More pictures of Averien in February

February seemed to go by so fast. I guess there was just a lot going on but it makes me sad to know how fast time has gone by already. Averien is getting bigger already and changing so much. She is just the sweetest little baby. We feel so blessed to have her in our home.

Rachel is an amazing help. She will hold her for me so I can get some things done or help Jacob and Kaelen things. She will change her diaper for me and help get her dressed. She is a natural. I don't know know what I would ever do without her.


Rachel loves to sit at the piano and play with Averien in her arms. Averien loves to be cuddled and swaddled up. She loves being all wrapped up and warm.

Averien's Great Aunt Margaret and Uncle Clint live close by and they came by to see her and to give her a present. They got her an adorable 3 tiered dress. It was so nice to have them come over and visit and so nice to have them close by. We love that they live close enough to know our kids.

Splish splash I am taking a bath

Averien enjoys taking baths so much. She becomes so calm when she is placed in the water. She loves to play on her bath mat but also just float in the water with you holding her head up. She has started to become a little more active in the tub when she is in it. She gets so sad when you take her out. I absolutly love these pictures of her alseep with her Dad after her bath. She is always so calm after a bath. She will fall asleep soon after and sleep for a couple of hours.

Kaelen and Averien

Kaelen is such a fantastic big brother. He really loves his baby sister. He is very fascinated by her. He will go up and touch her and kiss her. It is really cute. He has been doing great since she arrived. He scares me though because he doesn't understand gentle. He wants to pick her up ll the time too. February 9th, 2011

(doesn't Kaelen look like Jakson in these pictures above)

February 24th, 2011- Kaelen still loves his sister but is not always the nicest. He has hit her a couple of times and he loves to jump over her when she is laying on the bed or floor. It scares the heck out of us. he will also grab her arms and pull of them. I am grateful that kids are tough. Kaelen also loves her things. He will grab her binkies and put them in her mouth and will also put on her hats as you can see in the pictures. He put on her knitted hat from the hospital and ran around wearing it. It was pretty funny. Even though he has some jealousy issues and isn't always nice he does love his sister. He is kissing her all the time and gets excited to hold her.

Grandpa and Grandma come to visit and help

My parents (Grandpa and Grandma Fisher) came to visit on February 10. My mom was wonderful and offered to come and help me with the kids after Averien was born. We had no idea when she was going to come since we never know when my kids will be born but it worked out perfectly. Averien was just over a week when my mom came and Enoch had just gone back to work. My Dad stayed for the weekend and then headed back to work and my mom stayed for almost 2 weeks.

I was acutally hesitant on how it would be with my mom around and let me tell you it was absolutely wonderful. She was so fantastic.S he watched Kaelen in the mornings for me so I could sleep. It was so nice to sleep and not wonder what Kaelen was getting into. It was also so nice to have her around to hold Averien so I could shower and do things that I wanted.

Kaelen absolutely loved having Grandma around. He enjoyed playing with her and she was awesome at that. My favorite thing was to wake up and hear them downstairs laughing really hard. They would throw balls around downstairs, play with Kaelen's toys and watch movies together. Grandma also was fantastic about reading books to Kaelen. Kaelen is so destructive and crazy that you can't leave him alone or he will do something or get into something so having someone around just for him was amazing.

When my mom left I acutally cried and was sad to see her leave and Kaelen kept asking where Grandma was going. For the next few days he would ask where she was. She was amazing help and we loved every minute of her around.

Rachel and Jacob loved having her around too. She would help them with things and take them places too. She also helped clean and do dishes and help with dinner. We were so grateful to have her come and visit.

I think though her favorite part of coming to visit was holding Averien. She was always holding her. If i ever held Averien while she was asleep my mom would take her from me. She was really sad to leave Averien because she knew the next time she would see her she would have changed a bunch.
Averien loved to be held like this. She would sleep hours at a time sleeping on your chest. She loves to hear your heart beat but loves being on her tummy.

