Introducing our Oliver

Our son Oliver has arrived! He was one week old yesterday! He truly is the sweetest, most beautiful baby boy. We are so grateful to have him in our family.

Here's the story: Last Tuesday, my water broke at 9 p.m. It had been quite a lively day for us, including a long walk in the morning, doctor's appointment (he didn't expect the baby to come too soon), mini golf in Lehi, and Dominos for dinner. I was exhausted and we had decided to get ready for bed when my water broke... and kept coming. So, we grabbed our packed bag and headed to the hospital. Chris still wasn't convinced we would be staying so he didn't even grab our stuff as we walked in. But they did admit us and we were going to be having our baby. I was dilated to about a 2 1/2 so we had a ways to go.

We decided to try to get some rest after the long day. Chris slept and I tried to sleep. The contractions were making it a little difficult to do so. My pain during contractions, throughout labor, was mostly all in my back. We had decided we wanted to do this without an epidural. Sometime in the morning, the pain was pretty severe. The nurse suggested some pain medication through my IV to help me be able to relax a bit. We decided to do so because I would need some strength and energy to get through labor. So, she gave me half a dose. Honestly, I still felt the contractions the same. The pain was still there. The medicine did, however, help me be able to relax in between which helped me conserve some of my energy. I had been progressing in dilation, but after staying at a 6 for quite a while we decided to try a little pitocin to get things rolling a bit faster.

By this time, things were getting tough. To help with the pain in my back, our fabulous nurse suggested a variety of positions. I sat on a birthing ball, was on my hands and knees, etc. They moved around the fancy bed to try these different things. That was one reason why I didn't want an epidural. I wanted to be able to move around. I truly could not have made it through this without Chris. He was a champ and used lots of counter pressure to help ease some of the back pain. He got quite the workout as he would push on my knees while I sat. He talked me through each contraction. I just focused on his eyes and words of encouragement. Chris is the best! I'm so grateful to have had such a supportive and helpful coach throughout labor and delivery.

Finally, we had arrived at the time to push. It was hard work, but nice to have a change and be getting closer to our goal. I just have to give a shout out to our amazing nurse. She was seriously the best. Throughout, especially while I was pushing, she told me I was doing great, what was going on, and what I needed to do. Thank you Kellie!! After about an hour of pushing, Oliver had arrived! He was born at 1:59 p.m. on Wednesday, September 4th. It was all together a 17 hour labor. So, it was long but we had done it. We were so grateful things had gone smoothly and that Oliver was a trooper throughout. It was so fun to have my parents and Chris' mom here to see our little miracle. I was exhausted, but he was so beautiful. There truly is nothing like it.We are tremendously grateful for the bundle of joy in our home. We stayed two days in the hospital and then got to bring this little man home. Our hospital experience was great. We delivered at Alta View and everyone was so fabulous. We were so impressed with our nurses and everyone.

Oliver Jose Lopez was 7 lbs 2 oz, 19 inches. He is doing so great. He has been healthy and doing everything he needs to. He eats like a champ, and is even already  back to his birth weight. I'm adjusting to breastfeeding and he just loves to eat. He has beautiful brown hair and perfect little features. His eyes are pretty dark right now, but we're hoping they'll turn out olive green for our Oliver. He is just delicious, and we love him so much. We're loving the life of parents, maybe a little sleep deprived but very happy. Today is my due date, and we're so happy we have already had him here with us for one week. We are fully entertained by this teeny little man. We just watch him in adoration as he sneezes, hiccups, pulls funny faces, loves his hands, wiggles, sleeps, sucks, and squeals. Oh baby Oliver how we love you.

They gave us a fancy dinner the night
before we left in celebration. 

all ready to go home!

Grandma and Grandpa Boyce came down to see our Oliver. Grandma's reaction to him has been our favorite. She just stood there speechless for a minute. She thinks he's so beautiful, and of course we agree.

we sure love grandma Jan. Oliver is looking a
little cross-eyed. He's still figuring out
how to work his little eyes :)

after bath time

In honor of his one week birthday and to meet Aunt Teresa, we went on an outing to Cafe Rio for some lunch yesterday.

So that is our baby Oliver, our little bundle of joy.

Graduation!

Last Thursday and Friday was Graduation! It was an eventful few days and so good to spend it with family. Thursday was commencement. I celebrated with a scrumptious mint brownie before the festivities began. Besides waiting in the hot sun before doing the processional, it was a wonderful occasion. Elder Rasband spoke, and we were all fans of him. He was very personal and sincere and inspiring. Chris was working, unfortunately in Park City, but we met him at Carrabba's for dinner. It actually worked out pretty well because he got a table for us. Jamir was also walking, so Chris' parents were in town for the occasion. We went to dinner with them, Amy and Jamir, us, and my parents. The food was delicious! Yum yum.

