23 Years

I had a birthday. And luckily, I have a wonderful husband who made it so memorable.
(Let me apologize ahead of time for having so few pictures of my day. I am horrible with taking photos - something I really need to work on!)

My day actually started the night before when I was able to see Breaking Dawn at midnight! It was so much fun and such a great way to start off my birthday. Honestly, it was kind of hard being 7 months pregnant and staying up until 3:00 in the morning - but well worth it!

Then, when I got home, Josh had balloons waiting for me. Isn't he adorable?

The next morning I woke up to this...

And this...

A few of my favorite treats. Yes, that card says "Mommy" on it. So weird to think that someone is going to be calling me that soon! Josh wrote me such a sweet note from both him and Stella. He really is the most thoughtful, romantic guy!

See that little present in the middle of that pile? Well, inside was this picture...

Yep! I got a pair of these bad boys. He gave me the picture because they were being shipped and hadn't arrived yet. I got them a few days later and wear them ALL THE TIME. He even picked them out himself - perfect size and all. I was impressed to say the least!

Later that day, my mom treated me to a massage. I told my mom all I wanted was a maternity massage. Of the course the massage was incredible, but to be honest, I really just wanted to be able to lie on my stomach for a while. I was never really even a stomach sleeper, but being deprived of it while being pregnant has been SO hard for some reason. I guess its the whole "wanting something you can't have" thing. So being able to lie on my stomach for almost an hour was such a treat! My mom also gave me a new set of scriptures with my Madsen name on them (about time I got a set of these right?) and a gift card to my favorite store.

Later that night, Scott and Kerri had us over for dinner and to celebrate with the family. It was such a wonderful night and I always enjoy Kerri's delicious cooking!

22 was a great year. The most exciting event was finding out I was pregnant with our little girl! But I know 23 is going to bring so many great things, including the arrival of our little one, and I seriously can't wait to see what's in store!

I couldn't have asked for a better birthday. I was completely spoiled by my family. Josh went out of his way all day to make sure my day was perfect. But being able to just relax with him all day was honestly the best gift of all. He is such a thoughtful and sweet man and I feel so lucky that he is all mine! I love him so much! How could I not? I mean seriously...just look at him!! ;)

Madsen/Cox Family Shower

A few weeks ago, Kerri and Heidi threw me such a wonderful shower in Manti at Grandma Cox's house. The Madsen and Cox families are truly some of the most supportive people I know! Almost everyone in the family was there and I couldn't be more grateful! Here are a few photos of the fun evening.

A few pictures of Kerri's decor. That woman sure does know how to throw a party!

And some of the gifts we received.

A swing (which I am SOOO excited about!)

A bathtub

My mom gave me this beautiful blessing dress. I know you can't see it well here, but it is seriously the most precious thing I have ever seen! I will be sure to post more detailed pictures on Stella's blessing day.

Along with this dress, she also gave me the shoes, tights, and accessories to go along with it. (I'll be honest...I helped pick out the dress, so it wasn't a huge surprise!) But my mom did surprise me with a beautiful blanket for Stella to use on her blessing day. One of my mom's best friends has a daughter who was studying abroad in Bethlehem. She brought home a blanket from Bethlehem. I wish I had a picture of it, but it is truly something we will cherish.

Josh's sweet grandma made us this quilt. She is not in the greatest of health, but still puts so much work into making a quilt for every new baby that comes into the family. She is truly amazing!! And this of course is another gift we will always treasure!

Those were only a few of the gifts we received. We were also completely spoiled with blankets, toys, a baby monitor, books, a play mat, bath time goods, and lots of cute clothes! We really got so much stuff that it would take A LOT of photos to show it all :)

The Greenwell girls who made the road trip down with me just for my shower!

And the Madsen ladies who put together this whole party! They are incredible!

Ps...isn't baby Josie so sweet? She is three months old now...and Stella is sure lucky to have a cousin so close to her age! I know they are going to be the best of friends.

Josh and I really appreciate everyone who showed their love to us and baby Stella. I feel so blessed to have married into such a wonderful, supportive family! And thank you so much mom Madsen and Heidi for putting so much effort into such a wonderful shower. I love you both more than you know!!

Build-A-Bear Birthday

Today is our adorable niece Sadie's 3rd birthday! She is getting so big!!
Her mom needed a babysitter for a few hours the other day while she did some birthday shopping, so Josh and I decided that, as our gift to her, we would take her to Build-A-Bear!