Averien's first bath at home

It was a long time before we bathed Averien at home. We wanted to do it with the kids around and it was always too late in the evening or something happened that we couldn't do it. She was over 2 weeks old when we finally bathed her. I guess it is a good thing babies don't get very dirty.

Averien loved her bath. We did it in the kitchen sink. She would just lay there and move around. She was so quiet and content. The kids loved watching. They all hovered around watching and wanting to help. It was really fun acutally to have the kids there to see her bath. Grandma was there too and that was nice for her to be apart of one of Averien's firsts.

Averien stayed in the bath for quite a while. My arms were getting numb. She got a little sad when we first got her out but once she was totally wrapped up she was happy. I am excited to see how she is in the bath in the future.

First time at the Temple

Rachel today had the opportunity to go to the Idaho Falls Temple and do baptisms for the dead. Enoch and I went with her as well as Grandpa and Grandma Fisher. Grandma and Grandpa Heileson had a family member visiting so they with the help of Aunt Gregorie took Kaelen, Jacob and Averien for a couple of hours so we could do this with Rachel.

It was a really wonderful experience for her to do family names. She only did 8 names but she loved it. She was the only one that did names. She said that it was a really nice experience. It was so exciting as her mom to see her enter the temple and do this amazing work. I hope that throughout her life she remembers the spirit she felt and make the temple a part of her life always.

After we did baptisms we went and got pictures outside the temple and then Enoch and I left so we could go and get our baby. Rachel stayed and went and ate the the temple with Grandpa and Grandma. She really loved it. She said she had really good mashed potatoes and gravy.

When I went to pick up Averien she was just getting hungry but was not sad at all. I was so happy because I was so worried about her and how she would be. She didn't cry at all while we were gone, in fact she slept most of the time. I was so happy that she was good and that I didn't worry about her while at the temple and that we had the opportunity to go and do this with Rachel. I am always so grateful for family who help watch our kids so we can do things.

Skiing with Dad and Grandpa

Jacob had the opportunity to go skiing with Grandpa Fisher and Dad today. Jacob went during the school day with his school. Jacob's school has an outdoor club for all students and they went skiing up at Kelly Canyon. Jacob went with Enoch and because Grandpa and Grandma were visiting Grandpa went as well. They had tons of fun. Jacob loves skiing despite it being harder than it is for most of us. Enoch has the brilliant idea as well to use his crutches instead of poles. Jacob's crutches have ice picks on the bottom to keep from slipping on the ice. What a smart idea. He did though later try to ski with his poles. They only stayed on the bunny hill but I guess it was not only a challenge for Jacob but Grandpa too. Grandpa had one really good wipe out I guess. Poor Grandpa. They came home from a full day of skiing sun burned, exhausted but happy from a fun day.

We have been blessed with the best baby ever. Our other kids by a day or two old started crying and never seemed to stop for months. Jacob never cried but he ate all the time and then we had our share of problems with everything else with him. Well Averien is a blessing to us. She sleeps so well. She will eat and then go to sleep for 2 plus hours. She'll wake up with just a tiny cry or by making noises. You can change her diaper and she just lays and kicks her legs. None of our other kids were like that. I remember Kaelen screaming in the hospital when we changed his diaper. She will sometimes stay awake for 20 minutes at most and then go to sleep. When she is awake she will look around everywhere like she is trying absorb and take everything in. She is always so content. She burps very well too and there are times where she doesn't even need to burp. She is just so happy. The last 3 nights she has slept 4-5 hours at one time. My kids didn't even do that at 3 months old. We have not had a baby that sleeps about 23 hours out of the day.

This video is of her crying. This is pretty much what her cry sounds like and how long it lasts. It is the most amazing thing. I know she is only a week old (this was filmed at 3 days old) but none of our other kids were this good, even at the beginning.

The video is dark because we had the lights dim in the room. Rachel filmed it for me.

