Lately

I think all of my blog posts will just be named "lately" because I can never write about just one thing.
So we just got back from Zion yesterday...actually I never went into the park, the sun and I are not friends, but we stayed at this super nice cabin that Jenna's husband's family owns at Zion Ponderosa! We had so much fun! I loved hanging out with my sister, and I loved that everyone could hang out and spend time with Hadi. I am so worried about moving to Philly....my biggest fear is that my baby is going to grow up not knowing her family members! Justin hears about it all too often...anyways, back to Zion...We went to this place called Best Friends. It is the largest animal sanctuary in the nation. We went on a tour and got to visit Kittyville, the Dog place ( I don't remember what they called it...), and the pigs. I'm not a huge cat fan, but there were some pretty cute ones there. And I wished we could have seen more of the dogs. They had a whole building for puppies!!!!! And they didn't let us go in!! Oh man I love puppies. Who doesn't love puppies? And the pigs..., we also saw the pigs...they were hideous, and mean. People actually have pig pets? Wow. I think I'll stick with dogs.
Before we left on our trip I scheduled a Dermatologist appointment because I'd heard about this thing called a Kenalog injection that helps if you have sun sensitivity. It helps calm down your skin's immune reaction to the sun. So I go in, all excited about this shot I'd heard so many awesome things about, and I talk to the Dermatologist, and he wouldn't let me get the injection :( I was totally heartbroken. It had to do with the medication that I'm on. I was so upset about it, I'd totally gotten my hopes up. Having this sun allergy has really been hell...I can deal with the Lupus, with the drugs that compromise my immune system, with the thousands of dollars I spend on doctors appointments, treatments, etc, but this sun thing has proved to be really the most difficult part of it all. The sun is everywhere...I'm not sure if you knew that...but I really never paid much attention to it, but now I realize how unavoidable it is. I can barely go in the car without getting blisters or a rash! The Derm also told me it's not JUST the sun, it's also heat that can bring on the reaction, or a combination or the two. It is the hardest physical trial I've ever had to deal with. I'm hoping to talk with my Rheumatologist at my appointment next week and see what he says about the injection and the medication I'm on...I'm keeping my fingers crossed that he'll have a different opinion than that of the Dermatologist's, but we will just have to wait and see. Until then it's ugly huge hats, long sleeves, and an annoyingly large amount of sun block....and missing out on a lot of really fun activities that include being in the sun! But anyways, I shouldn't be complaining so much...I have so many blessings and if I had to choose between being allergic to the sun and some of the things I've seen friends go through, I'd take the sun allergy any day! So even though it's not easy, it's not the end of the world...


On a happier note, we have finally found ourselves an apartment in Philly! You can check out their website and see what you think, it's http://www.kormanmewsvillas.com/pages/floorplans.asp and the main reason we picked it is because they have a 30-day guarantee thing where if we don't like it within 30 days, they will refund us and let us out of our contract. That is VERY appealing when you have no idea the kind of place you are moving into, and you can't afford to go check it out first.... It also comes with a washer and dryer in each unit, which was the first reason it stuck out to me. But we are for sure moving June 15th, we will be throwing ourselves a little going away party, we just don't know when yet....but check out facebook first of June and I'll have info up.
Also Hadi! Oh I never thought I could be so madly in love with someone who doesn't even talk....oh I love her so much! She is starting to smile and laugh a little bit! It is just the cutest thing ever! We had so much fun taking her to Southern Utah this last weekend! I just love hanging out with her, she is amazing. She has beautiful huge eyes that still haven't changed color yet (I wish they would just stay the gray color they are....they're so pretty!) and she still has dark hair. She is so sweet, and such a great baby. I love having her in my life!

So that is pretty much it for 'lately.' I will try and keep everyone updated. Um, also, I'm sorry our blog is so dang ugly....I CANNOT figure out how to get the background working! I keep putting in the html in the designated place, and it comes up being white....so hopefully that will be fixed soon. Until then, sorry.

The past 7 weeks or so...

