Jackson Dancing

Here's Jackson dancing to his favorite song. . .it's a little long but funny!

Happy 4th Anniversary Jay!!!!

Thanks for a wonderful first 4 years! I look forward to many more:)
January 29th, 2005

Weekend of Birthdays!

Friday night we had Gaga's birthday dinner at our house with Bill and Grandmommy, Gaga and Paw Paw Jimmy, and the 3 of us. We had a great time and Jackson loved being with the family:)
Saturday afternoon we went to Ellie's birthday party which was also lots of fun. We had a wonderful homemade lunch and got to see Ellie enjoy opening presents and eating a delicious but healthy (the same one Jackson had as his 1st birthday party) cake. Then we went to the hospital to visit Tara, Dave, Savannah and tiny baby Bonnie Kate who was born 5 weeks early on the 23rd as well.
Unfortunately we had to miss Christina's birthday party saturday night but I have a feeling we'll make it up!
Also both Friday and Saturday Jay and Jack went to the "man store" (aka home depot) for some fun home improvement ideas. Jackson LOVES to run errands with his daddy and Jay is so wonderful about taking Jax with him whenever he can.
What a great weekend of family time and celebrations!


Ellie's cute birthday cupcakes.



Singing to the birthday girl.



Cake overload!



Jay getting some birthday snuggles!



Jackson "helping" Ellie open her presents.



Daddy and Jackson having some man time.



Ellie with her mommy, gaga, and presents!



Jackson almost eating my fingers as I gave him some of Ellie's healthy cake.

Jackpot Adams at 17 Months

Recently Jackson has begun speaking much more. At first I wasn't counting all of his words but Jenna (my advisor:) says they count even if a stranger might not recognize the word out of context. So, since this serves as my baby book I wanted to make a list of the words Jax "says" at 17 months:)
momma
dada
gaga
nana and nanny (he says the same word for both)
papa and paw paw (same word for both)
whoa
boom (he says this when he falls down)
thank you (like dank ewww)
kitty
meow
puppy
bread
bar (for a larabar which we call nanabar)
book
shoes
tools
Ellie (ah ie)
Mia (mama)
Lennon (inin)
baby
no (he screams this as if he's being terribly abused any time he gets his diaper changed)
bye bye
cool
roar
yucky (uck)
hot
elmo (melmo)

He still signs MUCH more than he uses actual words but he is constantly babbling.

He is 30 pounds and 35 inches, he wears size 2T in most things. He goes to sleep at 6:30 p.m. and sleeps (I am crossing my fingers on this one) until between 6:30 and 7:45 a.m. He went down to one nap over Christmas and sleeps anywhere from 1-3 hours. The 3 hour days are awesome b/c I'm either super rested or my house is clean:)

He is such a little lover who kisses and hugs all of the time. His best friend is definitely Ellie and his affection for her is pretty funny. She's such a good natured little girl who is pretty much never phased by anything he does. He especially loves to hold her hand.

We have had some trouble with him hitting kids on top of the head but we're working on it. He always does well in sunday school despite crying as I walk away. It's so hard to leave him crying but they say as soon as I'm out of sight he happily plays with the other kids. We're currently working on time outs but he knows how to climb out of his pack n play so it's a challenge. He has only actually climbed out twice though so that's good. He's never climbed out of his crib and I'm praying he doesn't do it any time soon.

Most of our days are spent playing and just having care free fun. I am definitely not one of those moms who tries to teach their kids things super early or to put them in "school" at age 1 to get them to read. More power to those who are like that but I figure Jax will have the rest of his life to read and write and "work" so my goal is to have his early years be filled with lots of fun and creativity. I love just playing with him and helping him use his imagination. Being home with him is an immense blessing and I am enjoying it so much these days. He continues to bring Jay and I so much joy (and snuggles) and his constant happiness is amazing to watch. Jackson at 17 months is pretty awesome, I can't wait to see where his life takes him!

Monkey See Monkey Do. . .

I am learning all too well that whatever Jay and I do Jackson will soon copy. This will be an especially important lesson when he starts to talk more:) Regardless, last week I replaced the Elmo Live batteries and this weekend I found Jackson trying to replace them again. He knows where we keep the batteries and the screwdriver (although he of course grabbed the wrong size it was still amusing to watch him try).

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!

Happy Birthday to Gaga and Ellie!!!!

What's Next???

I have recently had to keep Jackson away from all stools, chairs, or anything else he might climb on. He uses them to get on top of the kitchen counter, table, etc. Anyway, he constantly assures me that he is one step ahead and that I'm wise not to leave him alone. Evidence below. . .


BTW-notice the light on in the bottom oven. He was originally climbing onto the oven door to get into a higher drawer to try to reach the cabinets (where he knows snacks are kept). I would have gotten a picture of that but it was too dangerous.



Now, I am definitely a new mom and amazed by everything he does, but is all of this typical? I just want to be prepared if all little boys are like this because we might have another one some day. I choose to tell myself that all of this running around is because he is such an incredible and unique little guy and that our next one might just like to read:) Of course I am kidding and really do get such a kick out of his inventive nature!

The Croup!

