I'm an aunt!!!!

I am so excited to be an aunt! If you are reading this blog, you probably know that my sister Whitney and I were pregnant at the same time....in fact, we were due 6 days apart. We caused a little extra stress for my mom with this, since I obviously live in Texas and my mom and sister live in Indiana. Luckily, we ended up delivering 2 1/2 weeks apart so she didn't have to worry about being in two places at once. :)

On Monday, February 27th after a loooong day of labor, Whitney gave birth to a baby boy, William James! He was a big little guy at 9 lbs and 22 inches long and he's as cute as can be. From the pics I think he looks like his daddy and I can't wait to see him in person. I know we are in for a lot of fun with our 3 boys!

Here's Will!
I love his hair!
Little sweetie.

Bowling

After my mom left, AJ took off the last three days of last week to stay home with us and was determined to get Hunter potty trained while he was here. Hunter got to pick his reward for doing a great job pottying and he decided that he wanted to go bowling. "Real life bowling" as he put it!

I woke up one morning and AJ and printed out like 6-7 bowling pictures from the computer and they hung them around the house together so Hunter had a constant reminder of his reward. It was a really great idea. He was soooo excited to show them to me and ran around touching them all saying "bowling" as he hit them.



Every time Hunter went to the potty AJ would pretend like he was calling the bowling alley to tell them how well he was doing. I have to say, it ended up working great! He's been in underwear around the house and is now telling us when he has to go, which was our big hurdle when we tried this before. I was a little hesitant to even try it since they say kids can/will regress in things like this when you bring a new baby home, but I really think the timing ended up working well for Hunter because of all of the extra positive attention he was getting when he went potty.

I REALLY wanted to go bowling to be there for Hunter's special day but was hesitant to take Cole. I ended up going and kept Cole in his stroller with a blanket draped over his carrier, so you wouldn't have even known he was there. I just took pictures and watched while AJ and Hunter bowled. He had such a good time and it was so cute to watch. I'm so glad I ended up deciding to go.

He was skipping as we were walking in...


Check out his miniature bowling shoes....who knew they came in sizes small enough for a 2 year old!
Here is a video of him in action. Love it!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wuvCqC3EOp4&list=UUcX1LN-1rwjtP1u9_jkJTRg&index=1&feature=plcp

Dare I say that he's now officially potty trained??? I'll give it a couple of more days before making the official call, but signs are pointing to YES! I'm so proud of my guy!

2 weeks old

Cole had his two week check-up with Dr. Terwelp yesterday and checked out great! He's up to 7 lbs 5 oz from his birth weight of 6 lbs 15 oz, so he's eating and gaining like a champ! He measured at 20 inches long, which I'm not sure is completely accurate, but we'll take it. :) Both weight and length are in the 25th percentile.

He's still doing great at home. He's quite the little sucker, so he might end up being a pacifier lover. Hunter never really took to one, so we'll see what Cole decides he likes. He's able to eat on demand now, but is still eating mostly every 2 1/2 hours. He sometimes sleeps for a longer stretch during the day, although in true newborn form he's up and ready to go at night!

It's a BOY!

We have another boy! Coleman Winship Johnson was born on Feb. 10th at 7:12pm. He was 6 lbs, 15 oz and 19 inches long. He goes by Cole and he looks a lot like his big brother Hunter did when he was born!

My due date was 2/23, so he arrived a couple of weeks early like his big brother. Hunter was born at 36 weeks, 1 day so as I hit 36 weeks and beyond and we still didn't have a baby, it almost felt like I was overdue. I ended up being pregnant for two weeks longer than I was with Hunter. Cole came at 38 weeks, 1 day and it was quite a different experience from Hunter's birth...

Cole was in our arms less than an hour and a half after we arrived at the hospital. As I sat on the bed to get my epidural, my water broke and he was born 5 minutes later. So, I ended up having an unmedicated delivery, which was not in the plan...but, it definitely makes for a good story! AJ jokes that I scared any other poor souls that were laboring in rooms surrounding us. It was seriously like an out of body experience for me. Thank goodness I got a sweet baby out of the deal! :)

Cole has been doing great since his arrival. He's a very sweet little baby. He really doesn't cry very often and when he does he's pretty easy to calm down. He still sleeps most of the time at this point. Hunter loves being a big brother, but it's definitely been an adjustment for him. He's not jealous, but he's definitely a bit more sensitive right now than he usually is. I'm just trying to make sure that I give everyone the attention they need and that has been the biggest challenge for me.