Don't get mad, I do not have internet in my apartment! So the only time I can post things is when I'm at my parent's house, which I am right now, so I am posting a blog.
Anyways..so I decided to write about what's been going on in our lives..obviously...this is our blog.... Most of you know, we had a beautiful  baby girl on January 28th! She weighed 6 l bs 1 oz and was 21 inches. Oh we are so in love with her! She is so freakin cute. And it's a good thing too, because if she wasn't so wonderful then I would be thinking the process that brought her here was not worth it....because it's a sucky process!!! But she is so so so worth it! The first week after she was born I was so exhausted. I always thought I knew the definition of exhaustion...no, not until that week. I seriously thought the world was going to end. I told Justin (and I meant it with all my heart) that we were never having any more kids! Thankfully he was very understanding and didn't try to disagree with me. Now (to Justin's relief) I am thinking it's okay if we have one more kid in, like, five years. And then maybe (MAYBE) one more five years after that...but we'll just cross that bridge when we come to it. But I just love my baby so much! I have the best job in the world, I hang out with her all day long! But as cute as she is, watching her sleep can get old...and there's only so much cleaning you can do in an itty bitty apartment. I've watched almost every movie we own, including all the special features (I'm pretty sure I'm a professional at this point and could easily make a major motion picture), and I've also gotten incredibly good at MarioKart.
So that is the baby stuff. Now onto the Grad School stuff.
So the decision has been made! We have decided where Justin will be attending Grad school to get his MSW! And the winner is...(drumroll please)...the University of Pennsylvania!!!!! Yes. Justin got in (he actuallly got in and got very generous scholarship offers to every place he applied to). The program at Penn is very exclusive (they only accept 25 students) so I am so proud  of him for getting in! He has worked so so hard and we feel like his hard work is paying off. We are also really really hoping he will be accepted to their Ph.D program!! They only accept 3-5 students so it will be tough...but that would be so great. Justin really really wants to become a Professor and going to an Ivy League school is really going to help him get ahead of the competition. Plus he loves their program, it focuses more on macro-level stuff which is what he is really interested in. He already has an incredible resume for an undergrad and I just know he would make an incredible teacher! I am so so so very proud of him. He's worked harder than anyone I know, but he still finds time to spend with his family. Hadi and I are his number one priorities and we are so thankful for that! 
So we will be moving to Philadelphia in June, and let me tell you how nervous I am!!! Very. Very very. I don't know a living soul out there. I am nervous about finding a place to live, I'm nervous about being so far away from family, I'm nervous about not knowing anyone, I'm nervous about driving there, I'm nervous about being so close to DC and New York City (because ever since I studied terrorism I have developed a phobia of it...and I feel like DC and New York City are two prime terrorist attack locations...yes I know it's completely irrational, that's what makes it a phobia, I'm even afraid of terrorist attacks in Logan!); I'm just all-around nervous. But I am also really excited! There's a broadway show in NY with Daniel Radcliffe that I really want to see! And it is a possibility now that we will be so close! (I will even risk a terrorist attack to go see it) And visiting DC will be totally awesome too! I just have to keep telling myself statistically I'm pretty safe from terrorists...But I'm also excited to just have this adventure with Justin and Hadi...and Oli (oh yes, we are bringing the dog). And if anyone is ever in the area please come visit!
So there it is. This is the longest blog I've ever written...and I'm getting really sick of writing. And I still have no idea how to post pictures in between paragraphs and stuff so, again, they are all jumbled together.

I'm having a baby this week!

This will be short. Basically I went into the Doctor today, my blood pressure was higher than it's ever been, and we scheduled my induction for this Thursday at 3:00 pm!! Holy cow. One of the crappy things about the baby coming so early (a month to be precise) and it being my first pregnancy is when they induce me, it's quite a long process. First I have to go in and become dilated (since I'm totally NOT dilated, being a month early and all..) So they give me this drug, and it can take up to 18 hours to dilate me to where I need to be. THEN they induce me, which can take up to 36 hours. My doctor kept mentioning 'patience' which, now that I think about it, I will definitely be needing! The other bad thing about the baby coming a month early is she isn't fully developed. My doc said she'll probably have to spend at least a few days in the NICU but that she should be fine.
Justin and I are so excited to be parents! And I am so freakin nervous! But excited nonetheless. So that's the update. Next time you hear from me, I'll have plenty of pictures to post of my darling little girl! Wish us luck!

