Happy Easter!

The Johnson family celebrated Easter in Pella this year. Our day was complete with church on Sunday morning followed by dinner and an Easter egg hunt. It was a beautiful afternoon and we all enjoyed being outside for a little while. Jack had a lot of fun running around in the yard and playing with Avree and Kaiya. I think he also enjoyed the Easter egg hunt, but it was hard to tell because he was more concerned with his baseball bat and ball! Everyone had a great day and it was a good ending to a long, but fun weekend!

Jack is 2 years old!

Jack is 2 years old! He is a happy little toddler who is always on the go. Jack is at a fun age and we enjoy watching him grow and learn new things every day. Here are a few highlights:

• Jack is talking a lot now and he is starting to put words together in sentences. Mommy and Daddy can distinguish most of what he is saying, but sometimes we still hear gibberish! His favorite phrases are "I see it!," "watch Barney?," "okay," “hold the baby?,” “I sorry,” "mommy’s bed?," “awesome!,” "did you see that?!,“nice catch,” “I got it!,” and “all done!”


• He counts to ten and also likes singing the alphabet song.


• Jack still really likes animals. Some of his favorite animals are elephants, alligators, and lions.


• He loves sports, especially ones with a ball. His favorite balls are golf balls, soccer balls, and basketballs. He is also in love with his golf clubs. Jack whacks at anything and everything he can when he has a golf club in his hands. He also loves throwing anything and everything. Jack is 100% boy!


• Jack loves being chased. It is one of his favorite games to play.


• He is still very attached to his blankie…also known as “boo-boo.” We never leave the house without it!


• Jack is in love with Barney. One of his favorite things to do is sit in Mommy’s bed and watch Barney on tv. He enjoys singing along with the songs and he knows all the words to the “I love you, you love me…” song.


• He loves going for rides in Mommy’s car and asks to do it often.


• Jack still loves toys that plays music....he will hold them up to his ear and dance around the room. He also likes singing to himself and he really likes it when other people sing to him. We hear “sing it!” quite often.


• He swings his left arm when he is excited (and also when he dances).


• Jack’s favorite foods right now are bananas, chicken nuggets, pretzels, raspberries, apples, french fries, eggs, juice, and potato chips.

We are having so much fun with Jack right now and we are looking forward to watching him grow and change over the next year.

Jack's 2nd Birthday Party

We celebrated Jack's 2nd birthday on Saturday afternoon. The party was a little chaotic, but that was to be expected with 8 children under the age of 5! Jack opened gifts and enjoyed his Curious George birthday cake. Since Jack's birthday fell on Easter weekend, we thought it was only fitting to send the kids on an Easter egg hunt. Everyone seemed to have a great time! Jack was so tired by the end of the day that he fell asleep in his high chair while eating dinner!

The birthday boy!

Jack had lots of helping opening his gifts!Chaos!

Curious George birthday cake

Easter egg hunt Aunt Steph helping Kaiya and Avree with their candy Jack and Mommy View of our backyard and pool The Johnson cousins with bunny earsKaty with her bunny earsHe was a tired boy!

Decorating Easter Eggs

Jack and Katy decorated Easter eggs this afternoon. Jack had fun putting stickers on the eggs. He put half of the stickers on the eggs and the other half in his mouth. For some reason, he loves to eat stickers! I have been waiting a long time for him to grow out of this habit. I guess I will have to keep waiting! Jack also had a lot of fun throwing the eggs on the floor. If you look closely at the pictures below, you can see that most of the eggs are cracked!

Jack's first hospital stay

We had a scary experience this week while Jack was battling a severe case of croup. Jack woke up on Monday morning not feeling well. He had cold symptoms and was also running a fever. On Monday night when Jack went to bed, we noticed he was breathing heavily. During the middle of the night, I could tell his breathing had gotten worse so I woke up Jay and had him bring Jack to the emergency room. They treated Jack for croup by giving him some steroids and a nebulizer treatment and then sent him back home. We had another low-key day on Tuesday with Jack still not feeling well. By the time Jay got home from work on Tuesday evening, Jack's labored breathing had returned, so Jay brought him into the doctor. From there, they sent Jack back to the hospital to continue the nebulizer breathing treatments and administer more steroids. Jay and Jack spent the night in the hospital on Tuesday night and by Wednesday morning Jack was still not doing better. The doctors seemed a little baffled and did not understand why Jack was not responding to the treatments. Jack's condition deteriorated pretty quickly on Wednesday morning and by the time I got to the hospital to visit him, he was not doing well. The poor little guy was fighting so hard to breathe. They ended up moving him over to the ICU because there was talks of having to intubate him. Once he was moved over to the ICU, they called in an ear, nose and throat specialist who was able to get a scope down his throat, which confirmed there was nothing blocking his airways and that it was just a bad case of croup. That was good news. They put Jack on an IV and gave him oxygen to help him breathe. They continued treating him with steroids and also put him on an antibiotic. The doctors told us it would just take time for the virus to run its course. We did not see much improvement in Jack through the rest of the day on Wednesday, but we did see him perk up a little on Thursday morning, which was great to see. He continued making small improvements during the day on Thursday and by Thursday evening, we started seeing Jack return to his normal self. They released us from the hospital on Thursday night. Jack was so happy to finally leave the hospital and go home!

