5 Months!

I know it's so cliche, but seriously?! 5 months?! I really don't know where the time has gone.

Jared rolls over, both ways. Very pro-like. He's almost sitting up, and stays awake a lot it seems. He's (for the most part) a bit happier than previous months. I still mistakenly eat dairy sometimes. I usually can get away with eating a little cheese and butter, but I've been over-doing it the past few days so he's been pretty unhappy all around.

Jared had his first hair cut a few days ago! Most people think I'm cray, but if you look back to the previous post, he had a lot of hair! His head is getting bigger so its naturally thinning out, and then he likes to rub his head around, and claw his hair out (weirdo).... So to make him look even cuter, I made it all even :)
He didn't cry and bit! Paul did an awesome job keeping him occupied and taking pictures. I just did a #1 all over his head with the clippers. What a champ!
He is such a fun little guy. All smiles when he's feeling well. The past couple days he has to have two (not one) teething tablets popped in his mouth right before he eats or he just screams. So lame. I hope those little demons hurry up and break their way through!

2-4 Months

First let me start off by saying there will be missing info in this post. I am so upset with myself for not writing everything down, but I only have his stats from his 2 month appointment! I even just got back from his 4 month appointment and because it was so crazy, I don't even remember. Gah. Moving on.

2 Month Stats:

13 lbs 20 oz

23 1/32 in long

This little guy is so sweet. He had a really rough first couple of months while we were still trying to learn his quirks and such.

I LOVE his red hair and hope he keeps it forever and ever! He was born with SO much of it, and I couldn't help but style it. :)
(3 months)

Just like most babies, Jared spent the majority of his time sleeping. And when he wasn't sleeping, he was crying. Why? Well from the time he was born I suspected he had acid reflux. He had all the same symptoms that Abby used to have when she was an infant. He would swallow over and over and over, scream out like he was in terrible pain, arch his back, not eat, etc. His doctor ordered and ultrasound of his stomach to see what was going on.

The ultrasound tech confirmed that he was very gassy, something that I was also suspecting was causing pain, and that he had acid reflux. So we started Previcid, morning and night. It helps a TON.

Something else was still bothering Jared though. He would cry soooo much. Morning and night. It was so.hard. The doctor decided to do a dairy allergy test, but all came back normal. She suggested I go ahead and cut out dairy completely because he could just have an dairy intolerance. So I did.

About a week and a half into no dairy, there was still no change. It was SO FRUSTRATING! I talked to some friends and they said it could take about 2 weeks for a change. So I stuck with it. I swear exactly two weeks on the dot I started to notice a little bit of a difference. It didn't seem like a huge difference so I gave up and had a bowl of cereal with a little bit of milk. 4 hours after I ate that (it takes 4 hours for my body to process food into milk), I was feeding Jared and he started to scream like crazy. I then realized that there had been a gradual "feeling better" even though there was still lots of crying, it had gradually diminished. So from that day on I've tried so hard not to eat dairy. It has gotten way easier as time has passed.

(Still working out the milk problem in this picture)
(4 Months)

Jared has been such a joy in our lives so far. He has the cutest, biggest belly laugh and his dimples are to.die.for!
My little thumb sucker!
With the combination of A.R. and a dairy intolerance, there are still hard days. On the eve of the hard days when he has warn me out the most I love to sit a cuddle him. He really is such a sweet little guy, he just has had a rough start in life.

Paul and I went to Vegas (there will be a blog post about this) on February 9th, 10th and 11th. My awesome SIL kept Jared for those 3 days and he was bottle fed. When we got back, Jared went on strike for almost a month and would ONLY eat while he was asleep. We didn't go many places for those 3+ weeks. It was one of the most frustrating times of my life. Seriously. Picture a baby screaming because he's so hungry he can't stand it but the only way he will eat is to rock him to sleep first. Yeah. It was absolutely terrible. I talked to a friend of a friend and she told me her baby did the same thing at 4 months and then again at 6. It turns out he was teething! (AHH!) So she told me to try teething tablets and lavender essential oils. I tried the teething tablets with Jared and guess what! It worked! Then I started noticing little marks where teeth are coming in. chances are he'll be a terrible teether like Abby was, but at least we know the cause!

Jared is surely giving us a run for our money, but we wouldn't trade him for anything. He's got the sweetest little spirit and something about this little boy has me swooning every single day. His smiles? His dimples? His giggles? The way he sleeps? I don't know what it is, but I love this little guy so much!

Sawrah

My friend, Sarah, is doing a giveaway on her blog! Go check it out!

HERE

Happy Birthday to Me!

My Birthday this year rocked. Really. I have some seriously awesome friends and family.