Rachel's 12th Birthday

It is exciting to have Averien's Birthday so close to Rachel's. It is fun that they will have birthdays two days apart. They will never forget either. This year for Rachel's birthday I had to be on the ball with everything and plan ahead. I knew that I would either have a new baby or be ready to have one and not be in the mood to make a cake. I went Monday and pre-ordered a cake from Sam's Club. I ordered a round chocolate cake with an edible topping. It was flowers with her picture in the middle and then purple edging and around the side of the cake it read "Happy 12th Birthday Rachel." I also wrapped all of her presents on Monday and had those already to go.

Well as you all know Averien came on Wednesday and so for Rachel's birthday we had to simplify. She said she loved it though. I left her a present to open Friday Morning when she woke up. I had bought her a really pretty wrap sweater and I wanted her to look pretty on her birthday. I think that she did.

In the morning when Rachel opened the curtains to look for Jacob's bus she saw a sign on the lawn that said Happy Birthday. She was so excited to see that. It came from the young women's presidency. They made a bunch of signs to put on the lawn for all the young women's on their birthdays. It was so cool. It just made Rachel's day to see that.

For dinner Rachel wanted a stake dinner. Enoch made steaks for us they didn't turn out too great. They were perfect but then while he was cooking them I had kid drama and he came and helped me and the steaks got over cooked. Oops. I felt bad. Rachel still was grateful and loved it all. We also had a Cesar salad and then I helped Rachel make this jello with whip cream and fruit mixed in with that. Rachel was really happy with what we ate.

After dinner we had family come over for cake and presents. Rachael came over with her boys, Madeline, Brytton and Evie came as well as Gregorie and Grandma Heileson. Rachel loves having family be at her events and loves feeling special and being the center of attention. We had cake first. It was fun to see all the Grand kids gathered around the table excited for cake. I will say that cake was awesome especially because of the butter cream frosting. Yum.

After cake we opened presents. Rachel was so anxious for this. I wish I had taken a picture of all her presents because they looked so nice but one of them was huge. From Grandpa and Grandma Heileson she got a new shirt and a grand piano charm for her charm bracelet. She got a charm bracelet for Christmas and has now started collecting them. It is really fun and she is so excited to get charms for it. Her piano too looks like a real piano. It is so awesome.

Madeline, Brytton, Evie and Gregorie gave her money. She is excited because she has some things she wants to get with it. Rachael, Joseph, Carter and Collin gave her chocolate and then balloons (and balloons for all the boys that say stuff like your are now a big brother Kaelen, Happy 12th birthday Rachel and so on). That was Kaelen's favorite gift to come into the house. Rachael and Joseph are making her a pegboard to put all of her hair stuff and jewelry on it to hang in her room. It was not quite done yet so she will get it later.

Rachel got from Kaelen a Taylor Swift poster and man she freaked out when she saw it. She has been asking for one for so long and let me tell you they are hard to come by. I finally found one for her. Jacob got her a littlest Pet Shop Blyth babysitter doll with pets. Rachel doesn't play with many toys but she still plays with Littlest Pets all the time. Rachel will even get Jacob to come and play with her. It is really fun. Jacob for weeks has known exactly what he wanted to get her and he even wrapped the present himself. I am sad that I never took pictures of the present because it was pretty cute. The only thing I helped him with the wrapping was cutting the paper. He did the rest and he was so proud of how it turned out.

I got Rachel 2 more charms for her bracelet. I got her an R with little diamonds in it and then a heart with her birthstone. She is getting such a great collection for her charm bracelet. She has mentioned that this summer in Canada she wants to find a maple leaf for it. I think that it is fun that she wants to look for charms now and collect them at each place she goes.

Enoch and I bought her another sweater to wear and then a whole new outfit for church. We bought her a new skirt, a couple of shirts to go with the skirt, a camisole and a jacket. We wanted her to feel and look beautiful at church on Sunday at her first time in young women's. I loved her outfit. I wanted it.

