Jo's Story and Reflections on being a papa

Note: To see more pictures of Jo, comment on the post or email me and I can send a link to our Facebook album)

Being a papa is so amazing. My baby, Josephine Rose Barlow, was born on June 24th, 2010. The whole experience was wonderful, and I could never hope to come close to describing in a blog post. But I thought I would try.

Jo was born one day after her due date. Kayleen had not been progressing (as far as dilation, etc.) in over a week, and so the doctor suggested that it would be okay to induce her on Thursday morning the 24th. We felt good about this decision and were excited to finally know when our baby would be here.

We drove to Orem Community Hospital at 6:15 a.m. We were tired, but too excited and a little nervous to notice. The hospital experience was wonderful--nice rooms, good environment, great nurses. They got Kayleen an IV first thing and started the pitocin to induce labor. A few hours later Kayleen got an epidural and the doctor broke her water. She still didn't progress until the middle of the afternoon, but we enjoyed the day together just watching movies, reading books, taking naps, etc. It really was a relaxing day (and a nice break from being at work!). Our moms were both there throughout parts of the day, which was also fun. Kayleen's mom Mary stayed at our house for a few weeks while visiting from Minnesota, which was great. She spoiled us and Jo so much! We really were so lucky to have her there with us. Anyway, we chatted with them through the afternoon and evening.

Finally around 4 p.m. Kayleen was starting to dilate more. We got more and more excited that our baby would be here soon. I think Kayleen was the calmest out out everyone in the room, even at 10 cm dilated and ready to push. It really was so nice that everything went so smoothly for us, and labor was not bad for Kayleen. Jo was born at 10:09 p.m. I will always remember her first little scream that brought tears to my eyes, and then holding her for the first time. She was and is so beautiful and perfect.

Kayleen and I love little Jo with all our hearts. She can be a handful sometimes, but she is worth it. Being a parent is truly indescribable. We have been so lucky to have such a perfect and beautiful little baby to call us parents.

Barlow family

This is my favorite picture of Kayleen and Jo. I love them both so much!!!!

Springtime Adventures

Here are some pictures of some adventures we have had this Spring. We have gone to Thanksgiving Point Gardens twice. We went to my work's Spring Retreat in Midway for a weekend. And we went to the zoo! The warmer weather has been really nice. And it's nice to be out of school and have a full-time income, too. Enjoy!

These owls were actually at the waterfall at the gardens. This is not a picture from the zoo. :)

Graduation

This week I graduated from BYU. On Thursday was the University Commencement. I walked in the processional up to the Marriott Center along with thousands of other happy grads. We heard Elder Christofferson speak as well. Kayleen took me out to eat at Red Robin afterward and we also took some pictures with the tulips on campus. That night Kayleen had a little graduation party for me and a cake. Some of our friends came over and we visited till the late hours of the night. It was very fun!!

On Friday were the college convocations. The Marriott School of Management had its convocation in the evening. We heard from Bill Marriott, the CEO of Marriott International. He gave a very excellent speech. Then we sat through a couple of hours of grads walking across the stage to shake hands with the dean and department heads. They also had a large piece of the Marriott Center basketball floor that Bill Marriott signed along with all of this year's graduates which will be kept in the Tanner Building on campus (where the business school is) as a remembrance of Mr. Marriott coming to our graduation this year!

There are too many pictures that I wanted to post, so I am just posting the link to the picture album on Facebook (most of you are on Facebook anyway but the link doesn't require you to log in to Facebook -- anyone can see it).

Click here for pictures: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2330170&id=17829252&l=34e5a8fdd2

My new favorite toy

This is my new distraction.

I'm trying to concentrate on getting through another final week of school before I graduate. And I'm trying to stay on top of all my work at Squire, which is not easy considering it is an accounting firm and the tax deadline is next week. And I'm thinking about Kayleen's birthday coming up. And getting gifts put together for my wife, mother, and mother-in-law for Mother's Day. And trying to meet my personal goals. And thinking of all the books I want to read.

I don't need a distraction, but there it is all the same. It takes up an hour or two every day that I can't keep myself from playing it, and a lot of lost productivity comes from daydreaming about all the songs and ideas and projects I have in my head now.

A Big Scary Story

So, a couple of weekends ago we had a stake conference at our church in Provo. Our ward also had a dinner to raise money for the people in Haiti an hour before the conference was supposed to start. So when we got to the church for dinner, the parking lot was mostly empty. Now, as some background, the church is kind of awkwardly placed in that it is hard to get out of the parking lot very quickly and there are usually traffic jams whenever anything is going on at Church. So when we got there and had our choice of parking, we decided to park on the far north, close to an easier exit, on the opposite end of the lot from the church building. What a great idea, we thought. We will be able to get out so easily now after the conference is over!

So after the meeting got out and we headed to the parking lot, we realized that the parking spot (where we were 100% sure we had left our car) was empty!

Uhhhhh...sinking feeling in the stomach...awkward looks at each other...more sinking feeling in the stomach...mind racing...

"Um," says Kayleen to me, "what happened to our car?"

"I don't know. It's gone."

"Well I can see that. Do you think it got towed?"

"I don't know why it would. We were parked legally."

"Do you think someone stole it?"

Pause the story. At this point most people would have been freaking out/crying/extremely angry etc. But my Kayleen stayed so calm. We have been working on keeping a good attitude and it really helped in this situation. A lot. We try to keep in mind what we learned from Joseph Wirthlin's talk a while back about staying calm and happy even in the worst of times.

http://www.lds.org/ldsorg/v/index.jsp?hideNav=1&locale=0&sourceId=b5f44bb52a73d110VgnVCM100000176f620a____&vgnextoid=2354fccf2b7db010VgnVCM1000004d82620aRCRD

Back to the story.

