Rylee Eleanor Clark: May 6, 2012, 2:11AM, 6 lbs 15 oz, 21.5 inches

She came about 8 days early, but we're SO glad to welcome her into the family. There won't be much text in this post--mostly pictures with some description. We'll post up later on how the labor actually went. For now, we figured that some pictures of Rylee will suffice. Enjoy!

We had a great Doula, Jennie Ballif, from the ward help us with various birthing positions. 

She was great!

Kari's first look at Rylee

The Miracle of Birth

Baby Shock (I love this picture)

Happiness and Joy (Doesn't she look beautiful?)

Dirty newborn Rylee

Closeup of dirty newborn Rylee

Elated Mother

Exhausted Dad (they don't tell you that you won't sleep for another 4 hours after the actual birth... my adrenaline ran out a lot faster than Kari's)

Exhausted Rylee (I guess birth takes a lot out of the infant too)

Rylee has Dad's hair!

So peaceful!

Not so peaceful (less than a second after the previous picture)

Proud Father (Daddy's little girl has a strong climber's grip already)

Clark Family Picture

Beautiful Mother (How does she look so good less than 24 hours after labor?)

Rylee's favorite pink knit hat (it's the only one small enough for her head)

Peaceful sleeping (pre-BM)

During BM?

Post-BM

Kari: Still So Happy!

Grandparents (and others too): If you want any of these original files, let me know. I can email them to you when I get a chance.

Moving Across the Country

We always told ourselves that when we had a baby we would start a blog. That time has come. It kind of snuck up on us, but she's coming soon.... and she's going to ROCK OUR WORLD! Or so we've been told. We decided to start back when we left for Pennsylvania. It might take a few FHE's to get current.  Bear with us and hopefully our little girl will wait to join us until we get caught up.

We left for Pennsylvania on August 8, 2011. After a 4 day trip, with a quick stop in Nauvoo, we finally made it to our apartment. Here are a few pictures of our stop in Nauvoo.

Our favorite part was an endowment session in the Nauvoo Temple.

Statue of Joseph and Hyrum's last ride in front of the temple.

Carthage Jail was the last sight we saw on our way out of town.

It was a sad day for us, arriving at our new apartment. A few surprises awaited us:

• The only light fixtures in the apartment were in the kitchen and bathroom. Apparently Pennsylvanians believe in lamps. Conveniently, the light switches also turn on the outlets you plug your lamp into. It took a while to figure this out. Kari is still figuring out how to charge her phone at night with these tricky outlets...
• It was much smaller than we thought it would be, even though we knew it would be a 1 bedroom apartment. Anything would seem small compared to the 3 bedroom townhouse we'd been spoiled with in Provo. 
• Our keys were made at Home Depot! We know this, because we learned our lesson as managers in Provo: Home Depot makes VERY BAD key duplicates. Our friends, Jeff and Melanie had us over for dinner that evening, because we weren't settled in, and after a 'quick' trip to WalMart to buy groceries, and those stupid lamps, we went home, only to find that our key decided to crap out completely. Yes, we got locked out of our own apartment at 11 at night, without any idea of who to call. Eventually, we found a neighbor awake, and after a few phone calls got a hold of the after-hours management, and 40 minutes later we were back in our apartment. 

What a first day in Pennsylvania! On a happy note, the pizza we got from Jeff and Melanie was excellent, especially after 4 days of fast food. We still have good memories of it... In fact, Kenny was remembering it again today. 

In the end, we really did end up liking our apartment despite the noisy neighbors (stories will be told about them in the future). Kari decided that we would decorate our apartment this time. In Provo, we always knew we would be leaving, so why decorate, right? Little did we know, a few months after moving into this apartment, we would buy our first house.

At least the main area was spacious.

 Those dang lamps!

That's all for now.  Stay tuned for next week!