Sooo Pretty

Almost every day when Bracken sees me after I've finished my hair and makeup, he looks up at me, stops, and in a high squeaky voice he says, "Mommy, you look soooo, soooo, pretty!"

I love being a mom!

Christmas Newsletter

Merry Christmas Everyone!

This has been another full, busy year! Here are a few of our highlights.

Brian and I went to Cancun in January with the company Brian worked for the last two summers. We went zip lining, parasailing, toured Coba and Chichen Itza, swam with dolphins, went snorkeling with sting rays, built sandcastles, and ate lots of food at the buffets. It was so relaxing and fun to have time for just the two of us.

For the first summer since we were married, we didn’t move or sell alarms, and it was wonderful to have a summer “off” playing together. We went on several camping trips, hiked in Zion’s National Park, went to family reunions, went swimming in Cedar’s reservoir, and visited family in Phoenix, Richfield, Idaho Falls, and Island Park. Brian also managed the SUU Garden, where we planted our first garden. We were happily surprised with how well it turned out. By the end of the summer we had vegetables coming out our ears, especially tomatoes.

Brian—This last semester was insane for Brian! He took 18 credits as usual, but they were much harder classes than he’s had before. On top of that he volunteers weekly at our local hospital’s Emergency Room, was called to be in a singles ward bishopric, and started two new jobs on the Dixie and Iron County Ambulances. He’s been dreaming about working as an EMT for a while now, and has loved his new jobs. An added benefit is that he needs the patient exposure before medical school. With everything he had going on he never felt like he had enough time for all his studies or his family, but he pulled through the semester with very good grades. We are so proud of him and excited to have him to ourselves for a month before school starts back up.

Kira—Some of our most exciting news is that we’re expecting another baby, due in May! This last semester I pretty much took care of Bracken and tried to keep food down, but I’m 20 weeks along now, and have started feeling good again the last month or so. I’ve been working on increasing and using our food storage, cooking and eating healthily, and experimenting with my sewing machine. Sewing is one of my new favorite hobbies, and I’ve completed a bunch of fun projects this year.

Bracken—Keeps us laughing and on our toes. He is all boy, and loves wrestling, football games, sword fighting with balloons, puzzles, reading, coloring, and Signing Time movies. He adores his Dad and when Brian is around Bracken is his little shadow. He is very friendly and says “Hello!” and carries on a conversation with any friend or stranger he sees. He almost never stops talking and is pretty easy to understand. He tells me almost every morning, “Oh Mama, you look soo, so pretty!” which makes my day. He loves to look through coins with Brian and whenever he sees a penny he holds it up and says, “It’s a good one!” The other day he was jumping off of our couches onto the floor, and then he said “Well, I’m pretty crazy.” He loves to sing and often goes around the house singing his ABC’s, Away in a Manger, or some other little song.

We are so grateful for our family and friends, for the blessings we’ve had this year, and for our Savior. We hope you have a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Love,
Brian, Kira and Bracken

Cracking Eggs

Our home teachers came over last week and Bracken had a great time playing with them. After a while though he came up to me and asked for a "green shake" (aka a spinach smoothie), and I told him he'd have to wait until we were done talking. He started throwing a tantrum and ran out of the room. We just ignored him and he quickly found something else to occupy his attention. It got really quiet and we heard a "smack" sound. Brian went into the kitchen to investigate and I heard him say, "What are you doing?!" I came in the kitchen in time to hear Bracken say, "Look Dad, crack egg on the floor!" as he threw another egg on the kitchen floor. He'd opened the fridge and "cracked" about half a dozen eggs on the floor. He was so proud of himself. Thanks to our laughing hometeachers suggestion, we got a picture. Thanks to their being there, I laughed too instead of flipping out.

Bracken's Nativity

I bought Bracken a little playschool nativity to help him become familiar with the Christmas story. When I first opened the box and began handing him each figurine he started exclaiming, "Oh Mom, Look! A camel!" then "Oh, a donkey!" "Oh! A Sheep!" etc. When we were finished pulling the plastic off everything he picked up the stable and hugged it to his chest and said, "I love this!" several times. It made me happy that he was so excited for his gift. I totally felt like buying him more presents.

Our Nativity's Anomalies:

Our stable usually has a donkey on top instead of an angel. You see, the stable has a little spot on top for the angel to stand. But Bracken insists that it is a better spot for the camel, sheep or donkey. Whenever Bracken notices that Brian or I put the angel back on top, he quickly takes it off and puts an animal in it's place.

Bracken thought the stable was for the animals and always put baby Jesus and the people outside. When I explained to him that the animals wanted to let baby Jesus stay in their stable so he could be warm and they could see him, Bracken started putting baby Jesus inside the stable. But then he crowds every figure around as close as they can get while saying, "Cow look at baby Jesus, Camel look at baby Jesus" for each animal and wiseman.