Friday Jackson woke up coughing like crazy. I just assumed it was a cold and that the crazy weather was getting to him but Jay and Adrienne talked me into taking him to the doctor. Luckily, they were smarter than I had been because it turns out he has the croup. Having Jay home on Fridays has been so nice and he got to go with us to the pediatrician (he had never been before). It worked out well because for some reason we had to wait for 30 minutes once we got back into the exam room. But since Daddy makes everything fun Jackson didn't mind at all!

Ellie and Jack. . .

After visiting Leanne, Skylar and baby Carter I watched Ellie so that Adrienne could help a friend with a new little one. I can't post pictures from every play date that Ellie and Jax have but these are too cute:)

Here are Jax and Ellie just playing happily. About 3 seconds after this picture was taken Jax walked by and bopped Ellie on the head. Now this was the first time he bopped her this day but it has happened before. She didn't seem at all bothered, however. . .


directly afterwards Ellie grabbed Jax by the back of the shirt and pulled him down to the ground. They both just looked up at me and I told Jackson not to hit her anymore or she would do it again. He also got a time out. But it was pretty darn funny that Ellie took charge:)



She also likes the tool set!



Here Jackson is being very sweet and playing nicely again.



Ever since I went to the mommy and me yoga Jackson is obsessed with doing "down dog."

Meeting Baby Carter!

Jackson and I finally made it out to see Carter Chase Zinglemann last Thursday. He is so precious! Leanne is doing really well and Skylar is a great big sister.

It was good to see Leanne doing so well with two kiddos. . .makes me feel a little better about the possibility of taking on another baby in the next few years:)





As is typical, as soon as I picked up sweet little Carter, Jackson wanted to snuggle me and hug the baby. And of course as he snuggled and hugged. . .he started to gently push Carter away from me:) He's a little territorial about his mommy.

Luckily Jackson and Skylar "played" really well together and I was able to love on little Carter for awhile!

Jack the Tool Man

Last weekend Adrienne sent me the link to a tool set on craigslist for Jackson. It has a few cracks etc. but for $15 it sure made his day. One day last week when he was missing daddy we pulled into the garage (it was out there so I could clean it) and Jack saw it and went crazy. I told him it was from Daddy and he LOVED it.


BTW-I had put water into the sink for Jax to play with but quickly realized it wasn't such a great idea. . .see how much of the water he is wearing:)

Jackson Talking

Here's a short video of a few of Jackson's words. In this clip we had just gotten home from spending several days with my parents and the Francis family for Christmas so there's laundry everywhere. He was so excited about his toys and their boxes that he won't talk for long but it's still a few of his cute 16 month old words:)

Blast from the Past

Ok, some of the things I post on here are just for me because this blog also serves as my scrapbook. But some of you will enjoy this as well. Here's Jay's kindergarten class picture. It's pretty darn cute and I am trying to picture what Jackson will look like at age 5 since he looks so much like his daddy.

Can you guess which one is Jay? (If you double click the picture you can enlarge it.)

Best Buddies

Here are a few shots of Jackson and his best pal Ellie at the park last week. Adrienne and I have tried to get them to both smile at the same time or to have them swing at the same level for a picture but it's not likely and they are having way too much fun to worry about it:)

I think they are planning something here. . .we are paying close attention!



Jackson was so excited to see Ellie! He kept trying to share his food and snuggle her. She is so sweet and he just adores her:)



A rare shot where they are both looking in the same direction!

Our Little Helper!

Jackson has been so "helpful" lately. Yesterday when Jay got up with him (while I was sleeping late. . .THANK YOU JAY!!) he said Jax did the sign for help and went straight to the play room. He was being so quiet that Jay went in to check on him after about 60 seconds. Yes, that is about the longest Jack can be in the play room without us needing to see what he's working on. Any longer than that and it can be dangerous! Anyway, here's what he found. . .

Cleaning the windows with baby wipes.



Even if he misses a few spots he's still the most adorable cleaning guy in the world!



Jay said Jackson was so proud when his daddy praised his good work.

After his nap I was doing the dishes from lunch and again Jackson wanted to help with the cleaning.

Polishing the tray.



Leaving no dust behind!

My Funny Brother In Law

Jenna noticed that one of my pictures of Jackson wasn't quite blog appropriate. . .opps! Anyway, my sweet brother in law, Shelby, quickly fixed it for me to repost. While fixing it he made me a few other versions for us to laugh at. This one just cracks me up although I'm not sure Jackson will love it at 15:)

Thanks Shelby!

Like Mother Like Son

Ok, so Jenna keeps saying that Jackson looks a lot like my baby pictures despite the fact that everyone else thinks he is a carbon copy of Jay. What do you think?

Here's me on the phone with Dacia about 28 years ago. . .



And the little guy helping with the dishes today.

Ok, well, I haven't yet posted all of the Christmas pictures or even captioned them yet, but let's talk about today. Today Jackson really missed daddy, the Francis family (we spent counless hours looking at videos of Mia and Lennon), and all of the grandparents he spent the holidays with but he made due with me:) He really wanted to "help" me with everything including the dishes. Here's my helpful little guy:


Aren't we all this excited to do dishes?



Those towels are totally necessary!



Jackson decided to ditch the diaper and hop on in!



This is Jackson's excited face. I had just asked him if he wanted to go visit Mia and Lennon soon.



"Cheese!"