Hunter had his first sleepover at his friend Owen's house while we were in the hospital. I was so worried about how we were going to handle arranging care for him if we didn't have any family in town yet and he ended up doing great. He also got to play at his friend Madison's house while we were checking out of the hospital on Sunday. Mom came in on Tuesday and will be here until next Tuesday. Hunter has loved having her around and she's been such a huge help. She has been making sure our house is clean and our freezer is stocked. I feel bad that she has been working so hard while she's here! I also have to give a lot of credit to AJ. He has been wonderful making sure we're all taking care of and holding down the fort around here. We've also had several friends bring by meals already. I'm just feeling so grateful and so fortunate to have all of the help that we have had. Our family and friends have been so wonderful.

Now for the good stuff....here are some pics of Baby Cole and his proud big brother Hunter!

Drawing

We've been doing a little drawing this afternoon. :) Check out Hunter's "H" and his smiley face. I'm so proud!!

33 months

3 months away from 3 years old! I don't like this one bit. It seems like Hunter JUST turned two....how can he possibly be almost three??

Our little genius is quite the comedian. He cracks us up every day with the funny/random/surprising things that come out of his mouth. He's exceptionally smart, if I do say so myself. :) He's still really in to numbers, letters and shapes. He can almost draw a smiley face. Even though he's becoming a big boy, he still likes to be rocked when he's sleepy and I think I'll hold on to that as long as I possibly can.

They say that age 3 is worse than age 2 and I'm already preparing myself for that. Hunter is quite independent and sometimes has some ideas about how things should be done that are different from what ours are. For the most part though, he's very well behaved and is still a super sweet little boy. He loves to be involved and wants to help with whatever you're doing.

Some of his current favorites are --
Food: PB&J. Interesting since he wouldn't eat it at first, then would only eat it with peanut butter and no jelly. But, 9 times out of 10 this is what he requests for lunch.
Drink: He's still a big milk and water drinker. I occasionally treat him with a little juice, especially if he needs the vitamin C, but he's not really a huge fan.
Fruit: Bananas. He's eat 5 a day if I'd let him. He really likes the little Cuties mandarin oranges too. By the way....both of these must be peeled by only Hunter.
Toy: Anything that involves playing outside. He really likes his basketball hoop, train track and play kitchen. With the chilly weather this winter, we've been going to some indoor playgrounds and bouncy places to play and he loves running around and still loves to jump.

He is quite the little singer and has a really great memory for lyrics. He sometimes will just sit in the back seat and sing. Some current titles are the playlist are: Row row row your boat, You are my sunshine, Old MacDonald, Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, Ring around the rosy, and the IU fight song. :)

He's currently around 31-31.5 lbs and a little over 36 inches tall. We'll see what his official stats are at his 3 year well check.

Sometime over the next 5-ish weeks, Hunter will become a big brother and I am certain a good big brother at that. He is convinced the baby is a girl, so I hope he's not too disappointed if he's wrong! We've been preparing by getting baby things out of the attic, washing clothes and all of the fun stuff that must be done before Baby gets here. He's interested in all of the baby gear and toys and always asks if it was his when he was a little baby. We've been looking at pictures of him when he was born and he really enjoying doing so. He also likes to talk to my tummy, which just melts my heart. One exchange earlier this week went like this:

(Lifting up my shirt while I was sitting on the couch) "Baby, where are you? Baby, come out! Mom, she won't come out!!!"

Soon enough. :)

Happy New Year!

Happy 2012!

This year we stayed in Texas for Christmas. Since I was at the point in my pregnancy where the Dr. didn't want me traveling past, Mimi and Papa came down to spend Christmas with us this year. They flew down on Christmas Day and stayed for a week and we were very thankful that they spent their Christmas with us.

Santa was very good to Hunter this year and even brought the red rocket ship that he specifically requested when he sat on his lap. :) He made cookies for Santa on Christmas Eve and even put the sprinkles on them all by himself and finally got to rip in to those presents under the tree that he had been begging to open for the past several weeks.


Here are a couple of pictures of him on Christmas Day:

I wasn't great at getting very many pictures. That seems to be a recurring theme in my blog posts recently....

I hope you all enjoyed your holidays as much as we did this year. Hunter really understood it a lot more this year and it was so much fun watching him. We are truly blessed.