We had a big laundry basket of blankets sitting in the living room after my brothers and sisters spent the night. Bracken looked at it and decided it was a manger. He crawled in, told me he was baby Jesus, and reached for the animals, "Cow see baby Jesus mom!" I handed him each figure one by one until all of them were in the laundry basket with Bracken. Then Bracken said, "Okay Mom, take a picture." (see below)

Through all the fun he is learning about the real nativity. His favorite book right now is about the first Christmas. We read it several times a day. We also act out the nativity with his figurines. Then, the other day I watched him with Mary and the angel as he said, "One day, an angel came. Said, "Don't be afraid Mary. You're going to have baby Jesus. Bye." That made my heart melt. Or having the innkeeper say, "Sorry Joseph, no room. But stable, warm and dry."

Thanksgiving Break

Brian was on call with the Ambulance most of Thanksgiving break, so we were very excited when his family decided to drive up and visit us for Thanksgiving this year. It was so fun to see Bracken around his "Grandpa RoB" (lots of emphasis on the "B"), "Gamma Sue," "Lissa," "Ricky" and "Kristi Sue." Bracken loved having such an attentive and adoring audience. He would dance, sing, and just go crazy for us every night before bedtime. He was so cute and fun that he usually got to stay up an extra hour or so while we laughed at and clapped for him. We also played in the snow a ton while everyone was here. Don't you love the little French snowman Kristi and Melissa made with Bracken?

After our delicious Thanksgiving dinner (complete with nine pies for seven people!) we ran outside to play in the snow. Bracken loved sledding and walking in the snow, as well as eating the snow.

Top Left: Kristi; Top Right: Melissa; Bottom Left: Brian and Rick pushing Bracken and I on the sled; Bottom Right: Kristi and Rob

I'm grateful for my family!

Ever since I joined the Johnson family I've heard about the "Newspaper game" but have never gotten a chance to play it. But on Thanksgiving we had some extra newspapers and our downstairs neighbors weren't home so we decided to play. That is one noisy, fun game! We were all jumping up and down, yelling out different animal names and getting smacked with a newspaper. Bracken wanted to play too, so we gave him his own rolled up newspaper. We were impressed that he knew which animal each of us was. We laughed a lot as he ran around yelling "Emu! Wombat! Buffalo!" and smacking us with the newspaper.

For Black Friday we looked around at CAL-Ranch (Rob's favorite store), played games while Bracken napped, and then went sledding. We all had a blast, and Bracken thought sledding was definitely a cool thing to do.

Left: Brian grooving down the hill; Right: Brian and Bracken racing Melissa

Left: Kristi and Melissa crashing at the bottom; Right: Family Tubing!

I love this picture of Melissa and Kristi right after they crashed. It just makes me smile! We all had so much fun over the whole break. I'm so glad our family was able (and willing) to make the long drive up here to be with us. We love you guys!

Our "Big" Boy

We love our little boy! He keeps us on our toes, learns constantly, and gives us hundreds of reasons to smile and laugh every day. He is talking more and more all the time (if that's possible) and using sentences now. Here are some funny things he's been saying and doing:

A few weeks ago Brian came home for dinner and Bracken had a hundred things to tell him. He literally would not stop talking. Finally I said, "Bracken, it's Mommy's turn." He was silent for about 20 seconds, then happily announced, "Bracken's Turn!" and continued to jabber at Brian.

Bracken was outside playing while we carried Costco groceries in the house. Brian was carrying a couple of boxes of rice milk in the house when Bracken looked up at him in amazement and said, "Ooo Daddy Strong!" That made Brian feel so proud.

A couple days ago Bracken and I were walking with my siblings when Bracken said, "I'm a boy." (while signing "boy") pause..."Mommy, I'm a BIG boy!"

Bracken loves horses. The other night when I was singing to him before putting him to bed he insisted that I sing a horse song. I couldn't think of any at the time so I just sang BINGO, but sang "There was a farmer had a horse" instead of a dog, and clucked my tongue instead of clapping for the letters. He loved it. As I laid him in his crib he quietly sang "Horse...Cluck, Cluck, N-G-O!" A few times.

Speaking of singing, Bracken sings bits of songs all the time. "Twinkle, twinkle little star," "The Colors of the Rainbow," "Holy Ghost Song," "ABC's" etc. If he finds a Hymn book or another book with music notes in it he opens it up and sings, "Song, song, La-la-la." I love to hear him sing, and he actually carries the right tune half the time.

Bracken repeats everything. I've really got to watch what I say. He kept saying, "crap!" one day over and over and I was feeling like a loser until I realized he was actually saying "crib." Boy was I relieved! Another night at a friends house he decided to say "Oh Man!" every time he dropped a toy or tripped or turned around. I know I say that sometimes, but he was saying it like a swear word every other second. Thankfully he's forgotten how much fun that is to say.

Bracken's favorite things to say:
"Mommy, look at this!"
"I see it!"
"No thank you." (At least it's not flat out "NO!")
"I love _____(fill in the blank)."
"Hello!" (to complete strangers.)
"I hear a dog!" (or a motorcycle.)
"Daddy fix it." (when he breaks something or gets hurt.)

We love our little man!