"Well should we go back inside to get a ride home while we decide what to do?"

I am still in disbelief. "Let's look around the corner. If someone is stupid enough to steal someone else's car, maybe they are playing a prank and parked it around the corner."

At this point our wonderful home teacher and friend Jake pulls up and rolls down the window. "Is everything okay?"

"Um, we think our car got stolen."

So, Jake gives us the number for the Provo police dispatch and I gave them a call.

"I'd like to report a stolen car."

"Could it have been towed sir?" asks the policewoman, slightly annoyed.

"No, we were parked legally."

"Where was the car last?"

"At a church building on 900 East and 700 North."

"Sir, your car has been towed for unauthorized parking." I'm not sure if I actually heard it or if it was in my mind--the way she said it made it seem she thought me very nieve. If it really was that way, I don't blame her.

"Would you like the phone number of the towing company?"

"Yes, please."

By this time Jake had gone in to get a police officer who also happens to be a leader in our stake and was at the conference. He was very interested to see why the car had been towed.

So I called the towing company and talked to the nice young man who towed my legally-parked car. He made his excuses and told how they were supposed to watch that lot carefully and how we were the only people parked on that end and that once he saw the lot starting to fill he had worried that he shouldn't have parked the car. I chuckled and told him not to worry, he was just doing his job and it was a big misunderstanding. He gratefully told me we wouldn't be charged or anything but we would have to come to the lot to pick up our car (on the other end of town).

Jake and Julia gave us a ride over. We are sure grateful for good friends and home teachers. And grateful that we listened to our counsel from our Church leaders to stay calm. We ended up laughing about the whole situation rather than dealing with unneeded stress.

Baby stuff

Here are some pictures. The first is part of what we have for baby Jo's room. It is jungle animal-themed. The second picture is some of the bows that Kayleen made with her friends Tricia and Ashley. And of course the last is my beautiful wife, finally with a little bit of pregnant belly showing.

We are so exciting for our baby Jo to be born!

I just feel like posting....

...which is not normal for me. It is a quiet Friday night. Kayleen is making baby hair bows with some friends for our little baby Jo. And I'm just chillin and enjoying not having as much homework as usual. Life is going good. I must say, though, that I am ready for school to be over and for graduation to be here.

On the other hand, I found out that it is going to cost me $45 to rent graduation robe, tassel, hood, etc. Anyone want to volunteer to pay that for me? That would be a wonderful graduation gift!

We have been enjoying the Olympics. We have become figure skating fanatics. We watched all 9 nights of figure skating. It was hard to get homework done.

We got callings in our new Church ward. Kayleen is working in the nursery. Since we are in a student ward there are like 2 kids in nursery. And 5 girls that are nursery workers. So it hasn't been too stressful for her. My new calling is to do Indexing online for the Census projects. So that is not stressful either. Hmmm, speaking of which, I have two batches I need to finish before tomorrow.

Kayleen made homemade bread! It is soooo yummy! She is so good to me.

Well, that is my rambling for now.

Next time: baby bows and pregnant Kayleen pictures.

Baby Girl Barlow

As most of you probably know, either by phone or Facebook, we are having a baby girl sometime around June 23rd! We had the ultrasound today and it was fun to see the baby. She was kicking the whole time! We are so very excited!!!!

We are having a hard time concentrating on school and work, but both are going well! I am loving my new job! I will try to post pictures of the baby room once we get it closer to being set up. We do already have a bookcase and the crib!

Boy or girl??

We find out on February 1st--comment and leave your guesses as to what gender our baby will be! Here are the guesses so far (some of these come from comments on Facebook):

People guessing BOY
Kayleen
Heidi Gardner
Megan Spencer Wells
Tonia Browner
Ron Janes
Marilee Cordery
Kyle Hutchings
Kirk Phillips
Hillary Dalton
Chris and Miriam Westover
Norine Barlow
Julie Ploharz
Deb Naatjes
Andrea Barney
Thomas McKnight

Brian Wells

Julie Poulson

People guessing GIRL
Jordan
Shaun and Lanette Nelson
Aldene Judd
Bethe Camp
Tricia Burke
Kara Ann Adams
Nate Holt
Megan Wallace
Sarah Walker
Alice Nuckols
Ashley Bills
Kirby Barlow
Andrea Barlow (?)

Jeremy Camp

Katie Shaw

People guessing one of each!
Laura Hild

Holiday activities

We are back in school now, but thought we'd tell about our adventures over the Christmas break. We went to Minnesota on the 19th of the December and got snowed in most of the time! We enjoyed playing games and watching movies and playing in the snow and spending time with Kayleen's family, especially our two adorable nieces, Halle and Sidney. Kayleen got to go maternity shopping with mom and sisters as well! The fam got some good pictures so I'll post them if I get them from Kayleen's fam. Here is one of Kayleen and Jake playing in the snow:

The week after Christmas we were back in Utah and played the whole time! We spent a lot of time sleeping in at home and finally being able to spend time together!

For New Year's we went to my aunt Alice's home to play games with some of the Camps. We were laughing the whole night--it was a lot of fun! New Year's Day we

helped Rebekah move into her cute new apartment in Sugar House, and Saturday the 2nd we hosted her's and Andrea's pre-birthday party! It was fun to have the whole family over and to play with nieces and nephews again!! We were excited to see the whole family again on Sunday for Tate's blessing in church. Here is the pic of our fam from my sister:

It was a GREAT Christmas break! Wish it could have been longer. Hope you all had a great break, too!