Lots of catching up to do

I haven't updated is so very long. Lets see, where to start. Here are some pictures from Cailyn's two year old birthday party. It was a small, family party in the park. Cailyn had a great time, she loves being surrounded by the people who love her.


We've since moved our little family to the lovely city of Salem Oregon. We are so happy here and love this city so far. Here are some pictures of our last day in Butte Falls and our first few days in Salem.


Here we are in our new apartment.

Braden Taylor Irwin

Yay, he's finally here. Okay, he's actually been here about a week and a half but I haven't got around to doing much other than take care of my TWO kids. I can't believe I'm a mother of two. That's crazy. Okay so here's the info. Braden Taylor Irwin was born on May 28th just before 8:00am, I'm not sure of the exact time, it's like 7:57 or something like that. He was 8lbs 8oz. 20 and a half inches long. Somehow he has dark hair, like really dark, which is very surprising. Jordan and I were both blond little kids, and Cailyn is super blond. He's very sweet, he's eats and sleeps very well and Cailyn adores him. The first thing she said when she came into the hospital room was "I hold baby", very cute. She likes to hold him all the time, only for about a second though, she has a very short attention span.

Getting closer

Yesterday I had my last prenatal check up. Yay, we're getting really close. I think this will be the longest 10 days ever. I'm so happy to see my little boy. I'm excited to see Cailyns reaction to him. She loves babies so I'm hoping she'll really enjoy being big sister. I tell her that I have a baby in my tummy and she repeats it a lot, but I don't think she really understands what's going on.

Oh yeah, Jordan and I decided on a name this morning. He will be Braden Taylor Irwin, the doctor thinks he'll be about 8lbs. That's less than Cailyn was. My c-section is scheduled for 2pm and I can't eat all day. That won't be very fun, but I'm sure he'll be worth it all. I'm really excited because I've only gained 11 1/2 lbs this pregnancy so I'll probably come out of it about 15lbs less than I started off. Super cool. Now I just have to make sure I don't go into labor in the next 10 days. Oh darn, an excuse to sit around and relax.

Confusional Arousal

Cailyn's been having these weird sleeping fits for a while now and I've been a little worried that she may have sleep terrors. So, yesterday I got this e-mail (I get these weekly newsletters from parents.com) that had an article about knowing the difference between nightmares and sleep terrors. I read it and it talked about something called "Confusional Arousal". It sounded exactly like what Cailyn's been having. Here's bit of the article that talks about what she seems to have.

"A confusional arousal begins with the child moaning and moving about. It progresses quickly to the child crying out and thrashing wildly. Even if the child does call out her parents' names, she will not recognize them. She will appear to look right through them.

During these frightening episodes, the child is not dreaming and typically will have no memory of the event afterwards. If any memory persists, it will be a vague feeling of being chased, or of being trapped. The event itself seems to be a storm of neural emissions in which the child experiences an intense fight-or-flight sensation. A child usually settles back to quiet sleep without difficulty.

These are very different from nightmares. You won't become aware of your child's nightmares until after she awakens and tells you about them. A child may be fearful following a nightmare, but will recognize you and be reassured by your presence."

It also says that some triggers for it are waiting until she's super tired to put her to bed and irregular sleep schedules. So sure enough, last night she went to bed two hours later than her bed time, and she didn't have a nap yesterday, double whammy. She had another episode of it. This time, instead of trying to wake her up, I took the advice of the doctor who wrote the article. He said to let it run its course and not to hold her down because it would prolong the experience. It worked she went soundly back to sleep in about a minute.

I felt a little bad though because she was talking, saying "Mama c'mon" and "Mama sit" asking me to come sit with her like she does on a regular basis when she's awake. I thought maybe she was having nightmares about me not spending enought time with her or something. Anyway, I'm super glad that I know what she's experiencing now. It's supposedly somewhat common in toddlers, I just hope she grows out of it.

Baby Name

Baby boy is on his way, three weeks from today. Jordan and I still haven't decided on a name for him. We've narrowed it down to four names that we both like. They are:

Braden Taylor Irwin
Conner James Irwin
Tyson Cole Irwin
Christopher Joseph Irwin

Those are our final four. I think Jordan likes Christopher the best, I think my favorite is Conner, I don't know I'm still not sure. This is freaking hard. Jordan sent out an e-mail to some friends and family to vote for their favorite, anyone is welcome to give their input. We obviously can't decide on our own.

Gotta Dance

This video was too funny not to post. This is what happens when we turn on music in our house. The other little girl with Cailyn is her cousin Destinie.

Cailyns first beach trip

Ok, so this posting is a bit late. Cailyn and I took a trip to the beach with my Mom and Dad the first weekend in April. Cailyn loved it so much. The weather was perfect, which is a big deal on the Oregon coast. We stayed at the White Rock Resort just south of Brookings for two nights. So I thought I'd share some pictures.

This was her favorite place, she loved to look out at the "ocean water" and she still talks about it, all the time.
This was the view from our back porch where we stayed.

Her first walk down to the beach. She was very attached to Grampa that day.




She had fun making a sand castle (well that's what it was supposed to be anyway) with Grampa and Uncle Nathan.She was very concentrated on her work.