GARRETT AND MEL!

Baby David is here and he is Mr. Personality. He has a swing that we inherited from my sister-in-law (Thanks again you guys!) and Baby David LOVES it! I love it too because it is the only way I can take a shower everyday. The swing plays simple, baby versions of some classical music and David is obsessed with it. He loves it so much that Garrett and I started playing other classical music for him in the car and in the house to help calm him down when he is fussy. He was having one particularly fussy evening and Garrett and I both had to work on law school/ church things, so we put on the music so he would sit calmly for a little bit. The trick worked and we discovered that Baby David loves Beethoven. He was finally calming down and I was almost done with a Relief Society project when the song switched and a Bach piece came on my itunes. David started FREAKING OUT! That is how we discovered that Baby David doesn't like Bach. This little guy is very opinionated.
He's still a squirmy little guy and loves to kick all the time. My favorite part about his body (besides that toothless grin) is his little baby calves. He was born with them! He has the cutest little muscles on his legs! I love it! He's my little athlete.
And, in case any of you were wondering, Baby David still hates seatbelts. I know most babies don't enjoy being strapped into things, but David is especially bugged by the idea and has wiggled himself partially out of some of his less restrictive straps. He's quite the Houdini, but I'll go into that in another post. It's tough for him though, because at this stage of life he has to wear a seatbelt to do most of the things he loves. There are straps involved in car rides, walks in his stroller, riding in his swing, and even in riding around on Dad in his baby carrier! Poor kiddo!

Hey Everyone!
It's been a long time and because of the situation in our apartment right now I am in the unique position to be able to take some time to work on some of the partial posts I've been waiting to put on the blog. It's not that I have nothing to do. In fact, it's quite the opposite, but because I can not clean or put things away I might as well write. So here are a bunch of new posts in no particular order. I've also added some baby pictures so that you will want to read everything :) Enjoy looking at my adorable baby boy.

 I feel so incredibly blessed to get to experience pregnancy and spend all this time with my little man before he even gets here. There are so many little personality things that I am learning about Baby David before he even gets here.

I know some of these things might be typical of most babies before they are born and some of them might be coincidental, but I'm choosing to believe they are little bits of his personality shining through. And really, with Garrett and me for parents, how could this baby not be OOZING with personality (poor kid).
One thing we noticed at the beginning of the month is that Baby David does NOT like seat belts! I have been walking to work in the mornings and have not really been in the car much since I got into my second trimester. At the beginning of March we took a trip to visit Garrett's parents who live about five and a half hours away.

We hadn't even made it to Salt Lake City yet and David switched from moving all over to specifically and forcefully kicking only where the seat belt was stretched over my lower abdomen. He continued to do this almost non-stop until Garrett said to him, "David, this is your father.Stop kicking the seat belt." As Garrett claims, Baby had "heard the voice of authority" and stopped kicking for about thirty minutes. He then continued to kick the seat belt for most of the remaining three hours of the trip. He even reverted back to normal movements when we stopped to eat and stretch our legs, but the SECOND I put the seat belt back on, he was at it again. Ever since then, whenever I wear a seat belt for longer than ten minutes, he has something to say about it.

I know other people have told me that their babies would freak out about seat belts too, but this little guy seems especially opinionated about them. Just one more way he takes after his dad. I have to make Garrett wear his seat belt and he HATES it too. The good news is that I am already prepared for the fussing that will ensue the first time I strap this kiddo into anything after he gets here.

 There are some other things we can tell about him. I've already mentioned the sugar and the acrobatics that follow. He really is so much like Garrett.

We know a little about his taste in music, too. I'm hoping that now that his ears are more fully developed I can really mold his early tastes. Last night our friend's band had a show. We went and David was perfectly still until someone did a soft rock acoustic version of this country song Garrett likes. Then he went nuts.I blame Garrett for listening to that song in the car all the time. My only consolation is that I'm around David more and I know he still likes Billy Joel and my Scottish folk songs better :) That's at least one point for Mom. We'll see what the final score is, but I'd much rather he was mostly like his dad anyway because I kinda love that guy!

It's a....





....Boy! And yes, we're going to name him David. (Please ignore the bunch in my shirt, Garrett isn't home and I had to bend funny to take the picture... my bottom is not that big) Most of you will know that I think that our family needs a little break from all the Davids and that I've been very vocal about not naming my son David. I even went so far as telling Garrett not to propose if that was a deal-breaker for him. I was fine with David as a middle name as long as he didn't go by it.
Of course, none of this was ever going to be a real issue because all I have ever wanted is a house full of boys. That of course meant that all I would have was a bunch of super-girly girls. Wouldn't you know it, we are the luckiest people in the world because not only do we actually get to have a baby, but it's a BOY!!!
Garrett and I fight over boy names like crazy. We could never find one that sounded right and we both liked. When we had an ultrasound at 15 weeks, the doctor said he thought it was a boy, but we would find out "for sure" at the next appointment.
That's when I really started to think about the name David and the wonderful guy I married... David Garrett. When I really started to think about it, I decided I needed to decide if it was more important to me to NOT have a David than it was for Garrett to have a David.
After some more thinking--and a lot of swallowing my pride-- I decided that it was more important to my husband to have a David than it was for me to push against it. I also decided that it was more important to me to only have one son named David than it was to Garrett to name all of our boys David and call them by their middle names (like Garrett's family has done).
So, we came to Grand Compromise.... our baby will be named David, he will go by David (not a middle name), and he will be our ONLY David.
We are still working on the middle name, but we feel good about the David decision. Before anyone thinks I got steamrolled by my husband (do you even know me?) or the hormones are getting to me, I want to make  it very clear that it was a thoughtful, prayerful decision on my part to even put the Grand Compromise on the table. I feel really good about it. Garrett never pushed me or even really asked me--except in jest. I just listened to what he had to say about names and decided that his feelings about it were more important. All that really mattered to me was that some part or all of the baby's name would be a family name and have meaning to us. David is a special name. It's my father-in-law's first name. It's my brother-in-law's first name. Most importantly, it's my husband's first name. Garrett will be a wonderful father. He has loved me and struggled along with me during almost two years of trying to get pregnant and taken care of me during all of the wonderful challenges of pregnancy so far. He's a great David to look up to. We are so blessed and so excited for our little David to join our family!

Dear Baby Swenson,
Thank you for kicking around inside my tummy. This is the longest I have gone without seeing you in an ultrasound and just when I start to get worried that you are not ok, you give a little kick-kick-kick and then I know you are ok. Thank you for giving your worrying mommy a comforting kick. Someday you will think I'm weird when I tell you I sang to you in the shower every morning and in the car, but right now I think you must like it because you start to dance. You are obviously your mother's child.The acrobatics you perform after I eat sugar is something you get from your father. It's cute when he does it, but when you do it it's freakin' adorable.I can't wait to see you on Friday and to find out if you are my baby boy or baby girl. In the mean time, if you could find slightly better times to sit on my bladder it would be much appreciated and awarded with extra Bob Dylan and Billy Joel in the mornings.
Love,
Mom
(Wow, that name is heavenly)

Here's a link to a quiz on Baby Swenson's Statistics. Have fun guessing :)

Baby Swenson Statistics Quiz