Sunday, May 6, 2012

Kaven Turns 3!!!

Kaven opening his presents in the special chair.
Kaven seems pretty excited about some of his birthday presents
The finished product.
Blowing out the candles on his cake
Happy 3rd Birthday my sweet Kaven!!!

My sweet little boy is growing up SO FAST right now!  We had a pretty simple birthday party for him this year because of the brand new (7 day old) baby in our house.  He got some fun presents and I tried to make it more special for him by making him an airport cake (He is still very much into things that you can drive).  The poor little guy didn't even get to choose his favorite food for dinner because someone brought us dinner that night because we had just had a baby (with the beautiful flowers you see in some of these pictures)  We have so many kind friends and people surrounding us.  He didn't seem to mind though.  He was pretty excited about his cake, so that was good.  He is my very easy to please child, so that worked out well for us as well.  What a sweet boy I have.

Easter 2012

We had a calm but fun Easter this year.  I was hoping for an Easter baby, but Elcee decided to "hatch" two days later instead.  Lucky for us though, we were able to celebrate Easter with Grandma Bug-a-Boo because she was here to help for when baby Elcee came. 


Kaven and Emery on Easter Morning all ready for Church
Emery and Kaven showing off their treats from the Easter Bunny
Emery, Kaven and Sariah Madry at the court Easter Egg Hunt

Friday, April 13, 2012

Elcee Winn Johnson

She is HERE!!! We are SO PLEASED with our new little addition to our family. Elcee Winn Johnson was born Tuesday April 10, 2012 at 10:59 a.m. She weighed 7 lbs 3 oz. and her length 19 inches.

I guess the story started on Tuesday April 3rd at about midnight when I started get really regular contractions. By 2:00 a.m. we felt like it was time to call our parents to let them know and have them come help us. We waited another hour and my contractions were still 3 minutes apart and were getting harder so we thought it was time to call. Tim's mom came right away (it is a 2 1/2 hour drive for her) so she could be with our kids while we were in the hospital and my parents started their journey here as well, so my mom could make it to the delivery. We went into the hospital when Tim's mom got here first thing in the morning. They watched me in the hospital for quite awhile with my contractions still at 3 minutes apart. Tim took school and work off and then the weird thing happened, my contractions just stopped and we were also sent home from that hospital at about 10:00 am. So after about 10 hours of labor we were quite confused. With both our moms here we were not quite sure what to do. Tim's mom decided to head home and my mom said she would stay until the baby came. This was probably the best result of my false labor. I was able to spend a week with my mom's undivided attention. We just loved having her here and she is such a great example and help to me and my family. One of my most favorite things about my mom is that I ALWAYS feel SO GOOD about myself after I have been with her. She has a special way of making me feel special and important. That is just exactly what I needed during the end of my pregnancy. I still feel that it was no accident that everything worked out the way that it did. Though I feel a little selfish having her all to myself/family for a week. For one, she was already up here for a dental appointment with my dad. For two, she ended up needing to go back to the dentist while she was here and for three (this is the real miracle) they were worried about how my dad was going to get home if my mom stayed with me. While they were at the dentist my mom's brother Chris came walking into the dentist office. Now Chris is from Mesquite (where my parents are from) and was heading home right after his appointment. They didn't even know Chris was coming up north as well, so this was quite a surprise to them. They couldn't of planned things that well themselves. So my dad ended up driving home with Chris and my mom was able to stay here with me while still having her own car.

