A Photo Shoot

We were so lucky to have Kristen here. She is an amazing photographer and was able to take new born pictures along with first bath pictures and birth pictures! she's pretty amazing. Thanks Kristen!
These still need edited but I am letting you see anyway.

First Bath

A first bath is pretty self explanatory...

 He really enjoyed it.

Mom Had a really fun time playing with all his hair. This was a hair do like daddy's.

 We ended with a part on the side.

A Birth Story

I feel like my story really isn't that interesting. It was all planned. Well... sort of. Monday Dec 27 we went to the Dr for the normal weekly check up and he said "I think we should strip your membranes and set a date to induce you this week if you don't go into labor naturally." So we did. We left the Dr with a date for Thursday Dec 30th so I would have time to go into labor and he would only be a week early if it came to inducing. I was pretty freaked out. It all happened so fast. I called mom to tell her the news. She was on her way to my house that day along with everyone else. We tracked my contractions for two days. Nothing unusual was happening. Dec 30th came around and we were told that we would get a call from the hospital saying they are ready for us. That could have happened as early as 530 in the morning. Jared called to see what was happening and we were on a waiting list as number 2. We got the call and left for the hospital at 11am as I started to melt down. We made it to the hospital and I managed to calm down a bit. They got me into a room and started me on pitocin around 1. Soon after that mom and Kristen came. Around 3 Mom and Kristen left to run across the street to big lots to get some cards and things to do. When they were gone the Dr came in to check on me and said "I think we should break your water and get things moving a lot quicker." So we did. Things started happening a lot quicker. Contractions started to hurt. I was debating on when I should get my epidural. We called in the nurse to ask her opinion and she said the anesthesiologist was going into a C-section at 5 and wouldn't be able to get to me for another 45 min after that so I decided I didn't want to wait that long especially with things happening so fast. I got my epidural which wasn't as bad as everyone told me it was going to be. Jen and Dad came to visit while I was in labor. They stayed and hung out for a few hours and finally decided to go home to bed around 10. Right after they left they told me I should start pushing and that we would have a baby soon. So mom called them back. I pushed for about 2 hours with all the support I could ever want. Mom and Kristen were there as planned. Dad and Jen ended up staying too which was fun and of coarse Jared was there. He was my counter while I pushed and I wanted to punch him in the face because he counted so slow! Eventually he came out and our little baby Jacob was finally a part of this world.

If you didn't read all that here is the story in picture form.
The night before... like my outfit??

 Starving. Trying to ignore Jared eating his panda express.

 yup.

 Getting closer. We don't have any pictures of mom and Kristen or of us playing games. We played yatzee and uno.

 Things started getting bad when I ran out of epidural juice in the middle of pushing. we almost didn't get me more but its a good thing we did because i had to push for another hour after that.

 Pushing.

 A baby! I was shocked when the nurse said he had a ton of dark hair. I could have sworn i was going to have a bald or blonde baby!

 9 pounds 5 ounces 21 inches long

Proud daddy .

 Proud grandparents.

 Dr Thorpe

 Like my hair do?

Going home.

The Newest McLaughlin

Hey everyone, sorry it has taken us so long to post anything about the newest member of our family. It has been much harder to be a parent than I thought it would be.  (Danielle kept trying to tell me) 

Jacob Luther McLaughlin 

was born December 31, 2010 at 1:28 am. He weighed 9 pounds 5 ounces and was 21 inches long.  He has a ton of dark hair. He is a very happy baby and we are proud parents. We are still at a loss for sleep so we will post the story and more later but I just wanted everyone to see a few pictures for now.

Winter Wonderland

Well it's Christmas time and everyone is in Tucson. Except for Jared and I. We are waiting for a baby. On that subject I was really excited when they first checked me and i was already dilated to a 1 and effaced 80% but in the past two weeks I've stayed about the same, despite regular contractions and sometimes pretty intense ones. With that news we were thinking this little guy would come early but since then we are not so sure anymore. Back on track with Christmas. Everyone is in Tucson having tons of fun. Seeing Santa, making cookies and gingerbread houses, watching movies and playing games.

 Jared and I have been having some fun too. We celebrated our 2nd anniversary last Sunday. With it being so close to Christmas we don't have much time or money to do much but it was nice. Jared made some stakes and baked potatoes. I bought some martinelli's and we had a quite evening alone. We then went to cold stone and saw a movie Monday night. I can't believe It's been two years. It seems so much longer and now we have a baby on the way. Its crazy how life has changed.

 We also made a gingerbread house on Sunday. Not for our anniversary. We did it just because its Christmas. We also had a TON of snow today. We woke up Sunday morning and it was raining and there was no snow on the ground. By Monday morning there was a few inches of snow and it snowed all day and all night. We had 10 inches. It stopped snowing by the middle of the day. It definitely feels like Christmas. I can't wait till everyone comes up here though. They will all be here after the 27th.  

We had some trouble with our tree. We bought a kit from Costco and it came with this tree that you had to break in half and put together... this is what happened when we broke it in half

Maternity Pictures

We went to Idaho for thanksgiving and while we were there i was hoping I could get Anna to take pictures of me. I didn't want it to be a big production sense we were only there a day and a half. So we literally threw this chair in the van and drove to this area on our way to my brother in laws house, jumped out and spent 5 to 10 min just snapping shots. I think they turned out really well! Thanks Anna you're the best!

This was at thanksgiving so I would have been 33 weeks?

Just a quick update... I went to the Dr this morning. I'm 35 weeks and 4 days along and I am 1 cm dilated and 80% effaced but I've heard that thats nothing and lots of people have been 3 cm dilated and stayed that way for weeks before going into labor. So no hope for this baby to come early!