A week old and just in time for Father's Day!

What a fun time we have been having! Our little guy, Hayden Thomas Johnson is finally here and we couldn't love him more. He was 6 lbs 10 oz and 19 1/2 inches long and came on June 11th at 2:10 a.m. It's crazy how you can instantly love something in that short amount of time. The story behind how he got here:

Before there was three of us

Finished baking

I had a doctors appointment on Thursday June 10th. That day I woke up ready to have a baby. The whole 9 months I was fine, but for some reason I really wanted him here. I told Andrew that if they said I could go in then lets do it. I had planned on not getting induced the whole time through the pregnancy, but in the end I was SO glad I did. When I got in to the office he asked how I was and so on. And I told him that I wanted to have a baby today. Another reason being Andrew had 6 days off because of how his schedule worked out so it would be perfect. So he checked me and after he got done he said "lets send ya over you're good to go. You're at a 3." It was crazy and we were so excited. He told us to go home and get things ready and eat something and then head in.

When we were driving home we both thought that it wasn't real. We had a lot of people texting us asking how our appointment went, because they knew that we had one that day. We had to tell a few little white lies and say that our appointment had been changed and we didn't know anything yet. (Sorry to those we lied to :) We got home got everything ready and when we were about to leave Andrew gave me a blessing that was so awesome and gave me a lot of comfort and eased my fears of the unknown. Thank you Andrew! I'm so glad that you're a worthy priesthood holder.

"Laboring"

We got something to eat and then headed over. It took awhile it seemed for the nurses to get me all hooked up on IVs and monitiors. We found out after the monitors were on that I was already having contractions. I guess he wanted to come that day too. I started progressing really slow at first. I kinda got worried that it was going to be a really long labor. Dr. Leavitt came in at 10:20 p.m. and broke my water. I was at a 4 at that point. I'm so glad that I asked to have the epidural when I did because I went really fast after he broke my water. I feel like I felt what labor was like and it was plenty long. Hats off to all those pioneer women that didn't have the option of modern day medicine! I could still feel the contractions and so I had to have another dose of medicine. The nurse told me that I was progressing really fast and the epidural couldn't keep up with me. I went from a 4 to an 8 and basically ready to have the baby in around 40 minutes.

I started to push a couple times and then the nurse made me stop and went to call the doctor. She turned my pit down and said that I was going to labor down. I labored down for about 45 minutes and pushed some more. Then I had to wait for about 10 minutes for the doctor to come. After he came I pushed like 3 times and then our little guy was here. It was not bad at all and now I feel like I should get paid to have babies. Andrew was able to catch the baby and he gowned up and everything. He said it was a really neat experience. I'm glad that he was able to do that.

What he has been doing for 9 months inside me

Very 1st family photo

1st real bath

We put aloe vera in his hair to see if the curl would stay. . . it sure does. We had to slick it back later because it was a little unruly. Of course Andrew had his comb on hand ready to do the job.

Andrew has been worried this whole time about what his hair was going to look like. When he saw his head he immediately said to me " Steph, he has curly hair." Now he is TOTALLY obsessed with it. He loves to comb it and he always makes sure that before anyone sees him his hair is combed. My sister-in-laws gave us the comb and brush and Andrew has used that multiple times a day. Thanks Jackie and Jamie that was a perfect gift, more for Andrew than Hayden I think :)

I tease Andrew that he should just clip it to his belt because he uses it so much!

Such a good baby!

I have recovered SO good and have no complaints. I think the after labor effects were more painful than the actual labor (breast feeding and having my uterus contract back down). Those were a little toe curling for a few days buy totally worth it. I call myself Bessy the Jersey cow because I can pump that grade A stuff out! I'm afraid Hayden's going to be chubby really fast because there's a thick layer of cream on the top of the milk when it seperates. Andrew jokingly said that we should scrape it off and make baby butter :)

He has been eating really good and sleeping soundly. Usually Andrew doesn't even know when he gets up to eat because he doesn't cry when he wakes up. Just starts with the little rooting sounds. So basically right now he's been doing what all little babies do: eat, sleep, and poop, and of course make his parents love him more and more every day. We're so grateful that he is here and in our lives. What a miracle little babies are. Now that we have him we couldn't imagine him not here with us. We love being parents and have a lot to learn probably, but we'll for sure learn along the way. It's been so fun working as a team with Andrew. He has been so amazing with him. He helps me out so much and is very selfless. I'm so grateful for the wonderful husband and father that he is. What a great example Hayden has to follow. I love my boys!

Happy Father's Day Andrew!

Before we're full time parents. . .

Andrew and I have been trying to "fill our canteens", I guess you could say, before the baby comes. We have been having a lot of fun doing it too. The beginning of the year or something like that Andrew has been going with my brother Bryan bear baiting. Our house at one point was a popcorn factory where Andrew was popping garbage bags full of it to take up to the bait sight. To attract the bears you have to have a bait sight so they'll come and then you shoot them. I learned all of this through them. I didn't quite understand why Andrew kept on wanting to go up there and help bait the bears when supposedly he wasn't going to shoot one. He told me that he was doing it to "enjoy the great outdoors." Ok, and I bought it. Well "enjoying the great outdoors" really paid off for him because he was able to get his first bear. All and all I was really happy for him. He had a good time doing it too.

The mighty hunter

My dad was able to help too

Now that Andrew has his bear we've been able to do other things as well. One thing that we've been doing is playing Tiger Woods golf on the Xbox. I'm not a big gamer but ever since we got that we have been down playing that together all the time. It's been so fun. It's also made us want to play real golf. We think by playing it on the Xbox it's made us a ton better on the real course. . . right. We've been able to go quite a few times (for us anyways) since the courses have opened this year. There's a course in Shelley that is really fun and cheap to go to. We went memorial day with Andrew's family. They were so nice to let a 8 1/2 pregnant girl tag along with them. It was SO fun and we all did really good too. Andrew's dad Todd was the only one to think about taking a picture so he did on his phone. It didn't turn out the greatest, but I still wanted to post it on here.

Andrew, Me and "Hank", Grandpa Johnson, Jarom, and Todd

Inbetween everything else that's been going on Andrew has been stressing about putting our garden in, but we FINALLY got it all done. I told him not to worry about it because there has been tons of rain and frost. So on memorial day we went up to town and got all of the fencing (to keep the dogs out) and plants to start. We were out there all afternoon. We're glad that we finally got it done though.

Andrew preparing the spot

The finished product

I feel bad because Andrew did all the work and I just kept him company basically. But it was fun being out there accomplishing something together. So the next 2 weeks we're going to really live it up before our little guy comes and turns our world upside down, in a good way :)