Now on to the REAL story. Exactly one week later, at about midnight again, I started having regular contractions, AGAIN. Now, I wasn't sure what to think because I had been tricked before. At about 2:00 am my contractions were getting hard enough that I couldn't sleep and were a lot harder than my contractions had gotten the last week. I decided to wait it out and let Tim get as much rest as he could. At about 4:00 am I couldn't wait any longer. I was worried about the baby coming fast because once I get to about a 4 dilatation my babies come really fast. I didn't want to risk anything so I woke Tim up and we headed to the hospital. Thank goodness my mom was at our house to stay with the kids while they were sleeping. Once we got to the hospital, they checked me and I was already at a 4 so they hurried me over to the delivery room and gave me an epidural. I have to admit that I was still skeptical and worried they were going to send me home again. They only thing was that my water had not broken yet. They waited to break my water because they were waiting for my doctor to get there on time. They finally decided that they needed to break it and when they did, they could not figure out what was going on because my water was not breaking. They brought someone else in to break it and she had no success either. They finally came to the conclusion that my water had already broke but was trickling so slow that it was hard to tell. Because of all their trying to break my water Elcee had lots of little scratches on her head from the little hook. She is just fine though. Anyway, within an hour of my water breaking I could feel lots of pressure and her head ready to come out. The nurses told me to wait to push because the doctor was on her way and it would take about 45 minutes for her to get there. They said she was running all the red lights and parking illegally to get there on time. Ha ha, it is usually the other way around in the movies. Well, we had another resident there and they decided to let me start pushing. Right when they got all set up and I was ready to push, my doctor came running in just in time. I started pushing and then my doctor told me to wait for a little bit so I wouldn't tear as bad. Two more half pushes and she was out. I couldn't believe how smooth it all went. With my epidural, I didn't feel hardly any pain which made it all too easy. I most definitely have to say that the healing after a baby is a lot harder than having a baby this time. I don't know why I get to be one of those lucky people who's labor and delivery is pretty easy, Just lucky I guess. (I was still worried that they were going to send me home with false labor even when her head was about to come out). I know what it is like to have a baby natural (with Emery) and it is NO PICNIC!!!! The most painful thing EVER!!! I guess it has made me appreciate my other two easy births that much more.

Elcee is just the sweetest thing. I have been enjoying her so much. She seems a little bit older than she is. The nurses kept saying that she seemed advanced for her age in the way she looked at people, responded to things and holds herself. One night at the hopsital Tim was holding her up with her body out. He started talking and she lifted her head and turned it around to look at him. We could hardly belive it. When ever I talk to her, she just lights up. Sometimes she even smiles. She actually smiles quite a bit and I swear it is not just because she has gas. After we had her, my mom was able to get back home to her life and Paula, Tim's mom, took our other two kids to Delta while I recovered a little. That has been the best and hardest thing. It would have been really hard having them here for me and them but I have missed them SO MUCH. It doesn't feel quite like home without them here. They will be home today though so we will see how it all goes. SURE LOVE MY KIDS!!!!! I am SO GRATEFUL for such great family to help out during this time. I sure do have great moms.

Here are a few pictures of our last few days with Elcee. I didn't get the greatest pictures and all that I wanted because we left it in the delivery room so it was lost for awhile. I didn't get pictures of when Emery and Kaven saw her for the first time. Those pictures would have been priceless because they adore her SO MUCH. Oh well, here you go.....

Meeting mom for the first time.
Meeting Dad for the first time.
Picture with mom and dad.
Elcee with sweet Grandma Bug-a-Boo (my mom).
Meeting grandma Paula
Emery doing a great job holding her all by herself. Just before this Elcee was crying and I couldn't get her to clam down. When we handed her to Emery she calmed right down and just let her hold her like this for a long time.
Here we are leaving the hospital. I thought Kaven would like this picture because of the wheels on the wheel chair.
Here is our little Elcee Winn right after I walked through the front door. Home at last!

Friday, March 23, 2012

St. Patrick's Day

St. Patrick's Day was kind of fun this year. Tim went to Ireland for his mission and we got married around St. Patrick's Day. So it makes it a little more of a special holiday for us. It was of course an all out green day. Tim made our hot cereal, butter (for the toast) and milk green for breakfast. The night before I had the kids pick out what green clothes they wanted to wear for the next day and set them out. We had been talking about leprechauns for the last few days and how they are tricky and like to hide things to play tricks on us. Soooooooo when the kids woke up in the morning they found their clothes in really weird places all over the house. Emery thought it was hilarious and Kaven was a little confused at first but later started laughing along with Emery. For the rest of they day they kept talking about those tricky and silly little leprechauns.For dinner we had an Irish meal of Shepard pie, green kiwi, green salad, green drink and a rainbow jello.It is sure fun having kids to make some duller holidays so much more fun!