Nursery Pictures and Baby News

I still have not figured out how to add pictures any other way but in one huge clump, but these are pictures of my nursery! (also as you probably noticed I don't know how to rotate them either...) And I have to say it doesn't do it justice, it's so much cuter in real life! But I pretty much love my nursery. The quilt that's in the crib has the fabric I picked out for the bedding I am maybe going to make for the crib (I was always planning on making it but now I feel too lazy so we'll see if that really happens), but my Aunt Barbara was nice enough to at least make the quilt for me! Isn't it just adorable? Again, picture doesn't do it justice...and the cool picture frame I took a picture of, I am planning on putting a cute picture of Hadi and Olli in there! They are just going to be the best of friends :) maybe.
But anyways, enough about my nursery. I'm starting to get more swollen with each day, my ankles look like obese-person ankles! And my face is a lot fuller than usual. AND I think my arms are fatter, yuck. So I am excited so get this baby out and this swelling down! As far as when the baby will come, it will either be this week or next. On Friday I went in for my twice-weekly non stress test, which usually takes 20 minutes, but oh no not this one!! They left me in there for 45 minutes until the nurse finally came in!! She said the baby had had a deceleration (of her heart rate, don't know what that means...) and she wasn't worried but just wanted to watch for another couple minutes. Little did I know that a couple minutes in nurse-time means at least a half hour of no one telling you what's going on! So I ended up being in there for almost an hour and a half and I was not a happy camper. Well it turns out they were trying to get my doctor to come look at my test results and he happened to be in a C-section at the time so they called him out of it! It was weird, I could hear them talking about him and trying to get him to come up, but I assumed it was for another patient. When he did come up the nurse was showing him something and then I heard him call out my name! I panicked a little bit and thought "was all that for me? why did they call him out of a freakin c-section to see something the nurse said she wasn't worried about??" Anyway, he came in, said he wasn't worried about it but that if I was planning on learning how to knit I'd better do it in the next couple of days....which I interpreted to possibly mean on Tuesday when I went in for my next appointment he'd schedule my induction. But who knows! I'm still holding out til next week! But I go in tomorrow, and we'll see what he says. If no induction this week, then when I go in next Tuesday we will schedule it for that week sometime. It's so weird to think I'll probably have a baby by next weekend!!  Whoa. Am I ready for this? Heck no. But I'm excited! And I know this is such a girl thing (my dad made fun of me for this) but I have the cutest little outfit for her to come home in! I just hope she fits! I don't know what to expect about her size, I was told if I went full-term she'd be a 9-10 lb baby, so I'm thinking around the 6 or 7 lb range if she comes before next weekend? Not sure...but I will take plenty of pictures of my new baby girl for everyone to see! Oh, and I had a 3D ultrasound a couple weeks ago and she is a fatso! Her cheeks are so chubby! And I'm happy about that, I want her to be a healthy baby. And who doesn't love chubby baby cheeks? Come on now. I would put a picture of it up but there is no scanner in this household I am currently residing in....which brings me to another point, I miss my husband! And I hate not being able to be in my apartment getting it ready for the baby to come. I am excited to get back to normal life. Not that I haven't enjoyed spending more time with my family! I sure love them, and we are moving in the summer (still don't know where) so I should take advantage of this...but it's hard not being at home with my husband.
Well anyways, I guess that's all for now. This didn't take up nearly as much time as I would have liked...I will probably go eat some jello now, because I love jello and there is some in the fridge just waiting for me to eat it.
The end.

Stay in there little H! And stay out of my ribs!

So our exciting life just keeps getting more exciting....which is not necessarily a good thing. Last week at my Doctor's appointment, my doctor told me that I shouldn't move down to Salt Lake February 1st anymore...he moved it up to TODAY! I was at Lee's in Logan today (best grocery store ever) refilling my prescription so I would be stocked up for my move, and I decided to take my blood pressure on their blood pressure machine. My doctor has been having me monitor my BP everyday since I have a predisposition for Preeclampsia, and he told me if it ever gets above 140/90 to go straight to Labor and Delivery. WELL...., to make a long story short my blood pressure was high...then I took it again and it was higher...then I went home and took it two more times on my own cuff and it was even higher! And I started to see spots in my vision (major sign of Preeclampsia), so of course I was freaking out. I went straight to Logan Regional where they admitted me for monitoring. Thankfully our little girl was doing fantastic! She passed her non-stress test within the first 5 minutes (usually it takes 20-30), but I was just the one having issues...they kept monitoring my blood pressure and it began to go down after laying there for a while (I think that knowing my baby was okay had a lot to do with that). Anyways, so everything is okay! Phew! But I am very interested to see what my doctor says when I go see him tomorrow...He seems to have no reserves about inducing me early to avoid Preeclampsia, last week he seemed pretty sure I'd end up getting it and now I think I'm convinced as well. But for now I am going to keep pretending she won't be here til the end of February like she's supposed to! And then worry about her coming early when and if that time comes. But right now I am just so thankful I have been receiving such fantastic care! My doctor is amazing and so smart it's almost scary...but Justin and I are so so blessed and so thankful for all the tender mercies we have been getting. And I am so lucky to have such a freaking awesome husband, I am so in love with him! He is so supportive and is so good at making this whole process easier on me, and the less stress I feel, the better off our baby is.
Now that I'm living in Sandy I will probably have nothing better to do than to keep posting information people don't care about on our blog, so if you are just as bored as I'm planning on being, feel free to stay tuned for more baby news! And I also have to write about Justin's Grad School stuff too, so there is plenty to come from the Bartons in the next little while! Whether you care or not :)