Rachel loves earrings and jewelry and asked for some for her birthday. Well I figured instead of buying jewelry we would buy her beads and everything she needed to make jewelry. She got tons of stuff for it. She was excited as ever to get it. I know that she will get tons of use out of it all.

Rachel got so many phone calls and emails too. She loved getting a phone call first thing in the morning and then getting phone calls all day and then in the evening too. I am so grateful for you all for helping make Rachel's birthday wonderful.

I can't believe that my little girl is now 12 and is heading to young women's. I am so proud of her. It is crazy to think that Rachel is going to be a teenager soon. She has though grown up into be a beautiful young women with amazing talents and an amazing spirit. We sure love her and are so grateful everyday for her.

We love you Rachel. Happy Birthday.

***February 9th- Since Rachel's birthday she has made 2 necklaces and 4 pairs of earrings. She loves her jewelry making stuff.

***Grandpa and Grandma came to visit and for Grandma to come and help out with Averien and when they came they brought Rachel her birthday present. They bought her a computer chair for her bedroom. Her chair matches her room color perfectly. When they gave it to her they had a balloon (which she got from her birthday already) tied to it. They had just the seat on the couch. She was so excited when she got it. She also got some Polly pockets that she doesn't play with but the clothes should fit her littlest pet shop Blyth doll. Kaelen really loves her chair too.

Averien's Room

One thing that I have looked forward so much to was that Averien was getting her own room. I have been able to decorate it how ever I wanted and it has been so fun. Rachel moved downstairs and Averien got Rachel's room. We spent many hours and many problems with paint getting her room ready. It was all worth it in the end and it turned our perfect. I was worried the room would not even be close to being finished before she came. Well it sat completely finished for 2 weeks before she ever arrived. Things turned out perfectly and I am so glad for that. I am so excitd to have just a nursery too for Averien. I never had one for any of our other kids so this has just been so exciting for me.

When we got home from the hospital Rachel had made this large sign on the wall welcoming home Averien. It is extremely cute. We had talked about putting her name on the wall exactly where Rachel made the sign but we didn't know exactly what her name was going to be so we never did it. Rachel's sign was such a nice suprise for the room and it looks perfect in there too.

Averien Comes Home

Our first night at the hospital went well. Averien the first day never wanted to eat. She went all day without eating. She slept the whole time. Nobody could wake her. Finally after not eating for 8 hours she woke up and decided she did want to eat. She then ate what seemed like all the time after that. It was more like every 2 hours though. She was up in the evening eating and then the nurses would come in and check our vitals and then at one point they took her at 3 AM to do some screenings on her. They do those in the evening I think to give the nurses something to do but then also when family isn't around. I didn't mind. I guess she slept through all of her screenings and stuff they do and I was also able to sleep. Enoch had no problem sleeping. He said that he didn't ever wake up when the nurses came in.

The next day (February 3rd) I was pretty tired though and was glad for all the catnaps I took. I had been up all night the night before and didn't get as much sleep as I would have liked the day before. We decided to go home today. I was tired and wanted to sleep in my own bed and the kids wanted us home. I will say it was nice to have food brought to me and the baths in the jetted tubs were amazing but I was ready to go home.

Enoch was gone for a few hours during the day doing some things and then brought Kaelen back. Kaelen watched Finding Nemo and Bambi in the room while I packed, showered and we got ready to go. He also ate lots of pudding and jello from the eating area outside my room.

Grandpa Heileson stopped by too to see Averien. He doesn't like to hold new babies but we made him. I think as tough as he acts he loved it. It was nice for him to visit us and to see Averien.

We wanted to leave the hospital at 3 PM but it never works out the way and we didn't leave till 5 PM. It was so fun getting her dressed and ready to go home. She is such an amazing baby. She rarely cries and makes noises. When we got her dressed she barely made any noise at all. When we got Kaelen dressed to go home from the hospital he screamed. Heck he screamed when we changed his diaper. This was a nice change.