Sunday, March 18, 2012

Spring Break and Anniversary

One great things about getting married during Spring Break is that we get to celebrate our Anniversary every year during Spring Break as well. This year our kiddos are getting older and pretty easy and we have a baby coming soon so we thought we would take advantage of all these things and take a night away and leave the kids at Tim's parents house. We decided to go to Beaver for the night and stopped in Fillmore along the way. We had such a great time getting away and spent two days just finding things to do together experiencing things around our world.

In Fillmore we stopped and visited the Pharmacy in town. Tim went to High School with the new Pharmacist there so it was fun to see both him and the pharmacy there.
We also stopped at a museum in town. Fillmore was Utah's first state capital and this was the building for it. We had our own private tour and bought a small gift for each of the kids while there.On the way to Beaver we spotted a car that looked exactly like the car we had when first married. This was the car that sparked my interest in Tim in the begging. Lot's of great memories with that car.
We stayed at the Butch Cassidy Inn, which was REALLY NICE for us!
We also went to a movie and had the whole theater to ourselves! It was a fun movie too called This Means War.
And just to throw it in, this is what I look like 36 weeks pregnant on our trip. We are really looking forward to our new little one coming in just 2 to 3 weeks.
It has been such a great 7 years. I look forward to spending eternity with my sweet heart.

Family Visits

A few weekends ago we went to Annabella for my nephew Hestons baptism. While there Tim helped Heston design and build a super cool derby car and we were able to see my mom and dad too.
My mom sometimes brings treats for the grand kids so here they are diving them all up. It is all very exciting for the kids.

Then......
Awhile ago my sister Jodi called and said she was coming to Salt Lake City with her daughter Casey for some gymnastic outings, so of course I had to have her stay with us. A few days later my sister Cami called and said they were coming to Salt Lake City as well. When I asked her the date it was the same time that my other sister was coming. Now it is not very often that we get family come and visit and here they were coming at the same time. I was thrilled. Not only that, but the day Jodi came she called my mom to see if she wanted to ride along. My mom jumped aboard and brought my other sister Erin with her. I could hardly believe it. We sure had a house full but it was SO MUCH FUN!
It always seems that when I am having the most fun that I forget to take pictures so I only got a few. We were able to take the shuttle to the University of Utah gymnastic meet and we almost filled up the whole shuttle. It was my first gymnastic meet and was really cool. We were able to get free tickets for all of us so we were sitting pretty far up, but it was still cool.
Thanks for coming family. We sure had a lot of fun seeing everybody!

Thursday, March 8, 2012

SNOW!!!

It is kind of silly but I have figured out that I start to really enjoy winter and the snow when winter is almost over. We have been having so much fun in the snow lately. It is almost like we feel like we need to enjoy it as much as we can while it lasts because spring is coming soon.
We have a GIGANTIC sled hill in the village, right next to where we live and we have used it a few times (mostly when Tim is around). BUT I figured out a really neat trick. There are SO MANY other little hills around where we live and they are WAY more manageable for the kids. They can go down the hill and pull the sled up by themselves, over and over again. The big hill where everyone else sleds on is just too big for them to walk back up, so we end up carrying/pulling them back up. That equals not very long sledding.
They spend so much more time on the smaller hill and have some much more fun. And we get the hill all to ourselves, plus the snow lasts longer on this hill we use. Then I can also take them by myself, without Tim's help. It is always a fun activity to do during the day when Tim is gone.
We also found it fun to build snow forts with a pink bucket we got from the hospital when Emery got her tonsils out.
I think it was more fun for Tim and I but the kids did think it was pretty cool.
Though we have been enjoying the snow, we are super excited for Spring and these nice warm days we have been getting. I guess it is just important to enjoy what we have right now and not wish each day away.