When her mom dropped her off at our house, she didn't know where we were going or what we were doing. She just knew that we had a birthday surprise for her!
When we got there, the man helping us gave Sadie a sticker so that everyone would know it was her birthday.

Of course she picked a Pink Bear! Here it is before getting stuffed...
In front of the stuffing machine...

For the first little while, Sadie was really shy and had to have either me or Josh holding her at ALL times!! She wasn't really interested in all the fun things they do while making your bear. But once it was finished, she was happy as can be!



Here we are giving her bear a bath...

And choosing an outfit. She picked the cutest little white fur coat!
Here she is squeezing her bear so tight that she was literally shaking and red in the face!

She also chose to put a little sound effect in her bear's hand. Every time you squeeze it, it sings a fun Happy Birthday song. It was stuck in my head for the rest of the day! Hopefully her parents aren't too sick of it yet ;)

We then went to give her bear a birth certificate. Guess what she chose as her bear's name? Stella!! Isn't that the sweetest thing you've ever heard? It made my heart melt.

And here she is leaving the store with a new bear in its little home!

We sure hope Sadie had as much fun as we did! This makes us excited to take our own little one there when she is old enough :) We love you Sadie Mae!! Happy Birthday!

Halloween 2011

This year's Halloween was pretty laid back for us. Josh and I have never been big on celebrating Halloween...Maybe that will change next year when we have a little one! In fact, Josh and I have NEVER dressed up together for Halloween in the 5 years we have spent together. I still don't know if I would count this as dressing up, but at least we did something extra this year! I found these iron-on decals online and bough some black shirts for us. Pretty easy costumes!

Cradling my skeleton baby :)

Every year, my family carves pumpkins. Its a tradition we have done ever since I can remember, and I plan to keep it going!

Josh's grim reaper:
My witch's hat and spider:

And here are everyone's pumpkins on display for the trick-or-treaters:

Halloween night was pretty much spent eating junk food and watching movies. Pretty exciting huh? Hope everyone had a fun and safe holiday!

25 weeks

Getting Bigger!!

My belly is definitely growing quickly! Which means Stella is growing!!! We love being able to feel her move every day. I am to the point now where I am feeling movement pretty much all the time and its so much fun! Its a feeling you really cannot describe. Sometimes I look at my stomach and only the right side is poking out, or only the left haha! I feel deformed sometimes...but it makes it that much more fun!

We only have 15 more weeks to go. She is coming fast and I don't feel like I am prepared to be a mom...so those 15 weeks are needed. But at the same time, I just want to meet her already! We are so excited to have our little munchkin here.

Some of you know that I had to find a new doctor. Talk about STRESSFUL!!! We found out that my original doctor is having a baby about two weeks before me, so she wouldn't be delivering me, or even really following me much anymore. I was pretty bummed because I loved her. But I wanted the doctor who delivers me to know my history and not be some stranger! So we started asking around and doing some research. I was a total stress case! Just ask Josh haha...I think he thought I was going crazy! So many people recommended Dr. Terry. He actually delivered both Josh and I so that would have been fun to go to him! But unfortunately, he is at the end of the career, and I don't want to have to find ANOTHER doctor when our next baby comes. So we ended up going with someone else in his office...Dr. Thackeray. And let me tell you, having to switch doctors was a blessing in disguise! I cannot describe how much I love this doctor! And I have only met him once so far! He is so caring and loving (not to mention LDS which is just an added bonus). He asked me questions about my personal life and told me some things that I never would have even thought of asking. Josh didn't even have a huge opinion on our first doctor, but he loves Dr. Thackeray which means a lot! We love him way more than we even loved our first doctor...so I guess it was meant to be! :)

I am trying to be better about posting pictures more often of my growing bump...so stay tuned!

Our Project

I wanted to have a little nightstand to keep next to a glider or rocking chair in Stella's nursery, but didn't want to spend a lot of money. So we headed to good old D.I. Seriously, I don't care what you say about that place...sometimes you can find some real treasures there! We bought this one for $10.
It was in pretty bad shape. The top drawer was missing, there was no back to it, and it completely wobbled. Whoever owned it before cut a weird chunk out of the bottom of one side, so we had to even it out. (Sorry I don't have pictures of that). To top it off, it was home to a spider and plenty of webs...gross! So it got a good cleaning. Since only one drawer was there, we also had to buy a completely new set of knobs. And since this nightstand was so old, they don't make knobs anymore to fit the holes that were already there. So my dad helped us out by cutting some cute panels for us. I love the way they turned out!

