More pictures...

So I know this is a little ridiculous, becuase Justin already posted those last two entries. Our little guy is only 5 days old and we already have 3 posts of pictures of him. We are a little bit crazy about him if you can't tell! Anyway, I did some editing while Braden was asleep in my arms and decided I should put them up. He iis just so sweet and such a happy, content little baby! I came upstairs the other day and Justin was playing the guitar and singing to Braden. I wish I could have had the video camera ready at that moment. Justin is the best dad and is absolutely in love with Braden. I don't think Braden could get a better dad! My boys are the best!
My Mom and Dad were able to come from WA andstay with us to help take care of Braden (and us). It has been so great to have them around. They are also in love with their new little grandbaby and can't wait for him to be done with the bililights so they can hold him all the time and spoil him as much as possible!

Christmas Package

So our early little Christmas present has come wrapped in his own Christmas lights. Braden has jaundice and we were sent home with the bili-lights. So here is our little Christmas present under the tree with his lights.

IT'S A BOY!!!!!!!

Sunday at 7:56am Braden David Peterson joined our little family. He weighed 7lbs 13oz and was 20 inches long. He has a little more hair than either of us were expecting, but it is still pretty sparse. He has been a very content little boy. He gave a few little cries as soon he was born, but then was happy to just look around at the world with those big blue eyes. He doesn't even cry when his extremely inexperienced father ineffeciently changes his diapers. It was truly an amazing experience to watch his birth and overwhelming to realize that we are this little guy's parents. We are very happy and blessed to have him. Elise is doing well and recovering nicely. She pushed for two and a half hours and,needless to say, was pretty exhausted after the whole ordeal. She had amazing endurance which can probably be attributed to her exercising late into the pregnancy. We are happy to have Braden here!

Projects, projects and more projects!

Well, to answer all your questions...nope, no baby yet. We are anxiously and very impatiently waiting and I walk 30-60 minutes every morning hoping to encourage the contractions that I do have all day long to be more intense and productive. I don't think I've ever been so excited to feel intense pain.
Anyway, I'm trying to be a little more patient and focus on enjoying the time that Justin and I have to ourselves until this little guy comes. :) And, thanks to my wonderful Justin, things are finally ready for our little guy to come! We have been working on project for months and months, and they are finally all finished! You see, I'm not much of a "nester". You'd think that I would be panicking that the baby could be born any day, and we have not yet gotten the carseat installed, and are just barely getting the room presentable enough for the baby to even have a place to sleep, but that's just us I guess. Anyway, here are the projects that Justin finished up this last week:

Gliding rocking chair ottoman - we bought a gliding chair for $5 at a garage sale months ago, and ever since Justin has been feeling the need to make an ottoman to go with it. So, he drew up a design, we went to Home Depot, he spent many hours cutting and sanding and lacquering, and viole, we have a gliding ottoman with a matching pillow! It's great!

Dressers - Justin and I have never owned a dresser, let alone found one for the baby. In fact, I think it's been about six years since I have used a real dresser. We recently tried our luck at the DI and found these two just waiting for us! So we brought them home and Justin worked on them all day. By nightfall we had a dresser for us and for the baby! YAY! It is SO nice!

Crib - We also purchased a crib at a garage sale for $5 and decided to refinish it. Big mistake. There are about a million dowels with scalloped edges that take 1-2 hours each to sand down - by hand. We have been working on this crib for a majority of the nine months I've been pregnant! I would never do this again, but it is beautiful and we love it. Let's just say it had better last a LONG TIME. Right now I don't have a picture of it put together, because there is not enough room in the bedroom for both it and the bassinet we are going to use. So, once our little guy is big enough that we want him in the crib, I'll try to remember to take a picture of it to show you all. I really love it.

And with that, our projects are finally finished! Everything is put away and we are just waiting for this little baby to join us!

A Great Thanksgiving...

Justin and I had the best Thanksgiving! The week started out with me fixing my first Thanksgiving dinner. It was wonderful! The rolls were the only big disasters, but in the end they turned out great. (We had some overzealous yeast that decided to explode while rising in a warm oven! I wish I had taken a picture because it was really pretty amazing. I am also very grateful for a handy husband who is able to unscrew things and pry the oven door open when I accidently broke the lock and got it stuck while the rolls were cooking in the oven! I wish I had a picture of that one too. It was all really funny!) It was so nice to have the leftovers and the good company over for some pre-Thanksgiving turkey dinner.