We spent that night in Provo in a hotel room my parents had gotten. Thank goodness because we had to wake up early for my 8am convocation. My parents gave me a too generous gift of an iPhone for graduating. They sure do spoil me, but I'm excited about my new toy. :)

I had the opportunity to speak at the School of Education's convocation on Friday. I was nervous about it and the fact that I was quite pregnant. But I made it through fine, minus some technical microphone difficulties. It was a nice opportunity to reflect and put into words some of my experiences and things I have learned during my BYU experience. I think because of the nerves, it didn't really hit me I was actually graduating until about the end of the ceremony. Walking across stage was great and sitting down listening to the ending remarks, I realized I was really done! I'm so grateful for the amazing experience of attending BYU. I'm grateful for the countless things I have learned and the person I have become. Thank you BYU!

 cute pic (minus the thumb)

fabulous Rachel in all of her beautiful leis

(Chris really did graduate in December of 2011
but since he never walked his mom wanted
a picture of Jamir and him in robes so he
borrowed mine for a few pictures)
Such handsome men :)

we thought we better show off the belly to
 prove to our son that I was very pregnant with him

haha. we're so funny

For lunch, we headed to Firehouse Subs and thought of our sweet Parker Jay. It was there, right before dropping Park off to the MTC, that I announced we were having a baby. It has been an eventful six months since then. Those sandwiches are just so delicious. I think that brisket is just about the best thing ever. It was a lovely day.

Firehouse first-timer

It is weird to not be going back to school this fall. This is my first time ever not doing so. But, I'm excited for a new type of schooling, namely having and taking care of a child. So now that I'm all graduated, we are pretty much ready for this boy to make his appearance any time now.

Shower Power

Two weeks ago I headed to Pocatello for a fabulous baby shower. Getting to Poky was more of an adventure than normal. My car was struggling kind of the last hour or so. I was flooring it and barely made it up the last hill on the freeway before Pocatello. I got to the appropriate exit thankfully, stopped at the light. Then when I tried to press on the gas again it would hardly move. I coasted to the gas station and called my mom to come get me. It was a little stressful, but I am so grateful I made it there safe and sound. I was definitely blessed. So our transmission went out in our Saturn Vue- Ramona. Bummer.

The baby shower was that evening at Aunt Karen's house. A big shout out and thank you to Karen, Michelle, and Rach. It was the cutest shower! The decor was so fabulous, everything being gray and yellow. It was just adorable. And of course the food was delicious. It was a party with so many fabulous ladies there (plus Ben:). Thank you all for your generosity. Our baby boy is one lucky soul who will be a styling little man. I keep joking that I will have to change his clothes twice a day so he can wear all of the cute clothing we have. I dreamed the other day that he was born kind of chubby and of course I was worried that he wouldn't be able to wear all of his cute newborn clothes. Silly mom dreams. Anyways, it was a fabulous shower. 

I loved Rachel's cutest fruit
baby that she made.

Thank you Auntie Karen for the fabulous party. I'm realizing I didn't take nearly enough pictures of all the wonderful people there.  But, what do you do? Although getting to Pocatello was a little stressful, the party was a hit.

Baby Corner Prep

We are now counting down days! What?! 29 days until our due date. I am 36 weeks tomorrow. We're getting very excited to welcome our baby boy into our family.

So, of course we have been getting ready. We only have one bedroom, so we have designated a corner for the baby in our large living room. I few weeks ago, we bought a dresser at a garage sale and decided to spruce it up with some paint. Choco of course made it a work of art. It is cute, and the corner is coming together. Of course the dresser took longer than anticipated and we ran into a few bumps along the road, but the final product is just adorable if I do say so myself.

we found these lamps at a garage sale so
decided to spray paint them too

round one

lamps and frames

turns out I'm not so great at not getting
paint on me. I had blue toenails for a
couple of days.  oops

of course, we should have sanded in the first
place but didn't. so we got to scrape of round one
and sand and then try again. you live and learn.

after re-painting the blue area for the tree,
Choco drew the outline for the tree in
newspaper, cute it out, and taped it on.
quite the laborious process. 

newspaper tree taped on, we
painted the whole dresser our
key lime green

after removing the tape and newspaper.

Unfortunately, Choco's beautiful tree got a little less detailed when he cut it out, and when he taped it, so it wasn't exactly what we had been imagining. But, with a little extra touch-up work he got it to look better. He even added yellow and gray leaves to tie in those colors. Finished product:

our baby corner

I love to see the (Draper) temple

A few weeks ago we went to the Draper temple. I love the temple. And I love my husband. It was a lovely day, and we even took a picture. I promise I was very pregnant at the time, so my dress is deceiving. Anyways, we love to see the temple.