Big Brother

Now there are four!

Bracken has been the sweetest big brother. He's already so protective and proud of Chandra. He hasn't acted jealous at all, and just wants to help take care of and love her. It makes me happy!

When anyone comes over he says, "Come see my baby sister Chandra Lia Johnson!" and takes them back to her crib to show her off and tell them about her "tiny, tiny feet" or demonstrate the sounds she makes.

Whenever he hears her cry he holds her hand and says, "Don't cry, baby Chandra. Bracken will take care of you." Then he looks at me and says, "Mom, I'm a good big brother."

He loves to hold her. And hug her, kiss her, hold her hand, pat her head, touch her cheeks...I have to keep an eye on them when Chandra's laying in Bracken's reach just to make sure he deosn't love her too much. I'm so glad he adores his little sister!

Chandra Lia, 3 days old.

It's a Girl!

Chandra Lia Johnson
Born: April 30, 2011
Time: 3:53am
Weight: 6 lbs 12 oz
Height: 19 3/4 in

We have a beautiful baby girl! Chandra Lia was born April 30, 2011 at 3:53am at my parent’s home in Richfield, UT. Everything went great with the delivery. We are so excited to have a daughter, and Bracken loves his new little sister. She is so perfect, tiny, and has a full head of dark brown hair.

She surprised us and came a week early. I had some contractions late Friday night, but didn't think much of them because they were so mild. When Brian came home from working on the ambulance I jokingly told him that we might be needing to go to my parents that night. When the contractions kept coming, we ended up leaving at 1:15am.

Bracken was so confused when we got him up in the middle of the night. He said, "I'm not ready to wake up yet." but then he took 45 minutes to fall back asleep. When he realized we were on the highway going to Richfield he kept saying, "It's too dark, I can't even see any cows." Thankfully he fell asleep before my contractions got especially painful.

We arrived in Richfield at 2:45am. My Mom, Dad, and sister Breonna were in the process of getting everything ready for us. (My Mom is my midwife). My contractions were pretty strong by this point. They had set up the birth tub, but I've never liked the idea of being in the water for labor or delivery so I didn't think I'd use it. Mom checked me and I was only dilated to a 3, so I figured I had a long way to go. Mom wanted me to get in the tub and just try it out. The water relaxed me, reduced gravity on my belly (I’d felt like I had to hold my belly up through each previous contraction), and made the contractions so much less painful there was no way I was getting back out of there, so I actually ended up having a water birth.

Mom checked me about 45 minutes later and I was at a 7. But 3o seconds later I said, "the baby is coming!" I must've progressed from a 7 to a 10 that fast because within a minute her head was out, and with the next contraction I was holding our little baby girl in my arms!

When Bracken woke up Brian brought him into our room and showed him Chandra and Bracken said, “It’s my little sister!” We let him hold her and he just looked at her over and over and finally said, “Maybe…we can take her home?” We laughed and told him yes, we’d take her home. He has been so sweet with her, running in each morning after he wakes up to say, “Good morning Chandra!” He loves to touch her head softly, give her kisses, and hold her hands. He’s such a good big brother.

We've just been spending time with our little girl, loving and getting acquainted with her. We're so happy to have a daughter and little sister, and love her so much already.

Happy Easter!

Happy Easter! We had a fun Saturday morning. I took a quick break from bedrest...(I know) and we went to the city easter egg hunt for Bracken and Sarah. Bracken has been looking forward to finding eggs all week, and it was the first thing he mentioned when he woke up this morning.

Bracken found a bat and ball from the Easter Bunny in his highchair this morning when he came in for breakfast. You should have seen his face! He gasped and said, "Look! A baseball for me!" Forget breakfast, all he could think about was playing baseball. We took his new bat and ball to the park with us and Brian and Bracken played while waiting for the easter egg hunt to start. I guess this means we can retire the duck-taped-stick he's been using for a bat. :)

I love his face! He actually does a pretty good job hitting the ball too.

Bracken and his little friend Lucy with their spoils. There were so many kids that the Easter Egg hunt only lasted about 10 seconds, but the kids were completely content. Bracken was so excited to look in each of his eggs, and we've been re-cleaning his sticky face and fingers ever since we left.

Playing with Sarah

I'm on bedrest for the week so my little sister Sarah came down to help me. Thanks Sarah, you have been a life saver! She's become a second mom to Bracken. Playing letters, numbers and words with him, taking him outside to play, building forts and towers and making sure he (and I) have food. She's been cooking and cleaning for us too. I couldn't have done it without her.

I'm on bedrest because our baby hasn't been growing these last couple of weeks. It's still moving strongly and often, but I just need to make sure my energy is going to growing this baby and not at the gym, chasing Bracken, or my various projects. It's been hard because I feel normal and it seems silly to be laying down constantly, but hopefully the baby will have grown a lot by my next appointment and I'll be off of bedrest. That's what I'm hoping for because I'm feeling like a useless piece of furniture right now. Either way I only have 2 more weeks!

In case we have a girl...

Since I have all little boy blankets I thought I'd make a baby girl blanket just for in case...and I love how it turned out!

In fact, part of me is hoping for a girl just so I can use the blanket

Only 2.5 more weeks!

Tough Kid

Bracken is all boy. He's adventurous, crazy and fun. Of course, when chasing balls, flipping into his crib, jumping off the couch and other things kids this age like to do, he also gets hurt sometimes. Here are some of his reactions:

He runs to me for a quick kiss better or kisses his hurt himself, then says, "all better!"

He asks Brian to fix it...with a saw, hammer, or pliers. "Daddy, I need the pliers!" is something we hear a lot. Brian saws or pounds on Bracken's bumps for a minute and it always fixes the problem.

Bracken showed me a tiny scratch on his ankle that he got from who knows where and said, "Mom, look at my owie." I asked what happened, and he said matter-of-factly, "I got attacked by a lion." So I asked what happened to the lion. He shrugged and said, "I beat him up."

One day we were playing ball outside and he tripped over the ball and scraped his knee. He cried for about a minute while I held him. Then all of a sudden he stopped crying and said in an astonished voice, "Mom! Look at my cool red knee!" It was all bloody, but he just thought it was awesome that his knee was red. He hopped up to play, and his knee never bothered him again.

Bracken was reading alone in his room when I heard, "I hurt my finger." He'd gotten a deep paper cut that wouldn't stop bleeding on its own, so Bracken got one of his first bandaids. The next day in nursery he lost his bandaid and fell apart. His nursery leader had to bring him to me in Relief Society. When he saw me he announced, "Mom! I lost my bandaid." As soon as we found another bandaid he happily went back to nursery.

His most typical response to getting hurt is not noticing it. We built a little fort for Bracken to play in. After he got tired of playing inside of it he jumped on top of it. The entire fort swayed forward and dumped him on the floor--right on his forehead. We were ready for some crying after that, but he looked up at us, grinned and said, "Wow! That was pretty crazy!" and went off to try it again with a big red mark on his forehead.