I was so glad that I brought 3 outfits to pick from because she was smaller than I expected and only one of the outfits fit her. She is so petite that in her room full of clothes nothing really fits her right now. I also can't believe how little Averien looked in her car seat. It is amazing that she actually could be buckled into it safely.

Coming home was so nice. I was tired but the kids were so excited. They started fighting over who got to hold her. I had to explain to them that she wasn't going anywhere and they would have so many opportunities to hold her. They didn't like that.

Gloria was so wonderful while we were gone. The house was clean, she had made cookies with the kids and she offered to have dinner done when I came home but a friend of my insisted on bringing Papa Murphy's Pizza. That was in the oven when we got home. I don't know what we would have done without Gloria around. Thank you Gloria you saved our lives and made being away from our kids so easy.

We feel so blessed with our little angel. She is so precious and has such a sweet little spirit.
I think also I am just so glad to not be pregnant. I have no more heart burn and can eat what I want. I love it.

Averien's Brothers and Sister Meet Her.

A few hours after Averien was born Enoch went to the house and brought Grandma Heileson and the kids back to the hospital to see her. They were so excited. Enoch had told Kaelen at home that his baby was born. He was excited to go see her. When he finally did see her he looked at her touched her head, said "baby" and then ran around the room. He found out that there was an area outside my room with snack foods in it and so he was excited to watch TV and eat pudding.

Rachel was so excited. We couldn't get her to stop smiling. She was so excited to finally have her sister here and to hold her. Rachel is going to be the best big sister. I know that she will do anything for her little sister.

Jacob came in wearing a mask. Jacob was sick a few days before and he still had a cough so we had him wear a mask when he held Averien. We didn't want her to get sick. He was so excited to hold her but isn't the best at holding her head. He'll figure it out though.

Grandma was so excited to hold and see her newest Grand baby. It was fun to see every bodies different reactions to her.

Everyone stayed about an hour or more and left after Kaelen starting running around the halls and causing problems for us in the room. Rachel and Jacob did not want to leave. We promised them though that they would come in the evening and watch a movie on the flat screen in the room.

Later in the evening they did come over and with dinner for them and a movie that they rented. We watch Shrek Forever After. It was fun to have the kids sitting on the bed with me or on the couch in the room watching a movie together like that. It was a fun family experience that we had. Enoch took the kids home after. Grandma Heileson stayed the night with the kids and Enoch came back to the hospital to sleep on the pull out couch.

Enoch said that in the evening while getting dinner with the kids and going to other places Kaelen kept asking where Mom was and when we could see the baby. It was nice to know that he wanted to see Averien and that he missed his mom.

Averien Gets Her 1st Bath

While I went and bathed the nurses cleaned Averien up and gave her a bath. Enoch went and took pictures. The nurse that bathed her is a women from our ward. Donella is an amazing women who has always been so kind and wonderful to us. It was nice that she was able to give Averien her 1st bath. Enoch didn't think to take pictures of Donella bathing Averien. Enoch said Averien gave a tiny cry out when she first got in the water but then calmed down right away and was quiet the rest of the time. It was so cute to see her come in wearing a beautiful knit hat and be all clean.

Averien Isabel Heileson

Today we welcomed our little new baby girl into our family. I had been having contractions all day and evening and then around midnight Enoch and I went to bed, well I tried. I knew that she would probably come in the next few hours or more so we made sure that we had everything that we needed. We packed up everything. I had already been packed but over the last few weeks things had started to come out of my suitcase. Enoch had to grab what he needed too. I was up all night with contractions. I would just concentrate on breathing and was fine most of the time. The contractions never really got where they were right on top of each other so I figured I was doing fine.