I'm not posting recent pictures of myself until my face is no longer swollen.

So what a lovely title to our latest blog post, huh? At my doctor's appointment on Tuesday my doctor told me my face was getting puffy....so of course since then I've been in a state of depression....not really though, I knew it would happen sooner or later! But as far as pregnancy goes I think I am just very recently getting to the large, uncomfortable, hard-to-do EVERYTHING phase. Last night Justin and I went to the symphony and of course we had to park a million miles away, and I wasn't wearing tennis shoes for goodness sake! And oh man when we were finally home in bed I wanted to die, my hips, my ankles, my feet, random muscles in my legs....everything hurt! And I was exhausted. Poor Justin, I kept telling him I needed lots of sympathy and that he needed to coddle me. What a sweetheart he is!! He let me finish his leftover Mandarin food, and gave me a foot massage!!!!! Oh it was amazing.
So, I guess I will update everyone (that means you, Jenna, since I think you are the only person who reads my blog) on the goings on of our lives. Recently we discovered our apartment had a major mold issue, and not in some discreet corner, but in my bedroom closet! With all my clothes in it! I bought some really cute new boots, and went to try and pull out a pair of pants I hadn't worn in a long time to see if I could squeeze into them. So anyway, they were on a closet shelf, on the bottom next to the wall, and I pull them out and they are COVERED in mold!!!!!!!! Obviously, it was disgusting. So I pull out the rest of my clothes, most of which had mold on them, and look at the wall behind, and there is mold on the wall. To make a long story short we moved the next week and we love our new place! It's a little more expensive, but mold-free! You get what you pay for, huh?
Well, another thing that's been going on is Justin has been applying for Grad schools. So far he's completed his applications for the U, University of Chicago, and Washington University in St. Louis. The other two he's applying to are The Ohio State and University of Pennsylvania (and BYU, but I don't like to count that one or the U because I know we won't be going there...). It's really exciting to think of where we might be living, but I wish I didn't have to wait to know! I have to make plans people!
Um, I guess another thing that's been going on is that I'm still pregnant....yep, 9 months never felt so long. I'm technically not due til Feb 24th but the Doctor recently told me I should be living down in Salt Lake by Feb 1st so I can be close if anything happens....boo!!! I will be a beached whale!! I will be huge, and soooo bored. Everyone will be gone all the time, I will only have the dogs to keep me company, and the worst part is my husband will still be in Logan!! I'm hoping as I get closer that I'm super healthy and I can postpone my beached whale time.
Another thing that happened is Thanksgiving!!! We went to Arizona to see my sister and brother-in-law and nephew Weston! (who is a dog). It was so so so so so so so so much fun!!!!!!!!!!!!! I wish my sister lived here!!! (if you're reading this Jenna, take heed!) It was so much fun to hang out with our WHOLE family! Even the dogs came down, even Brian came down!!!! It was a blast. Then that week we had many other Thanksgiving dinners.
Ok I'm getting sick of writing, and you are probably getting sick of reading. But expect more great things from the Blog of Barton!! My goal is to write in it more than my last two blogs...and not to forget the login information...

New Blog!

Well, I had to delete our other blog because it was linked to Justin's "professional" email address, so I had to open up my own gmail account and do a totally new one. So here it is, the new blog! Hopefully I will be better at updating this one than the other one!