Happy Birthday, Daddy

Happy birthday, Brad! The boys and I love you so much!

All photos by Anna Bryan Photography

2015 Review

Here's the nine most liked photos from 2015 on my instagram account. These photos pretty much sum up our year.

First row (l-r)
- Caleb and Brad after Caleb was discharged from the hospital in Kansas where he was treated for RSV and pneumonia.
- Caleb was so excited to hold his baby brother! They didn't get to meet at the hospital because Caleb had the flu when Tyler was born. January and February were rough months for illnesses in our family. Let's hope 2016 treats us better.
- Welcome to the world, Tyler Cole! Brad and I were so excited to meet our little guy!

Second row (l-r)
- Baby Tyler on his birth day. His head was too big for any of the newborn hats at the hospital.
- My precious family of four
- Those boys. "Tyler bit me!"

Third row (l-r)
- Happy Heart Day, Caleb! We celebrated the second anniversary of his open heart surgery on Feb 1st
- Another pic of my precious little family
- Caleb started walking this spring. What a game changer that milestone was!

Family Photos - November 2015

Our wonderful photographer, Anna, came to OKC a couple weeks ago and took our photos at a local tree farm. As always, she did an amazing job. If you know of anyone who lives in/near Little Rock, Arkansas, she's trying to build her photography business there. I definitely recommend her! I wish she still lived in OKC, but I love that she takes the time to photograph us when she's back in town visiting her family. Here are a few of my favorites.

San Antonio

It's been almost a month since we took a little weekend trip to San Antonio. I meant to write a long post about everything we did and share some advice for anyone thinking about making the trip... but seeing as how I haven't found the time to write out that post, I'm just going to post some photos and mention a few brief things. If you are thinking about going to San Antonio and have questions about anything we did there, please feel free to ask in the comments or send me an email! We ate at some delicious restaurants and went to a couple attractions... 

SeaWorld San Antonio 
Caleb loved the Sesame Street Bay of Play. He was able to do most of the rides with an accompanying adult. A couple of the animal exhibits were closed for renovations, but we did see some penguins, puffins, and reptiles. Brad and I took turns with my parents watching the boys, so that we could do a couple roller coasters. And of course, we saw the Shamu show ("One Ocean"). There were several other shows that looked interesting, but the show times didn't work with our schedule. 

Morgan's Wonderland
This is an amusement park for kids of all abilities. Anyone with special needs gets free admission, and everything there is wheelchair accessible. Caleb's still fairly new to this whole walking thing, so the barrier-free design was ideal for him. He had no trouble walking around and exploring this park. Caleb loved the carousel, playgrounds, sensory village and the Water Works play area. 

And, of course, what's a trip to San Antonio without a visit to the Alamo?! 

Tyler's Newborn Photos

I realized last night, as I was looking back through old blog posts, that I never posted any of Tyler's newborn photos. These were taken in Tyler's nursery when he was nine days old. The photographer, Anna Bryan, is an occupational therapist at the clinic where Caleb goes weekly. While in school, she did a rotation with Caleb's OT and that's how we got to know her. She does photography as a hobby, and we are beyond pleased with the work she did!

Tyler's Birth Day

On Friday, January 23rd, Brad and I went to the hospital for my scheduled induction. We had decided a couple weeks earlier, at the suggestion of my perinatologist and OB, to induce since Tyler measured on the "big" side at my last two ultrasounds.

We arrived at 7:30 and got settled into a room right away. I had been dilated to 3-4cm for over a week and hadn't made any further progress. Pitocin was started at 8:00, and my OB broke my water at 9:20. Brad and I spent the next couple hours reading and watching TV. My contractions strengthened, and I requested an epidural at 11:30.

The anesthesiologist was a very nice guy, but he made me a little nervous when he broke two glass bottles/vials while getting everything ready. I had to trust this person to precisely place a catheter in my spine, and he just clumsily broke two bottles?! Hmmm. Fortunately, he did just fine with my epidural and the medicine started working its magic by 11:40. Brad and I didn't have any visitors right then, so I took advantage of the quiet time and closed my eyes for a much-needed nap. The nurse woke me up at 12:20 because she could somehow tell on the monitors that I was progressing. She checked me, and I was 7cm dilated. She predicted that I'd probably deliver in a couple hours. No more nap... things were starting to get exciting! She checked me again at 1:00, and I was at 8cm. And at about 1:30, I started feeling some pressure. The nurse checked another time, and I was at 9.5cm. Almost there! Nurses and techs came in to get things set up, and I started pushing at 2:10. Brad and the nurse kept telling me "so close", "he's almost here", and "you're doing great", but I kept thinking that they must be lying. If Tyler really was "so close" and "almost here", my doctor would have been down where the nurse was standing rather than off to the side making small talk with me between contractions. Once she traded places with the nurse, I knew it really was time. And after just a few more pushes, Tyler Cole arrived at 2:38pm!