Next, we went to my Grandma and Grandpa Neilson's for Thanksgiving. We stayed with my aunt and uncle, Shawn and Heather, which was a blast! Justin got to play football with all the guys (an event he looks forward to all year), and came away this year without any injuries (except a few nasty bruises that is)! On Black Friday Justin and I ventured out to do some shopping. This was officially my first encounter with shopping the day after Thanksgiving. It wasn't too bad - I think mostly because we didn't go out until the afternoon when some of the mad rushes were gone. I don't know how people do that 5am shopping stuff. Some people must just love a good deal more than I do, I guess. Anyway, we found some good stuff, so it was successful.

The best though is that every year on the Saturday after Thanksgiving my mom's family gets together and goes to a little town called Eureka to cut down a Christmas tree. Although this tradition has been happening my whole life, I have never participated until this year! Justin and I went with them, found a tree, cut it down and brought it back to Logan! Now it is so pretty in our living room and it makes our apartment smell SO GOOD! Our first real Christmas tree. It's so exciting! I love Christmastime!

Angry Elise

This is Elise mad at me because I am taking her picture. Isn't she cute?

Dreams Come True!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Okay, well a lot has happened this week, so I apologize for a lot of posts all at once, but I had to catch up on this busy week we've had! First and foremost though, JUSTIN GOT ACCEPTED TO EASTERN VIRGINIA MEDICAL SCHOOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We didn't think we'd hear from them for a little while longer, but Justin (who is always anxious to get the mail these days to see if some medical school has sent him anything) went to get the mail last night and came running back in with an acceptance letter! We couldn't believe it! He swept me up and gave me the biggest kiss and I just held him as tight as I could! We have been hoping and dreaming that we would get accepted somewhere and be able to go next year and that all the years of Justin dreaming and his work these last few years would pay off. It's his whole life dream starting to come true! It was such an adrenaline rush and it is definitely one of those moments that I want to watch over and over again someday after this life is over!
EVU Medical School is one that Justin really liked and an area that we would love to experience living in, so we are really happy with it. If we get any other medical school offers from here on out it will just be icing on the cake and we will just get to be a little more picky about where we want to go. Anyway, it is all such a relief and huge rush! Heavenly Father has been so good to us! I can't tell you all the blessings that led up to this huge blessing, but He is always taking care of us! Thanks so much for everyone's love and support to get to here! I can't believe it is all actually going to happen!

U of U and Body World

Monday, Justin had his second medical school interview! This one was at University of Utah. So we got up at 4:30, got ready, and I dropped him off at the school at 7:30am. He had a great interview and was very impressed with the U, which is definitely a contrast to the opinions he had before. The whole day went wonderfully for him and he got a great taste of the medical program they have there.
While he was there for the day, I went down to Provo and met up with Kelli, a great friend who happened to be in town from CA. It was great timing and we went to lunch and got caught up on each others' lives. Good friends are the best! I love you to death Kelli!
After everything was over, I went and picked up Justin and surprised him with tickets that my family had baught for us to Body World! It's an amazing exhibit where you go around and see amazingly detailed views of the whole body and the different organs. They had such incredible views of different muscles and the nerves and veins. The body is an amazing thing and Justin and I had a great time! The second picture was one of the amazing things to me, so I hope it doesn't gross people out too much. But it was a display of the body's nerves all laid out flat. I have no idea how they even disected it, but it was amazing to see how all of those nerves come down from the brain and spread out to our finger tips and toes! Sorry if it's creeps anyone out...
Then, to top off the day we stopped at Dan & Dana's and had dinner and played Guitar Hero World Tour to our hearts content! Thanks for a great night you guys! Justin and I definitely got booed off the stage a few times, but all in all didn't do too badly! Anyway, it was a great day off from school and work for the two of us!

4 more weeks...

