The Joys of Parenthood

So, it's been a while since I've gotten around to updating the blog. A lot has been going on as of late. The month of June just flew by and was full of trips to Oregon and getting ready to move and then moving. We are now in San Francisco and I am starting up dental school tomorrow! Exciting/crazy times. Britton is still full of surprises. Just today we had to bathe him 3 separate times because of wicked bowel movements. Loads of fun. But in any event, here are some recent pictures of our adventures together.

I believe this one was at Zions.

This was down at Mesa Verde in Colorado.

This is overlooking Canyon Lands a twilight.

Good ol' Delicate Arch. We went down to Monticello to visit Nicole's grandparents and some of the national parks nearby.

Britton getting a little tired of the car seat. This is his unhappy face.

Yaquina lighthouse in Newport, Oregon. We spent 10 days back there with all of Nicole's family when her brother Alan got back from his mission.

One of the attempts of the family picture. I think we took over 30 and none of them having everyone looking...but what can you expect with 10 grandchildren?

Britton and Annie.

Britton never looks at the camera when he should.

Grandma and Grandpa Miller with the grandchildren.

We took Britton to the beach a few times.

Britton's first time swimming! He loved it.

After the move down to Cali, chillin' in my parent's pool.

We took Britton up to the lake boating with us. Again he liked the water.

Nicole decided to try slalom skiing and got up!

Britton now rolls like a champ from his back to his stomach.

He has also discovered his tongue.

He also really likes his bouncer toy thingy..whatever it is called. His feet just barely touch.

Well, that's life for now. We are enjoying San Francisco and hopefully dental school goes well!

More pics

So we recently went climbing on one of the rare weekends where we've had some good weather. We went with some of our friends from Provo. It was fun to get out and enjoy the warmth.

I recently went through the graduation ceremony at BYU. It was a little weird going back after not being there for a semester.

Britton has this car seat cover for when it is cold out. He loves it!

This is Britton in his jogger.

Goring Family Update

So I know we haven't been too good at updating the blog so here are some pictures of Britton. We take his picture every week on Wednesday to watch how he changes throughout the first year. It's already amazing how much he's changed and how big he is. We had his 2 month check up today and he is 13 pounds 9.5 ounces and 25 inches long. He's a big boy to say the least. I will post some more pictures of our recent adventures in a little bit.

Britton at 2 weeks

Britton at 3 weeks

4 weeks

5 weeks

6 weeks

7 weeks (making a face that his mom makes at his dad every now and again)

8 weeks

Isn't he so stinking cute?

Parenthood!

So, here are a few more pictures of Britton...OK maybe more than a few but I think he's just so dang cute. Slightly biased.

I know newborns can't really smile but check out this pic I snapped of him. It looks pretty close!

OK. This is just way cute.

Just another cute pic. Oh, and I'm so hoping that he gets blue eyes...we'll see.

Just getting ready to leave the hospital.

His first car ride! And we get to take him home. It's kind of weird leaving the hospital. At least my thoughts went something along the lines of "You mean we actually get to take him home?!?" That's when it really started to hit me that I am a father and have a baby boy. Crazy.

Mom and the little one all tuckered out!

So on the last day of our stay at the hospital we found out that his bilirubin levels were kind of high which indicates jaundice. We had to get him tested again the next day and unfortunately his levels jumped even higher. So lucky him, he gets to spend every moment that he isn't getting fed on the cursed thing. He isn't much of a fan and I can't blame him. Last night we got no sleep whatsoever. I think he maybe totaled 20 minutes at most for the whole night. The rest was spent fussing. Today we put an ace bandage across his eyes and have been playing music. It seems to be helping. Hopefully he'll be done with it soon. He normally sleeps so well at night.

And just one more in the straight jacket UV thing.

So, as we adjust to being parents we realize how time consuming it is and how much of an adjustment it really is. The lack of sleep is the hardest to get used to. Well, stay tuned for more cute pictures to come.

