me, you've been waiting for it): We're going to North Carolina!!! Daniel will be stationed with the 82nd airborne as a Medical Service officer so he's really excited about that, but I'm pretty sure I'm a LOT more excited than he is. My grandma thinks I never liked it out here in Utah/Idaho because I'm SO excited to get back out to the lovely east coast. (Utah and Idaho are great, by the way. But the east coast is about a bazillion times better).

Anyway, how about an update? My cousin berated me for taking over two months to update my blog...

In April, Daniel commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant! I sang the national anthem for the ceremony and he was more nervous for me than I was. It was a great ceremony and both our families came. Daniel got the Kalunky (sp?) award, which is the top award the ROTC offers! I've always known he's the best, now he has an award to prove it!

That same weekend, Daniel's little sister got married! My favorite quote that sums up the experience was when Daniel said, "I don't know how you managed it, but you both married down!" Ok so maybe that's not how we really feel. But he really said it. Then wrote it in their cute little sign-in book. We're good siblings.

This past weekend we headed down to Moab where Daniel ran in his second Red Rock Relay. He had a team with a bunch of other army guys and they came in third place! We had a lot of fun "camping" (in a travel trailer) with my parents and visiting the national parks down there. And we saw a bear on the side of the road when we were cheering Daniel on during the race!

His team placed third of about 160 teams! They're kind of a big deal.

So for the next few months we'll be splitting time between my family and his (which means we get to drive between Texas and Idaho over and over and over again...) and then we'll head to Ft. Bragg in October! We're excited to see our family out there more often and I get to be back on the east coast!!!

So there's my update. I hope everyone is happy!