Brady is now two week old. He had his two week checkup yesterday and is doing great. He now weighs 9lbs 4 oz. (75%) and is 21 inches long(50%). The dr. said he must be a great eater since he is gaining weight very well. Brooklyn seems to enjoy having her little brother around. She always wants to give him hugs and kisses, or an extra push in the swing. When Brady isn't in her site she is constantly signing baby and wants to go see him and make sure he is ok.

Here is the cute cake our friend Krista made for us to celebrate Brady's arrival. It was really yummy! Thanks Again Krista, you did a wonderful job!

Here is Brooklyn enjoying Nana's famous spagetti and meatballs. Thanks mom for making it for us while you were here. We sure miss having you around.

Mark and Brooklyn enjoying a BYU football game together. Brooklyn loves to cheer on the cougars with her dad. She says "GO COUGARS" anytime any sporting event is on or she gets really excited about something and wants to cheer herself on. It's super cute. I guess we will be teaching her the fight song next.

And this is Brooklyn with her little orange jello clown nose and a cheesy smile for the camera.

Brooklyn has become our little gymnast lately. She loves to stand on all sorts of things and see if she can stay balanced. She has also taught herself how to do somersaults. Watch the video to see her new trick.

Brady is one week old today. Time sure does fly by. I can't believe it's been a week all ready. It has been so fun having him with us this last week. Brady is doing very well and is very healthy. When we left the hosptial on Wednesday he had only lost 7% of his body weight, which is really good. Most babies loose 10% or more. He also had one of the lowest amounts of jaundice the nurses had ever seen. On Friday he went in for a checkup and he had all ready gained back his birth weight and more, which usually doens't happen until close to 2 weeks. So he is eating well and doing great. We are glad to know he is eating well and gaining weight, so we don't have to go through the stress of syringe feeding and weight loss that we endured with Brooklyn. Some of you have been wondering how the labor was this time around, so I will try and fill you in. I woke up Saturday morning at around 3:30am with contractions every 6 minutes. I got up and got the hospital bags packed and all of Brooklyn's stuff packed and hoped labor wouldn't progress too fast so we wouldn't have to wake someone up to take Brooklyn in the middle of the night. At 7:00am we dropped Brooklyn off at a neighbors and headed to the hospital. At the hospital, they monitored my contractions for several hours and found I was dialated to a 3. Improvement over Thursdays dr. appointment of a 2. But regardless of being a 3 they sent me home. The neigbors kept Brooklyn because the nurse assured me I would be back to give birth that day. Boy was she wrong. Saturday came and went and I found myself still having contractions. They weren't painful, just uncomfortable, but by Sunday they were starting to be painful. I held out most of the day. My mom arrived at 2:30 and we showed her around the house and where everything was. Then we headed off to the hospital. I was still a 3 and even though I was in pain this time they sent me home again and told me to take some tylenol and come back when my contractions were 2 min apart or if I was in really bad pain. So back home we went. It was a miserable night spent on the couch breathing through contractions. Now it is Monday morning at about 4:30am and I couldn't take the pain anymore so we headed to the hosptail again, praying they weren't going to send me home. Because I was going to be induced at 6:00am Monday morning they went ahead and admitted me. I was now dilated to a 5. At this point I begged for some pain medication and of course that would involve starting an IV before I could get any relief. Unfortunatly it took a long time and three tries to finally get an IV started. Then they gave me some type of drug to take the edge of the pain until they could get me an epidural. The epidural didn't go as planned either. They had to stick me twice(which was an improvement over the three times with Brooklyn), but after some time my blood pressure dropped really, really low so they had to turn the epidural completly off. So unfortunatly I had no epidural for delivery, but luckily I only had to push 10 minutes this time unlike the 2 1/2 hours for Brooklyn. Giving birth this time around was the most painful thing I have endured so far in my life, but it was more than worth it to get miracle baby #2 here. Here are some pictures of Brady's first bath at home. He didn't enjoy it very much.

Brady Douglas Stoddard has finally arrived. He was born September 15th, at 9:51am. He weighed 8 lbs and was 20 inches long. He is such a sweetheart and has brought us so much joy all ready. Mom and Brady are home now and everyone is adjusting well. Tarah's mom is here helping out which is wonderful since Brooklyn is quite the handful. Tarah's not sure what she is going to do when her mom leaves and she is left with two under two, but she will manage some how. Brooklyn is still a little unsure about Brady, but seems to be doing well. Brooklyn learned to say nana and bubbles this week. We will try and keep up with posting pictures.

Many people have been asking if we had the baby yet, and the answer is Tarah is still pregnant. We are hoping the baby will come on its own this week before Tarah's mom gets here. Mark finished painting the baby's room and it's all up and ready to go, just waiting for our little man to arrive. We will post pictures of his room later. Mark has had a wonderful football season so far. This is the first time in two years that he is able to watch the BYU games at home, and they have won their first two games. Mark has even taught Brooklyn to say, "Go Cougars." She says it now anytime she sees any football game, no matter who is playing. Brooklyn is back going to Tots Gym and had a blast today running around and playing with all the balls. But her favorite thing at Tots Gym is the cones. She loves to stack them and unstack them, over and over again. The pictures below are of Brooklyn just being silly.