He was immediately put onto my chest, and I held him while the nurses clamped his cord, cleaned him, and checked his vitals. Then they took him to the warmer set up across the room to weigh, measure and finish cleaning. Tyler weighed 8lb, 1oz. My doctor had predicted 7lbs, and I thought 7lbs, 8oz, so we were both surprised that he topped 8lbs! Tyler was 21" long! Everything about him is long and skinny... torso, legs, toes, arms, fingers, etc. 

For the next hour, I held Tyler skin-to-skin and fed him. And then Brad took some time to hold him before we invited family in. 

We spent the rest of the day bonding with Tyler, taking photos and visiting with family. It was a "perfect" birth day, aside from one thing...

The night before, we had plans to go out to one last dinner as a family of three, and then Caleb was going to spend the night with his grandparents. Caleb started running a fever though. We decided to get takeout for dinner rather than going out to eat. We still had to send Caleb to the grandparents' for the the night, since we needed to be at the hospital fairly early the next morning. Brad's parents kept us informed of Caleb's condition on Friday morning, and by late morning, we decided that he needed to see his pediatrician. Since Brad and I were obviously not available, Brad's mom took Caleb to his appointment. Afterward, Brad's mom called and told us that Caleb had tested positive for the flu. So rather than coming up to the hospital to meet his little brother, Caleb spent the next several days with his grandparents and his little friends, Pedialyte and Tamiflu. 

Caleb's Second Birthday

We celebrated Caleb's second birthday with family and friends on Saturday, October 25th. 

Before his party, we attended a NICU reunion and Halloween party at the hospital where Caleb spent his first ten days. We saw our favorite nurse and also one of Caleb's NICU buddies. He and his family live about 1.5 hours from OKC, so we haven't seen them since Caleb was discharged. It was great to visit with his parents and see our boys together two years later.

On his actual birthday (Sunday, October 26th), he woke to a crib full of balloons (we did this for his first birthday too). We went to church that morning and spent the afternoon/evening at home playing with his new toys and reading his new books.

Goodbye Summer

Several cold fronts have been coming in over the last few days. While not officially fall for another week and a half, it certainly feels like it today. 

Even though Caleb's not in "real" school yet, the new school year brings lots of changes for us. Several of his therapists are either parents (so their schedules change to accommodate their own kids) or they work part-time in the schools. It's always crazy trying to piece together Caleb's schedule into something that works for us. What we've got going now seems pretty good, though we did have to give up some fun stuff like story time at the library. I'm still working part-time while Caleb goes to Mother's Day Out on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Caleb does speech therapy first thing on Monday mornings, before we go to work and MDO. On Tuesdays, Caleb has PT and OT. We also try to run errands or go to the park on Tuesdays. On Thursdays, Caleb does PT in the morning and then we head to the church so that I can participate in a Bible study. Caleb gets to play with his friends in the nursery while I take a couple hours to study and fellowship with other young moms at my church. Our Thursday afternoons look different from week to week. Sometimes we have an extra session of PT or speech, and sometimes we just enjoy some play time at home. Now that the weather is cooling down, I'm hoping that Thursdays (after nap) will be a good opportunity to go to the zoo.

Brad and I have talked about how we'll have to take a serious look at Caleb's busy therapy schedule (and therefore my busy schedule) as we get closer to Baby #2's arrival. I don't want to cut back on any of the things we're doing, but I know that we will probably need to. Caleb is in what we've been calling a " developmental explosion" lately. For now, I'm going to focus on all the exciting new things he's doing/saying each day, and we'll figure out the rest as we go. 

As for other changes...

Baby #2 is growing and making his presence known. The baby bump is starting to become noticeable to more people than just me. Brad got my maternity clothes out of the attic a few days ago, and I plan to get them washed and ready to wear sometime within the next few weeks. The baby is moving around a lot, and I feel him a little more each day. If this little guy is anything like his older brother, he will soon figure out that it's "fun" to get really active or have hiccups right as I'm ready to go to sleep. 

And my younger brother is gone for at least a year. We spent this past weekend with him in Texas and took him to the airport on Sunday. After a month of training, he will head to east Africa with the Navy Reserve. We're sad to see him go (even though he's excited about it!) and can't wait for his return sometime next fall.

It's a Boy!

And Then There Were Four

Brad, Caleb and I are thrilled to announce that we're going to soon be a family of four! 

Baby Johnson is due to arrive in early February 2015! 

Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change. - James 1:17