A New Year and New Beginnings

2010.... can you believe it? I remember when I was in Elementary school talking about the year 2000 and thinking that it seemed so far away and that it would never be here, now here we are in 2010. Holy cow.

We hope that everyone had an absolutely awesome Christmas/New Years. Ours was great and full of lots of exciting news! We spent Christmas here in Grand Junction with my family. Jon was able to get Trevor for a few days during their Winter break. It was a lot of fun, kind of stressful on the kids and the parents but we all had a great time and we're happy that he had a chance to visit with us! We spent Christmas Eve at my sister Jenny's house. The kids had fun playing together and looked sooo cute in their Christmas pj's. (Sort of a Johnson family tradition we've started)

This year for Christmas, Jon and I did something a little different. Instead of buying eachother presents we decided to buy one present for the whole family. I was cruising Craigslist and found an ad for a 1 year old Dachshund who needed a good home. So our Christmas present this year was one of the newest members of our family, Odie. He's such a good boy! He's protective of our family and sometimes gets a little anxious when he meets new people, but he's such a good addition to our family. The kids LOVE him!

Christmas day was great, we spent the day relaxing at my mom and dad's snacking on good food and enjoying their HUGE new tv. I had braxton hicks contractions all morning but they went away that evening. The next day, the contractions started again, but went away later in the afternoon. This kept happening on and off for the week until Wednesday morning.

Jon had gone to work at 2:30 that morning and I had the bed to myself. I woke up about 5:45 and felt like maybe I needed to use the bathroom... all of a sudden I realized..."OH MY GOSH, MY WATER JUST BROKE." No warning whatsoever... no contractions or pains... just....water....and blood. TMI?? I grabbed my phone and quickly called Jon. Thank goodness he was working in town that day and was able to call his boss and get to me quickly. We made it to Saint Mary's around 6:30am. By this time I was having contractions about 2 minutes apart. They got me all situated in a room and checked to see how I was progressing. The nurse was really great, the same nurse who delivered Gavin. Turns out we're kind of related. Her dad is my dad's cousin?? I think. Anyway, she was really great. By 7:00 I was dialated to 4cm. They called my midwife and started an IV. This time around I had much more freedom than my delivery with Gavin. I was able to sit in the hot tub for awhile as I waited for Anita. She showed up around 9:00am and checked me again. Wow... I was up to 8cm. At 9:39 Anita told me to start pushing and at 9:43 our little boy was born!

Tanner Royce Stanley was born 12/30/09 at 9:43am. 7 pounds 4.7 ounces and 20in long. He's such a sweet spirit, you can just feel the love he has when you hold him. We were able to come home from the hospital the very next night. It took us a few days, but he's starting to get on a schedule and sleeping for 3-4 hours at a time throughout the night. We're so lucky!

Jon had to go to work the very next morning due to some scheduling mix ups which was kind of a bummer, but it was better that he had to be there when I was in the hospital than at home by myself. It's going to take some time to get used to the fact that we have 3 kids now. We learned really quick that we needed a bigger vehicle. Jon went out on New Year's day and found us a 2000 Dodge Durango that has 3 rows of seating. It's nice to be able to fit comfortably and safely into the car now.

So we've had a great start to the New Year and can't wait for all the exciting adventures and challenges that 2010 may send our way. Happy New Year!