Baby Britton!

It's hard to believe that the day finally came and we now have a baby boy! His name is Britton Michael Cleve Goring and he weighed a whopping 8 pounds 10 ounces at birth and was 22 inches tall. I have no idea where that height came from.

Oh, I should also mention that he was over a week late. Nicole's doctor decided that we better induce her so we went in Monday night, driving through a blizzard to the hospital. When we arrived at 8:30 pm we got situated and they started Nicole on a drug to thin her cervix since she was not effaced at all and only 1 cm dilated. Through the night they continued to administer the drug and we didn't get a whole lot of sleep. Come 6:30 am they started to induce her using pitocin (an artificial hormone similar to oxytocin). She started to have mild contractions and that went on till about noon. She had only dilated to about 3 cm by then. Around noon the doctor decided to break her water sack to help along the labor. That's when contractions got really intense. It got to the point that her contractions were stacked pretty much right on top of each other with no rest time in between. She also started having back labor pains that caused all her muscles to seize up so she couldn't relax them. That's when we decided to get an epidural. Unfortunately the anesthesiologist was in with a patient having a C-section and didn't get to Nicole for over an hour. That was probably the hardest time.

By the time she got the epidural, she had progressed to about 7 cm and 80% effaced. Oh, it was around 3 pm that she got the epidural. Now, in general most people progress quickly after reaching 7 cm dilated. Well, the next 2.5 cm took till 11 pm. All the time we were trying different positions and turning Nicole on to her side. We came to find out that Britton was facing posterior, which simply means when he came out his face was facing up and not down. This makes delivery more difficult because his head runs into the pubic bone and has trouble coming down. The other issue was that the last 0.5 cm of Nicole's cervix would not thin at all. Most likely due to the baby's position. So finally around 11 pm we decide to try and push past that part of cervix. Luckily after a while of pushing, he did make it past the cervix but still had the pubic bone to get by. But at least we now knew we would get by without a C-section.

So at 11 pm Nicole started the pushing and pushing and more pushing. Nicole pushed for about 3 hours and his head was visible but just wouldn't make it past the pubic bone. Finally, the doctor decides to use the vacuum cup to help pull him out. Finally, after 4 hours of pushing, the baby came out and man was he big! No wonder he wasn't coming out.

Well, he had finally come after being in the hospital for like 30 hours. Nicole was a trooper! Here are some pictures!

Update on our lives!

So, Nicole hasn't been too proactive about updating our blog so I decided to step in and give a little update. Nicole is a whopping ONE day away from her due date. I'm starting to think that she will be a little late, though. We shall see. We just go on with our lives waiting for the tell-tale signs of labor. Needless to say, we are excited! As for what we've been doing for the last 20 or so weeks of our lives...well here are some pictures to tell. Oh and let me preface by explaining that my latest "plasma money" purchase was a new DSLR camera so I had some fun with some landscape pictures.

So this first image is of the mountains by where Nicole's doctor's office is. I used photoshop to make the panoramic picture.

These two are just up the Big Cottonwood Canyon.

I took this photo while snowboarding after a snow storm up at Brighton. Most of my free days are spent snowboarding and tutoring.

I was driving in my car coming home form tutoring and saw the sun breaking through the clouds sending spot lights on the valley. I couldn't catch the best part in time but this is the best I could get of it. I need to edit out the power lines.

Nicole had her baby shower down in Provo around the end of January. We got some needed diapers as you can gather from the diaper cake she is reaching for in this picture.

Lastly, this picture was taken just the other night. My mom requested a pregnant picture of Nicole just before she is due.

So, the next chapter of our lives is soon to begin. It's hard to believe that after 9 months Nicole will actually have the baby. You kind of just start to get used to it and think she will be pregnant forever. Lucky for her that isn't so! We will let you all know when the baby comes and we will be sure to post pictures on here.