sEvEN mOntHs

Well...7 months has gone by incredibly fast and slow at the same time. Fast, in the sense that I can't believe I already have a 7 month old baby and slow, in the sense that I can't believe BJ hasn't even finished one semester of medical school and there's still a lot left! Overall though, things are going swell! BJ is doing really well in school and is still making sure Hadley and I are his top priority. I started working at the Quick Cares here taking x-rays. It's great though because I only work when I can, so so far I've only worked about once a week, so I get to be home most of the time. And Hadley is just a pleasure to be around, for the most part:) No, she's a genuinely happy baby and we love her to death. A quick update...

-she weighs 17 lbs 5 oz and is 28 inches long

-she learned how to clap her hands, which is so fun!

-she loves to yell, especially during sacrament, and likes to jibber jabber throughout the day

-she sits up all by herself

-bath time is her favorite time of the day and she goes crazy with excitement

-when music comes on she starts bobbing back and forth

-she really seems to have a fondness for Elmo compared to all the other Sesame Streeters

-her favorite toy is a plastic bag or water bottle, she's quite simple

-she's really ticklish

-she has an obsession with my hair and I am really flattered by it:)

-she drools like crazy, but still no teeth

-she's a wonderful eater, but awful drinker

-she really likes being around other people, especially kids

-loves when I (or anyone) sing "Popcorn Popping on the Apricot Tree"

-she kinda poops a lot. I guess that's good, but 3 times a day, really?

-she figured out how to roll over to her back, so night time hasn't been too fun lately

-she is very smiley and it just makes you happy when she does smile at you

We love her so much and she's getting so much fun! It's been fun to watch her learn and grow, she makes us so happy!

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

WeLCoMe tO vEgAS!

Obviously this isn't the greatest quality of a picture. We accidentally ended up on the strip one day after getting on the wrong freeway so we decided to stop and take a picture with this special little sign. The girl ahead of us in line to stand in front of the sign was wearing a stunning little number. A cute little revealing black bikini. She got up there and turned around and then did this really cool rap. I think I'll try and do something similar for our Christmas card this year.

We've been here for about a month now and it's been a good experience. It was especially fun having BJ home with us everyday for the first 3 weeks, but this past Monday school finally started. Our apartment is pretty much put together, but there are still some items I'd like to buy for decorating, so some of the pictures might not look the greatest, but it's still a work in progress.

I realize that our wall is very bare, but I have something in mind to place there. Don't you worry.

I came up with this idea by myself. Pinterest didn't help at all.

I wish I had a better camera or could get a better picture of her nursery. It looks cuter  all together rather than in little snippets of pictures.

There is a guest bedroom, but I didn't feel like taking pictures in there. And our bathrooms aren't done so yeah. We love visitors so if you ever need a place to stay just let me know!

Last weekend BJ and I thought we had the brilliant idea of going to a drive inn movie to see "The Dark Knight Rises". We figured Hadley would fall asleep and we'd just be able to enjoy the movie, no problem. Naive, aren't we? She fell asleep on the drive there and then the movie started, I looked back to check on her and her eyes were wide open and she was ready to watch. After about 10 minutes she started crying because she was tired, but too distracted by the movie and it was incredibly hot. Needless to say, we left and basically just wasted $15. Maybe next time, in 10 years or so.

Hadley is sitting up and doing tummy time really well now. She's started talking quite a bit this past week and is reaching more and more for things. And last night she full on laughed for the first time! It was so cute! I got it on video, but I don't know how to upload it.

Are anyone else's babies fingernails like little razors? I swear I can't cut her nails enough. Another thing...I finally understand why women have a baby and then chop there hair off. Geez, my hair is just coming out in the handfuls and it's kinda driving me crazy. I hate stray hair. I really do. It's one of my pet peeves and now I'm living it. I feel like this lady, except when I pull my hand away I'll have hair all up in my hand and she won't. She's so lucky.

I've been enjoying the Olympics these past two weeks. I love watching the gymnastics! They did a little clip on Missy Franklin, the amazing 17 year old swimmer, and she mentions how she's starting her senior year of high school in a month or so. It's so great all these young teenagers who are doing so much with their lives and have so much incredible potential. It makes me feel so good to just watch them accomplish such great feats. I'm really not bitter or anything:)

When BJ's family helped us move here we went to Lake Mead and spent a couple hours on the lake and then went to Hoover Dam. It was a lot of fun and we loved having them here to visit!

