"Someone oughta open up a window!"

Yes, that is the title for this Fourth of July blog; and if you can tell me what significance that quote has to the Fourth of July, I shall respect you infinitely more than you can imagine. ;)
One thing we learned this year is that making holidays more than a day without school or work can be difficult. Last 4th of July we're pretty sure we watched movies at home and had Little Caesars pizza. Pretty patriotic huh? With that in mind, we were determined to actually 'celebrate' this year.
Now, unlike everywhere else in the world that is made for four, Utah seems to be made for fourteen plus. Every park was full of extended family and friends. It felt like we didn't meet the celebration quota and after some frustration with finding somewhere to picnic we finally decided on the park behind the elementary school Johann works for. There was a pretty large gathering under the main pavilion where the bbqs but all of them weren't being used so we took the liberty of putting one to use. So after 30 minutes we enjoyed some bratwurst, watermelon and pasta salad. It was delicious and Henry really enjoyed being outside for a change.
After the park we came home for a little bit then met up with a friend from Apple Valley (Katie Conger, formerly Kachlemeyer) and her husband Travis and little girl Peyton for a fireworks show. Henry was a little scared of the loud booms at first but enjoyed it after that. Overall, it was such a nice day to spend together as a new little family!





For the rest of our 4ht of July pictures go to http://picasaweb.google.com/Deborah.Goodwin/HenrySFirstFourth

Henry, Henry, Henry

So here are some pictures of Henry, starting from when he was still in the hospital up until this past Thursday.

Henry's 'crib' at the hospital and adorable name tag they made him in the NICU

Proud Daddy


Henry the night before we got to take him home


Nap time with Daddy

His first church outfit

Hiding in Daddy's shirt

Peekaboo!

Looking around

We had NO idea how many diapers we would go through the first weeks!

Starting to go blond around 3 weeks


In the once beloved carseat. After the trip to CA, he's no longer a fan of it.


Bath time!


He takes his sleeping very seriously.

Visiting Briana and Adam. Their daughter Tessa is holding Henry.

Just hanging out

In his swing

Playing Catch Up...

As most of you probably know by now, Johann and I welcomed a little boy into the world on May 14th of this year at 4:55pm. Henry Dean Paul Simonds weighed 7lbs 14oz and measured 19.5 inches; rather small compared to the Dr.'s prediction of a 9lb baby! Henry's original due date was May 7th so when we got to a week over, the Drs decided to try and induce labor. After about 20 hours of no progress from a few methods of induction, we opted for a C-section. Though we were hoping for a normal delivery, the C-section turned out to be the best choice, seeing as Henry was so far up that forceps had to be employed. In just a matter of minutes Henry was born.
The whole experience was surreal, from being moved from bed to operating table without any sensation of movement in my body--ah blessed epidural--to hearing Henry's first cries. We're so happy to have him in our lives and can't imagine how things would be now without him.

Johann getting ready to go with me into surgery

My first time holding Henry

Our handsome little baby boy

We're bloggers!

So we've done it. We've started a blog. Hopefully this will help us stay better connected with everyone we don't get to see as often as we would like. Hope you enjoy and let us know if there is anything you think we should add/take away. We promise to keep the pictures of Johann dancing to a minimum. ;-)