Also, the color was HIDEOUS and I wanted to do something fun!

You've seen the before....and here is the after!

I also made these cute little guys for her room. I have a slight owl obsession so I couldn't resist! I got the wood cutouts at wood connection, and the decorative fabrics are from the bedding my mom is making for the nursery.

Things are slowly coming together. I have so many projects, I may have taken on a little too much. Only three and a half months to go!!

Miss Maddi

It is this beautiful girl's birthday today! Yes, I am posting about my dog. Only because I love her so much!! She is three years old today!! I can't believe it has been almost three years since Josh gave her to me before leaving on his mission. She has been the entertainment of this house to say the least!! And with us living with my parents right now, it has been so fun to live with her again. I love coming home and having her so excited to see us, and waking up in the morning to her wagging tail. We were blessed to get her as our dog. She has the sweetest personality and she keeps us smiling!

My family has had dogs ever since I was a baby. There is nothing quite like having a dog in your home. They bring such a light into your day!!

We love you Maddi! So glad you're ours!!

It's a...

We just found out this morning that we are having a little girl. Almost everyone we asked was absolutely certain it was a boy, so we were a bit surprised to hear we were having a baby girl. But we are THRILLED!! Now its time for the fun to begin...decorating a nursery, buying cute girl clothes and hair accessories...I can't wait! We have decided on the name Stella for our little one. Not after anyone or anything, we just heard the name one day and have loved it ever since. She doesn't have a middle name yet, but possibly Anne since that is my middle name. We will see what we come up with :)

I am also officially 20 weeks today. I can't believe I am halfway! So far, this pregnancy has flown by! And as of right now, I LOVE being pregnant!

Some things to note:

-We are feeling baby girl kick and bump more and more each day and it is the funnest feeling. She is most active bright and early in the morning, and I love to just lay in bed and feel her moving around.

-I haven't been feeling nauseas at all, other than the occasional moment or two.

-I have the biggest appetite I have ever had in my whole life and feel like I could eat everything in sight!!

-I am starting to get a bit of low back pain but nothing too major yet.

-I have been attending prenatal water aerobics. Let me tell you, it makes me feel so great after I'm done! Its quite a workout for a pregnant girl, but its fun to be with other women who are pregnant and share stories and have fun together!

-I am actually starting to look pregnant now, instead of just chunky. And its so fun when people ask when we are due and what we are having. I love bragging about baby already! ;)

-I am getting quite a bump! Here is a picture of me at week 20...

A lot of people say it looks like nothing, but it feels massive to me! :) And I'm proud of it!!

We went to Target today to buy baby's first gifts. I couldn't resist these adorable little tiny boots!

And Josh got her these cute bath time things!

Josh is going to be such an amazing dad. He loves to feel baby moving and gets so excited everytime I ask him to hold his hand to my tummy, even if its at 5 in the morning and I have to wak him up for it! He tells baby girl every day how much he loves her and can't wait to meet her. I know she already loves him too!

We can't wait to meet our little Stella!

365

...days ago, this happened....

I can't believe it has been a year! Time definitely flies when you are having fun.

Our anniversary was actually yesterday, but I am blogging today because we spent the weekend relaxing in Park City together. We went to the same place we spent our honeymoond. It was so nice to relax and just spend time together with no interruptions and no worries!

I am absolutely CRAZY about Josh! After a year of marriage, and five years total together, he still has a way of making me giddy. I am basically the luckiest girl in the world! Sorry to break it to the rest of you...but I got the BEST husband ;)

One year down... Eternity to go!

14 Weeks!!

Let me apologize ahead of time for this long post. I don't usually like to read blogs that are really wordy (I know...terrible), so props to you if you can get through this whole thing! There is just a lot to catch up on!

A lot has happened since our last post!! That ultrasound photo from the last post was taken at our first doctor's appointment. I LOVE my doctor...her name is Dr. Lisa Gravelle at IMC. She was recommended by a friend, and then I found out another friend is seeing her, too. She is so warm, friendly, outgoing, and made us feel completely comfortable. So if you need an OBGYN, go see her!

Baby is doing well! He/she is growing right on schedule. As of today, I am 14 weeks. And here is what I have to say about that...