 My mom and Dan came out to visit a couple of weeks after we moved in. We were really happy they came to visit and had a fun time with them! We went to the strip one night and Hadley sure loves all the bright lights and shows. She'll probably want to work on the strip when she grows up, but we won't let her:)

By the way, it's 111 degrees today. It feels real nice.

tHrEe mOnTHs

Wow, these past few months have gone by so quick! We made the move to Henderson, Nevada last Monday (July 16th) and well, it's dang hot here (106 degrees), but everything went smooth and we are excited to be here! BJ's family drove across the US of A this summer for family vacation so they were here and helped us get moved and we were so grateful for the extra help! I'll post more about our new place at a later date. 

Hadley is getting so big! I feel like just in the past few weeks she's grown so much. She's recognizing who we are, so when she sees our faces she just lights up, which I think makes things more fun. A couple of things about this little monkey are...

-loves making bubbles, so she constantly has drool running down her face 

-has discovered her hands so she sucks on her fist and fingers a lot, and anything that's near her mouth

-she's very independent, you can just lay her down and she's totally fine (for nap and bedtime we just swaddle her up and lay her down and she puts herself to sleep. Awesome!)

-sleeps pretty good through the night, we may just have to put her binky in once or twice

-loves to face out when she's held

-loves bath time and pool time

-she makes a lot of grunting noises and we can tell that she wants to laugh, she just can't get it out yet. I'm excited for when she does!

-loves reading books

-unfortunately she also loves staring at the TV, especially when The Bachelorette is on:)

-she does great in her car seat and with travelling

-startles easily. BJ sneezed and she just started crying, granted it was the loudest, most obnoxious sneeze you'll ever hear:)

-she is basically just an incredibly great baby and we love her so much!

This is her bubble making face, she looks a little devious

bath time

She's not rolling over because tummy time just involves her licking the floor or her boppy. She makes no attempt to really even move, also because I'm bad at doing tummy time.

Watching Bachelorette. She wants Jef to win.

oNe moNtH

Yesterday Hadley was officially 1 month old. This past month has gone by quite rapidly and we've loved every second of it! Well...she had a really bad day one day and we didn't love that so much, jk. She has been such a good, happy baby and even though she doesn't do a whole lot, she's pretty fun to look at and is starting to give little smiles here and there:)

                                                                 On our way to church.

On Friday, my little brother Colby came home from his mission. His call was the Oklahoma Tulsa mission, but he spent most of his mission in Missouri. It was so fun to see him and we are so happy to have him home!

                                                                         The airport.

The month of May also brought my first Mother's Day! I don't think I've been a mom long enough to feel like I deserve to celebrate Mother's Day, but it was still a super fun day and I love being a mom so far!

 Our outfits match quite perfectly and we didn't even plan it.

All the grand kids with grandma. 

They aren't the most cooperative when we're trying to get them all together for a picture. For a Mother's Day gift for the grandmas we thought it would be fun to have real pictures taken of the grand kids all dressed up. They just weren't having it and this was the best we got. None of them are smiling, but they look pretty cute all grumpy:)

Here's Hadley taking her first bath ever. She loves bath time and just lays there so peacefully with her little duck keeping her warm. This has been a great month and we're excited for a fun summer!

She's FINALLY here!!!

Well...Hadley Lynn Kramer finally decided to make her grand entrance into this world on April 20, 2012. BJ and I couldn't be happier! She honestly has been such a perfect little baby! I'll tell more about everything that went down, but first a couple of exciting things have happened in these past few months that I haven't updated about.

So these past two years we both kind of feel like we've been a little stuck with waiting to start medical school and get the show on the road with our lives. We applied last year and unfortunately weren't accepted into any of the schools, so we had to apply again this year. Round 2 went much better and things seemed much more promising this time around. BJ had several interviews during December and felt good about all of them. When we heard back from the schools all of them said that he was on a wait list and could be notified as late as August of whether or not he was accepted. We felt grateful for the wait list, because it was definitely better than a "no", but a little worried because if they weren't going to let us know until August it made it a little difficult to plan what our next step should be. Well early February BJ had a phone call from Touro University of Nevada telling him that he was accepted into their medical school and that school starts the beginning of August! The school is in Henderson, Nevada which is just right outside of Las Vegas, so if anyone ever wants to come to Vegas make sure to give us a call! We were both so thrilled to know that he would definitely be starting medical school this year and this school was one that we both really liked and felt good about. I am sad to be leaving Utah and all our friends and family that live here, but so grateful to be going somewhere close by and where it's pretty much nice weather year round:) I'm so proud of BJ! He worked so hard to make sure he had a good application and has been so patient with this whole process. I know that he is going to be such a good doctor someday and can't wait for him to get started! Even though it's been frustrating waiting a whole year longer to get started, I really do feel that has been a blessing for us to be in Provo another year and know that Heavenly Father definitely has a better plan for us than we do!