It started off with my friends (click for pix). We all went to the park to hang out and they spoiled me with food (the real way to my heart). It was so nice to just get to chat and relax while our kids played (attempted to run in the street). I seriously have the most wonderful friends. They are once in the lifetime friends, and really more like sisters. Thank you, ladies, for being so wonderful!

On Saturday, Paul took Abby and snuck out real early. When they got back, I was feeding J (all I ever do, really) and they had loads of white bags. I love white bags. Why? Because it means they went to the donut shop! Paul said 'Hang on Abby, let mommy help you!" so I went over to help her out. There was a bag full of napkins. They were arranged like tissue paper. Weird. So I pulled them out and *ahh* (angelically) there was a beautiful white iPhone 4s tucked away in there. I was surprised. Really. We'd been talking about me getting one and I'd dropped some not so subtle hints... but I really didn't think I'd get one. I love that thing! So handy.

That evening was my nephew's (and bday twin) birthday party! Paul and I went and dropped off Abby so we could go out to dinner at Pappasitos (yum). After dinner I started feeling a bit weird and gross... But we picked up Abby and headed to Sandee's house. She and Jenner watched both our kids while we went out to a movie! It was SO nice of them. At the moment I can't even remember what movie we saw... I was feeling so sick. I must have gotten food poisoning or something. Once we got home I was feeling horrible. I was up all night sick and feeding J. It was crazy. I even had to miss my 'birthday dinner' with my family the next day.

(I don't care if I got food poisoning, I still love you!)

We did get together with Paul's family to celebrate all the January birthdays. (Me, Jenner, and Liz) It was lots of fun as usual. The Johnson's spoiled me totally.

Thank you everyone for all the birthday wishes and gifts! It was such a fun birthday weekend (even if I was sick for most of it) :)

Christmas (backtrack)

Christmas was wonderful as ever last year. We had lots of family time! As the years go by, I'm getting more and more appreciative of family. It is really nice to live by them and to get to see them often!

Christmas Eve was spent with my family. We missed Chelseas family as they were in Oklahoma celebrating with the Fullmer side. All the rest of the Mac's came over to my house for hoagies and chatting. It was so fun to get together.

Christmas morning we woke up early to open up all our gifts! It was a Sunday morning and we'd previously decided to go to Paul's parents ward at 1 so it was a nice morning spend with our little family.

When Abby woke up, I'd already been up feeding Jared but I didn't want her to come in the living room without Paul being awake, so I hurried and shooed her into our room to wake up Paul. While he was getting a shirt on, Abby waltz on out to the living room, saw her new stroller and doll from Santa, walked right over to it and started pushing it around. She didn't look surprised at all! It was more of a "Finally mom!" kind of look. So funny. She had a blast opening all her gifts!

Jared just hung out on the couch and watched. It was such a treat because during this time, we didn't know of his Dairy intolerance or his acid reflux. I'll share all that fun stuff in another post :)

Paul opened all his gifts and was kind of bummed because he knew all that he got didn't add up to our 'limit'. He saw one last gift, it was a note! It told him he had to go out to my trunk for his last gift... A new golf bag! He was so excited.

I loved all my gifts as well. I got way too spoiled. Michael and Beth had our names last year for Christmas so we got to open our gifts from them as well. Beth made me this AWESOME tree skirt that I love! I was so excited. She is a genius with the sewing machine, so I knew she would make me something awesome! I'm going to have to make some cute burlap stockings to match this year!

Church was great, and short, so we got extra time to spend with the family. We headed down to Milford to be with Pauls family that evening. It's always fun to go down there and play games Johnson style. Never a dull moment.

We had a wonderful Christmas! I hope you all had a blessed Christmas as well!

(backtrack) Jared's Baby Shower

MacDonnell girls sure do know how to throw a baby shower. My sisters spoiled me (and Jared) rotten! It was so sweet of them to do this for me. The food was wonderful (as always) and look at that cake!! Chelsea kinda rocks at the cake thing.

They put Apple Cider (my favorite) in the pumpkin. Clever!
We did a craft, because we all love to craft! Heather brought onesies and fabric so everyone could make a onesie for Jared. They are adorable.
For the game, my SIL Sandee brought all kinds of baby things and we had to guess the price. Baby's are spensive. And then she let me go home with all the things. Spoiled.
There was no skimping on the 'shower' part either. Jared got all kinds of cute things for his room, to wear, and to play with.

Thank you to my sisters, mom, and MIL for taking the time to spoil us a little more. It was a hectic day and not everyone was able to come, but I sure did appreciate it and had a blast with those who could come!

Love you guys!!

Jared's Blessing Day

(pondering the greater things in life)

Jared was blessed on December 4th in the Arlington 4th ward. It was the perfect day to do it because we only had 1 hour of church (because of the nativity). Friends and Family all came to our ward to be a part of it. Paul gave Jared a wonderful blessing. Paul, Steve (grandpa), Steven B., Jason B, Doug (uncle), Kurt (uncle), and members of the bishopric all stood in the circle.