Well, officially this week we have four weeks left. Crazy! Our little guys just keeps getting bigger and bigger. I'm not sure he's going to be able to stay in there for that long, he's just so squished (as am I)! People keep telling me that my belly looks lower and lower, which must mean that he's dropped or in the process of dropping. He's been so low the whole time, and my torso is pretty long, so I haven't really noticed much of a difference, but it's showing so that's good. I can't believe how fast things fly by! The holidays are coming up and next thing we know we're going to have a baby!

Eastern Virginia Medical School

Justin flew out to Norfolk, VA this last week and interviewed at the medical school there. The interview went really well. He had a great time and loved both the people and the area. He also fell in love with the medical school. He took some pictures, so I thought I'd post them and keep you updated as the interviews continue. The only other interview he has scheduled right now is at University of Utah in a few weeks. Other than that we're still playing the waiting game, which gets old quite fast. :) We're really excited to be in the spot that we are though. It's crazy to think how far we've come in the last few years in Justin's dream of becoming a doctor. Time goes by fast!
We will know in the next 4 weeks if Justin got in at Eastern Virginia Medical School or not. It's really nice to have a set time period that we'll know by, but it kind of scares me too! I guess we'll just keep praying!

The pictures of the buildings are the Medical school campus. The one of him is right before he went in for his interview. The big naval ship is the Wisconsin, which he toured while he was there. The beach is absolutely beautiful and his hotel was just across the street from it. Needless to say, he was won over by Norfolk!

Happy Halloween!

Well, with the creative minds of a few friends and a little too much time on my hands at work today, our little baby boy dressed up for his first Halloween! Or, I guess, my belly dressed up for him. It was pretty funny and my co-workers and I had a great time putting it together. I have to credit Lacey with the original idea of using an ultrasound picture. She's a genius.
So after some creative thinking and decorating, I decided that I needed to go show Justin(I figured he would think it absolutely ridiculous but get a very good laugh out of it). So I went and surprised/embarrassed him in the middle of the physiology lab that he teaches and brought the class some candy. It was great!

We had a great Halloween! Andrew and Katie (our niece and nephew here in Logan) were so cute as the little Cow and Batman! I've never seen a little boy so excited about a cape before. Andrew's really loving capes these days. They were great little Trick-or-Treaters too. Katie held on to each piece of candy she was given for dear life and then said in a cute little voice, "More?".

Montana

Well, I'm sorry I've been such a slacker and haven't put anything up in forever. Mostly we've both been working, my belly's getting rather large, Justin's getting ready to have his first medical school interview at Eastern Virginia Medical School in Norfolk (YAY! We are really excited about it), we've been very impatiently waiting to hear from other medical schools, and we took a trip to Montana to visit Justin's grandparents and relatives. Whew!

We had such a great time with Grandma and Grandpa Peterson! They are both hilarious and are so great to us. They had us move the woodpile - a tradition when anyone in the family comes to visit. Grandma gives us each a pair of brand new "Brown Jersy Gloves" to make us feel just excited to do the project. And then we move their wookpile from one place to the next, wherever they deem neccessary. Sometimes there seems to be a point to the moving, other times not. But you can't go to MT without moving the woodpile or picking rocks or doing some little project like that. It always makes us smile.

Grandma even inspired Justin to inspire his parents to go in on a sailboat with us!It was just sitting there for sale and calling our names. It really turned out to be more of his parents buying a sailboat than us going together. At any rate, we are pretty stoked about the whole thing. I put some pictures below. It's a definite upgrade from our little sailboat. It's all his grandma's doing. She has this great picture of us having a whole fleet of our own someday. :) Justin's parents are wishing that she would inspire us a little less in the boating department.

On another note, Justin and I had never seen Larch trees before this trip. Apparently there are these trees that, like deciduous trees, turn yellow in the fall. But they don't have leaves, they have needles. Then they loose all their needles for winter and grow them back in the spring. We were very astonished, having never seen a tree with needles turn colors unless it was sick and dying. Anyway, you can see it in the background of some pictures. It made for a beautiful fall landscape. We always love being there in MT.

Oh, I almost forgot to explain the deer picture. Justin calls it the "alien deer". He was out feeding the deer some apples and caught a picture of one when it looked striaght at him, and it turned out like alien deer with it's mouth open like that too. Anyway, we thought it was kind of funny.