Since we will be moving this summer to Las Vegas and for the past year we've just had one car, we decided we would invest in a scooter for BJ. We figured they're much cheaper than a new car, have way better gas mileage, he would only need to drive it to and from school which is maybe a 10 or 15 minute drive so it would be a good investment for the time being. I haven't been able to ride it a whole lot being pregnant and all, but BJ has enjoyed it when it's not raining. Here's the beauty...

Alright, sorry this is a long post, and there's still so much more...Maybe this will be more information than people want, but I kinda use this blog as my journal because I don't keep one so this is the only thing I have. So at my 36 week appointment the doctor checked how dilated I was and I was already dilated to a 2! I was so surprised and the doctor said that was great and the baby will be here any day. Then a week later I was dilated to a 3 and again was told any day now and everything looked great. Three weeks later, at 40 weeks, I was still at a 3! I was feeling a little frustrated because I had been expecting this baby a week or 2 previous and she still wasn't here. I kept trying to remind myself that it's better for her to continue developing as long as she can and that I would rather have her come late and be healthy than early and possibly have some complications. My date to be induced was Monday, April 23rd. Well BJ's parents were coming in to town and his dad was leaving on the 22nd. We for sure thought she would be there by then because my due date was April 14th. So when I went to my 41 week appointment the doctor checked me, stripped my membranes, and told me to come back the next day to see if I had made any progress. So I went in the next day, April 19th, and the doctor told me I was about at a 3.5 to 4 and that he would induce me that day, but hi schedule was full, so they got me on the schedule for the next day. I was so excited! He told me they would call me between 6:30 and 9:30 in the morning to let me know when to come in. Well April 20th was BYUs graduation and both BJ's sister, Tiffany, and my brother, Tyler, were graduating that day, so I figured I'd go until I heard from the hospital. Well around 8:45, in the middle of Tiff's graduation, we got the call and were asked if we could be there by 9:45. So we left pretty shortly after and headed to American Fork hospital. It was definitely a different experience than we were planning. We felt like we were checking into a hotel rather than going to have a baby. I wasn't having any contractions or feeling any pain, so we just went to our room, got changed, and watched some Disney channel:) They started me on Pitocin, I started having more and more intense contractions so I got the epidural, which was amazing! I don't know how women do it without an epidural because I was dying. Then at 7:26 that night she arrived weighing in at 7 lbs 9 oz and was 19.5 inches long. Everyone was guessing how much she'd weigh and thought she'd be in the low 6 lbs, but she sure proved everyone wrong! She has been such a blessing to us already and we just can't get enough of her! BJ and I both feel incredibly grateful for all that we've been blessed with lately. I had such a great pregnancy and was feeling really good all the way till the end. Labor and delivery was so much better than I thought it could be, and Hadley has been such a good baby. I know I may be biased, but this sweet little baby girl rarely cries, is feeding pretty good, and just makes us so happy. We are so grateful to our family and friends for being here for us and being so supportive and helpful.

 She was hungry pretty much right after she arrived.

 BJ loved giving her a bath and all of the nurses were having a lot of fun styling her hair the whole time we were in the hospital.

 After we got to our room and she was all cleaned up.

 Sometimes her hair goes a little crazy. I didn't think I'd have to worry about how to style a babies hair, but really I don't know what to do with it, so I try to do it, but it usually just goes all crazy again:)

 I feel like her car seat just drowns her and looks extremely uncomfortable, but so far she's done well in it and just sleeps.

 On our way home! Her outfit has a hood on it, but it's a bit too big obviously.

Haylee couldn't get enough of Hadley and wouldn't share her with anyone else. We wanted a picture of the cousins, but it was difficult getting one with everyone smiling and looking at the camera.

Thanks again to our friends and family for all you guys do for us. We love you guys! And we love you Hadley!

P.S. I haven't blogged since they updated this website and it is so much easier. It's great!