Around 3 AM I got up to go to the bathroom and the contractions were really painful then. I had to really concentrate. I was wanting to scream in pain but didn't want to scare Enoch. Maybe I should have. I accidentally dropped something while in the bathroom and Enoch right away asked if everything was okay. I said yes. I went back to bed and then 15 minutes later I told Enoch to call his Mom and get her to come. Enoch asked now or in a bit and I said "NOW." Well then I figured I still had lots of time (I didn't want to be at the hospital for hours) so I had Enoch take a quick shower. Well at about 3:30 we got dressed and then my contractions were really strong. I was in so much pain. Enoch was loading the car like a mad mad. We live only a half a mile from the hospital and on the way there I started to feel pressure. Enoch was driving so dang fast and was freaked out we wouldn't make it. He didn't want to deliver a baby in the car at

-27F.

He parked the car at the hospital doors and by then I was dying. I wasn't sure if I could actually get out of the car. Enoch took me upstairs in a wheel chair and when we got to the nurses station they started asking questions like name and and stuff. Well we hadn't registered yet because we had only decided a few days before as to which of the hospitals we would deliver at. When I told the nurses that I was feeling so much pressure they almost looked at my like yah right. They took me though to my room and helped me get into my gown and then they checked me. The look on the nurses face was shock. She yelled "she is complete" and then 2 nurses came running in. They were ripping that room apart getting it ready for Averien to be born. The nurses called my doctor but said she lived too far away and wouldn't probably make it. I was going to call her when we left the house but I was in so much pain I never did it.

The nurses looked at each other and asked if they were ready to deliver. Nurses can do it and know how but don't like to because of the lawsuits that can happen and all the paper work. They don't treat it like a doctor delivering. Well at this point I was in so much pain that I had to rely on Enoch and the nurse to help me breath through the contractions and not push. Another nurse at this point came in and said that Susan the midwife was next door helping another lady. Well they went and grabbed her. She came in with a gown on and said "alright lets push".

A funny tid bit is that at this point Enoch had not gone to move the car and the car was still outside running with all of our stuff in it. Well I realized that and as I was pushing I remembered the camera. We had left it in the car while we were in a hurry to get me into the hospital. I was so sad. I had this idea on how it was going to be and all the pictures we were going to get. So we have no pictures of Averien just as she was born because we had no camera. At least we have a good story on how fast it all went so it made up for not having the camera. The nurses thought that it was funny too that I was concerned most about the camera at this point of the birthing.

My water had not broken yet so they broke it and then Averien was born in a few pushes. It was so nice to have it over with. It was really hard and painful. The midwife was amazing too. She put Averien one me and she stayed on my stomach for at least 15 minutes. Enoch cut the umbilical cord after the umbilical cord stopped pulsating and then after a while they took her off me to weigh her. Everything is done in the room right there in front of us. It is really nice that it is that way.

After about 20 minutes of Averien being born Enoch finally filled out our admission papers and insurance information. The car ended running outside for almost an hour. Oops. Enoch really thought as did I that he would have had time to go and move it before Averien was delivered.
My Doctor came 3 minutes after Averien was born. Get this too, it was exactly 11 minutes from the time we got to the hospital that she was delivered and 14 minutes after we came in my doctor arrived. So everything happened so fast.

Averien was born at 3:54 AM. She weighed 6lbs 11oz and was 19 inches long. She is a small little thing. I guess she needed to stay as long as she could inside because if she had come any earlier she would have been really small. She has lots of dark brown hair too.

We got her name because we loved the name Avery but wanted something longer. Enoch came up with Averien. We wrote her name out 40 different times to see which spelling we liked. We loved this way because if she wanted to go by Averi when she is older she can and it also looked feminine this way.

It was so nice after she was born to just hold her and then Enoch and I took turns sleeping with her. Finally after a couple of hours the nurses took her to see the pediatrician and to bath her.

Last Picture Pregnant

I went to the doctors today and found out that I was already 4 cm dilated and so I figured the baby would be coming soon. I had contractions all day and then in the evening had Enoch take pictures of me pregnant in case the baby did happen to come. I wanted to get pictures as close to her coming as I could. This is me 11 days before our due date. I am always told I look like I put a basketball under my shirt. I now see what people were saying.