With Katy being only a week old, we did not want to expose her to anything by bringing her to the hospital. Therefore, I was not able to spend much time with Jack during his hospital stay. I felt very helpless during the entire time, but I also knew my responsibility had to be with Katy. I am so grateful and thankful for Jay. He never left Jack's side during the entire incident and he did such a great job taking care of Jack and comforting him when needed. Jack spent most of his hospital stay resting and sleeping on Daddy in the hospital bed. They became very good cuddle buddies by the end of the week!

Jack keeps getting better with each passing day and we are happy to report that he is well on his way to making a 100% recovery! This entire incident was the scariest thing we have faced so far as parents and hopefully we will not have to go through anything like this again!

First week home with Katy

Our first week home with Kate went very well. So far she is a very good baby. She is eating and sleeping great...we just hope that continues! Right now, our biggest problem is keeping her awake to take a full feeding. She likes to sleep a lot!

Jack really likes his little sister. He likes to talk about her and is always wanting to hold her. It is very cute! We are looking forward to watching the two of them grow up together.

Here are a few pictures from Kate's first week home.

Visitors in the hospital

We had several visitors stop by to see us and meet baby Katy while in the hospital. Katy and Corey drove up on Friday evening to meet her. Katy was especially thrilled to meet her namesake!

On Saturday morning, Grandma and Grandpa McCulla brought Jack in to visit. He was so excited to meet his baby sister. He also had a lot of fun playing with all the gadgets in the hospital room and whenever he saw the opportunity, he would take off for the door and go running down the hall. He thought it was a fun game! I am not sure Grandma and Grandpa agreed.

Great-Grandma and Great-Grandpa McCulla, Great-Grandma Johnson, and Great-Aunt Kathy also stopped by to meet Katy. They all thought she was very sweet and they couldn't get over all her dark hair! Aunt Steph and cousin Kaiya also had fun meeting Katy. I think seeing Katy made Steph even more anxious for her baby's arrival in June.

Katy and Corey Whitaker

My two Katy's!

Grandma and Grandpa McCulla

Great-Grandma & Great-Grandpa McCulla

Great-Grandma Johnson

Great-Aunt Kathy Steph and Kaiya

Katy Mae Johnson has arrived!

Katy Mae Johnson arrived at 2:09pm on Friday, April 1, 2011 at the Iowa Methodist West Hospital in West Des Moines, Iowa. She weighed 7 pounds, 4 ounces and was 20 inches long.

I was induced on Friday morning at 39 weeks in hopes of an easier labor and delivery than what I had with Jack. Jay and I went to the hospital around 7:00am and the doctor broke my water at 7:30am. We waited around for awhile for my contractions to pick up and it wasn't until around 11:00am that I was in labor with regular contractions. After that, things progressed quickly. I got an epidural around 12:30pm and by 2:00pm I was ready to start pushing. Katy was born shortly after that at 2:09pm.

We named her Katy after my best friend, Katy Whitaker, and the name Mae comes from Jay's Grandma (Edith Mae Fleege). Katy arrived with a full head of dark hair! We are not quite sure yet who she looks like. We see a little of Jay, myself and Jack all at the same time! So far she has been a great baby....she is quiet and rarely fusses. We will see how long that lasts! Jack was very excited to meet his baby sister. He was very interested in her and wanted to keep touching her and calling her "baby". We are already looking forward to watching the two of them grow up together!

Last pregnancy pictures

Just seconds old Daddy helped cut the umbilical cord On the scale...7lbs 4 oz Happy Mama! Footprints First bath (she didn't like it very much!) Proud parents

Lots of dark hair! Sleeping soundly

Jack was excited to meet his baby sister!

Proud Daddy!

Our family of four!

Going home

Birdie and Bogey meet their new baby sister