After church was over, all the family (since there's a billion of us) headed to the cultural hall to have a nice little pot luck. We are so thankful for those who were able to come and to those who wanted to be there. We're blessed to have such a large family.

I'm so thankful that my husband holds the priesthood and stays worthy to do so. I cannot count how many times it has blessed mine and my families lives.

Halloween

I just realized I never posted about Halloween. Probably because I really don't remember much about it...

Jared and I got out of the hospital on the 29th, and we headed out for Halloween on the 30th and 31st. Abby was a little bumble bee and Jared was a monster (not literally.... yet.. ;)

We went to our ward Halloween Trunk or Treat (30th) and got down on the goods. The only reason we went is because I felt like Abby was super robbed with the whole getting-a-new-brother thing.... So I made sure we went and had a good time!

On Halloween, Paul's school was canceled and our friends graciously invited us to go trick or treating with them. Abby had a blast with her friends and getting all the yummy candy. She would get the candy from the house, then she would try and sit down in the street to eat it. Needless to say, it took for-ev-er. I was plenty sore that next day, but it was completely worth it. I loved getting to spend some time with Abby having fun!

One (fast) Month!

One month stats (technically 5 wk stats)

11 lbs 10 oz.

21 1/4 in long

Where oh where did the first month go? It went by so fast! He still just eats, sleeps, poops and cries. Abby got him to smile at her TWICE now (not fair). He's got the sweetest little face. I love his dimples! His left dimple shows up a lot (that's side we get the gas smirk from) but it's a real treat to get both of them at once! And check out the strawberry blond hair! I love it!

Abby is doing pretty well with him. She still ALWAYS wants me to hold her when I nursing him. She's figured out that she can get into pretty much whatever she wants while I'm feeding him, because I can't get up and stop her. She loves it when daddy comes home (although, she really only sees him Thursday-Sunday now because he goes right to school and most of the time has to go right to church on Tuesdays for YMs) because he gives her lots of much needed attention. I always feel so bad that she doesn't get all the attention she used to. I'm considering pushing her bedtime back to 8:30 so she can get to see him every day.

Lifes been a whirlwind since baby J has joined our family. My family and friends have helped me SO much. I could never have kids if I didn't live by family and had no friends. (I'd just be one of those crazy cat ladies. Well, maybe not cat. I hate cats. ) They have been such a strength to me: Always answering my questions about anything and everything (mostly nursing because nursing sucks- no pun intended) I really could never repay them for all they've done! THANK YOU!

-- post will be cut short because of the screaming baby :)

Jared Paul Johnson

Jared Paul Johnson

October 26, 2011

12:32 pm

7 lbs 7.5 oz, 20 inches long

We headed to the hospital at 4 am on the 26th for me to be induced. Everything got going pretty fast! I didn't have to take the liquid drink this time, like I did with Abby. They just stuck an i.v. in me and let the pitocin run through my veins. All was in place at 5:30 and the waiting began. I was dilated to a 2 when I got there, so we asked the nurse if she had any predictions of birth time. She guessed about noon. I guessed 1 and Paul guessed 11. (We really wanted to get this baby out :)

Contractions started heating up at about 7am when my doctor came in to break my water. At that point I was about a 4. I handled them okay until 9 when all the labor moved to my back (JUST like it did for Abby). I called the nurse for an epidural, but the "epidural giver" (ha) was in the room with a lady getting a c-section... so it took a good hour for him to get there. Longest hour ever. He (the epi giver) finally got there to give me my epi at 10. I don't remember it hurting so bad with Abby, but this time it literally felt like he was filing my spine. Holy it hurt. Then it wasn't working right... I could still feel all my back labor, but he said there wasn't anything they could do about it. Gay. At 11:30 Jared turned the right way and there was no pain! Woo Jared!

I was at an 8 when they checked me and the nurse said "If you feel any pressure, you call me asap!" So I fell asleep and woke up to a lot of pressure. I called the nurse, she was busy so a different one came in. She checked me, I was still at an 8.. Grr. I asked her when I could start pushing and she said I had to be at a 10. Then for some reason she decided to check me again (literally 3 minutes later) and she said "It's time to have a baby!" Luckily, Dr. W was headed up the stairs to check on me.

Dr. W got in the room, got all saddled up (he's quite the cowboy. Really. He wears scrubs and cowboy boots to work every day) and told me to push. Then to push again.. Then one more tiny push and Jared was out! It took 10 minutes tops. Awesome!

Introducing, Jared Paul...... !!!!!

Abby was pretty confused. She was excited to see a baby, but then got distracted by her surroundings.

Now we have this squishy little guy here with us. Cute little dimples and all!