SO LONG 1st TRIMESTER!!! :)

Don't get me wrong, trimester #1 was full of excitement! We got to announce our pregnancy to everyone and we are learning new things about our baby every day. But I would be lying if I said any of it was easy. There were days when I couldn't even get out of bed I was so sick! I had constant headaches and was so exhausted! But good news....I am starting to feel normal again. I can actually eat real foods (instead of just crackers and popsicles) without wanting to throw up every five minutes! I still get headaches but they are less frequent. And my energy is going up a little. I realize I will be tired through this whole pregnancy, but at least I don't feel like I need to sleep every hour of every day anymore.

Now all I am worried about is the fact that I am starting to fill out...everywhere! I only have one pair of capris and one pair of shorts that I can actually button up anymore and a lot of my shirts are becoming too tight! I feel like I am starting to get to the point of just looking "chubby" instead of pregnant. I will be glad when it looks like there is a baby inside me!

Josh couldn't be more excited to be a dad. When we found out I was pregnant, I can't lie, I was basically an emotional wreck. Its no secret that this baby was a complete surprise to us! So I kind of had a meltdown and had no clue what we were going to do! But Josh completely held it together and was such a support from day one. At least one of us was strong through this. Otherwise, I would probably still be a mess!! But we are now past the point of being schocked and are excited to have this baby here. I love watching Josh with his nieces and nephew. He is so great with kids and truly loves to be around them. He is always feeling my tummy and telling our baby that he loves him/her. He is going to be the BEST daddy and I'm grateful I have him! We already love this baby so much...its amazing that you can have so much love for something that you've never actually seen.

Sorry there are no pictures to go along with this post. There hasn't really been much to take pictures of! But now that I am starting to show...I will take pictures often to show my growing belly! So stay tuned!

On a side note...for some reason I can't comment on anyone's posts. So please don't feel like I haven't been following you because I have! It asks me to log into my google account, so I do. And then when I go to post my comment, it asks me to log in again. And again and again and again.... I can't figure it out. If anyone has a solution for me, please let me know!

Do You Know What This Is?

That's right!

Baby Madsen due January 20th!

Sadie

Josh and I got to have a sleepover with this cutie last weekend while her mommy and daddy moved. Meet our niece, Sadie Mae.

Isn't she precious?! We love her so much. I have never known a kid her age to be so animated and enthusiastic. She is HILARIOUS!! If our kids are half as smart and funny as she is, I will be a happy camper!

I am dumb and only took this one picture the whole time we had her...

We watched Snow White in our room while having treats and soda. It doesn't take much to please this girl! We also went to the park, McDonald's for lunch and to play on their playground (remember when you were little how you thought that playplace was so huge? Well I've learned that I can barely even squeeze in it anymore haha!), and took her to my parents house to see the dogs and kitties.

Thank you for wanting to spend the weekend with us Sadie! You kept us laughing the whole time! And thank you Jason and Heidi for trusting us enough to let us babysit. We had so much fun and we'll do it again anytime!!

For My Dad

It was this guy's birthday last week...I am a little late wishing him a happy birthday on here! Happy Happy Birthday Daddy-O!

I love my dad...I am definitely a daddy's girl. I have been thinking about my dad a lot lately. The first reason is because he recently lost his dad. I am so grateful that my cute grandpa was healthy and able to attend my wedding! Look at how cute he was...probably one of the sweetest, most giving, caring, and loving men that ever existed. He will be missed by so many people but I am so grateful to know that we will all be with him again. (I wish I had a better picture of him.)

It seems like Josh and I have attended too many funerals lately. In fact, Josh's aunt passed away the same night as my grandpa, and her funeral was the exact same day as his. So Josh and I had to split up. I attended my grandfather's, he attended his aunt's. I wish I could have attended both. It has been an interesting few months, to say the least! But the Plan of Salvation is such an amazing gift that we have! And it is so comforting to know that, even their time here on earth is over, it is not the end for any of us!

There is another reason I have been thinking about my dad...Someone who has become very close to me recently told me that his father passed away unexpectedly from a heart attack when he was just 52 years old. My dad just turned 52. (I'm sure he wants everyone to know exactly how old he is haha!) When he was telling me about the loss of his father, it hit me like a brick wall! That's the same age as my dad! Holy cow...like can be cut short at seriously ANY moment! None of us know how or when its going to happen. All we know is that it will.

I love you Daddy! I'm so grateful that you're my dad! Couldn't ask for a better one :)

Good News!

We're Back!!!

I know. I disappeared for a while. But I am making a goal to be better about posting the significant things that happen in our lives. Truthfully, not that many significant things have happened. But still! So... since I'm sure most of you don't even really care... prepare to hear a lot more from us! :)