3 months at a glance

I'm telling you - this working thing, taking care of a toddler, dogs, cats, husband and a house, etc, etc is busy work!! So I do apologize for not blogging for the last 3 months. I could say I'm going to be better, but we know I probably won't be, so you'll just have to settle for a post every so often.

Jack looking at his baby pictures

Since Feb - Jack's been talking up a storm. He says well over 100 words, many 2 and 3 word sentences and phrases, and he's starting to get quite the case of the Terrible Two's. He's an angel most of the time, but when he doesn't get his way he lets us know he isn't a fan of it. He'll smack the wall, couch, floor, etc. He talks back to you but you have no idea what he's saying.He's an amazingly funny little boy though...here he is having fun..

Yes - he's wearing my heels and pushing his truck around..so what?

He went into his basket and pulled out his hat and mittens and asked me to put them on him - I can't deny him so I put them on!!

This is Jack pretty much all the time - making us laugh..

He got his first haircut in March. He was ok for most of it and then the lady brought out the electric clippers and the noise scared him - so unfortunately his hair was cut crooked. Oh well. Next time I'll probably do it. Now that it's been 2 months since his haircut - he's gonna need another one!

Before

During

After

We dogsat Holly in April when Mom and Dad went down to Florida - Jack and Holly became fast friends and absolutely love each other. Well, except when Jack tries to sit on Holly - she's not a fan of that. But he loves to throw the ball at her and it cracks him up when she goes running for it.

So they shared a dog kennel..is there a problem?

Jack was watching the donkey at church on Palm Sunday

For Easter Jack got his first Easter basket full of goodies. The Easter Bunny didn't bring him anything last year cuz he was so little. He didn't get to search for it until after church and his nap. Then he came downstairs and his first reaction was "WOW!" It was adorable. We had a nice low-key dinner, just the 3 of us.

Coloring Easter Eggs

Easter Photo Shoot

At the beginning of May we went up to visit Grandma and Grandpa for the whole weekend. Jack had a blast playing in the sandbox/waterbox. He was full of sand and loved every minute of it. That told me when we got home on Sunday, we had to put his sandbox out that we got from a garage sale.

Now that the weather is nice, we go outside every morning before I have to work. He runs around with his truck, lawnmower, wheelbarrow or 4 wheeler. Plays in the sandbox - helps me garden, or walks up and down the sidewalk. We got a bike trailer to hook onto our bikes at the end of last summer and we're finally able to use it. He loves going for bikerides. He gets himself into the trailer, we buckle him in and we're ready to go. He just sits there, oohing and aahing about what he sees. We see people outside and he'll say hi.

Problem with the weather being so nice - Jack doesn't want to nap or come inside. It's a struggle sometimes, but we're managing.

This past weekend Grandma and Grandpa came down to visit for the whole Memorial Day weekend. We all had a lot of fun. We made 3 raised beds for our vegetable garden. Jack just watched us work and tried helping. He and Grandpa would get up in the morning, eat breakfast and then go outside. They were pals this weekend and really bonded - I loved it and I know Jack did as well. We all kicked the balls around the backyard and had a lot of fun. Jack was sad to see them go and kept asking for Grandma and Papa that night. We'll see them in 3 weeks for Jack's birthday party.

Can't believe Jack will be 2 in 3 weeks. So hard to believe. Time has just flown by. His birthday theme is Monkeys!! We call him monkey all the time because of him climbing all over things. We rented a monkey bounce house so we're very excited to see him in that. I know some people might say I go over the top when planning birthday parties, but he's only going to be 2 once. I want him to look back at pictures and know that I really went all out for his special day because he deserves it. I'd give him the world if I could. He's my life and reason for everything I do.

So I'll be posting more in the next few weeks about his party. I can't wait to see how everything turns out. It should be a good time. Keep reading!!

Sorry for the bad blogging!!

Time has gotten away from me again when it comes to blogging! I can't even imagine if I was working full-time. So this entry will be a run down of what has happened in the life of Jack in the last 2 months.

Dec. 19th - Jack had his 18 month well baby appointment and we met his new dr - she's fabulous!! She is definitely a better fit for us than his last dr - I'm just sorry we didn't make the move a long time ago. He weighed 30 lbs and was 33" long I believe. We don't have to go back to the dr until he's 2 which is coming way too fast!

Our annual trip into Chicago to see the Holiday Lights

Christmas Eve - Mark was working and the weather was just awful so instead of making our annual trip up to Fond du Lac, I decided it would be safer to stay home and keep my family safe. So Jack and I spent Christmas Eve on our own - I was pretty sad about it - Jack didn't know any different. I hope next year won't be such a lonely Christmas Eve.
Christmas - Because of me not driving up to Fond du Lac, Mom and Dad and Jessica, Alan and Owen all drove down on Christmas morning to celebrate Christmas together. Jack got up around 8 and we came downstairs to see what Santa brought - he brought Jack a toybox and a beanbag. Around 10ish the family arrived which was nice. We all had a great time and dinner was fantastic as usual. Well we all had a great time until the toilets backed up - so $250 and a plumber later we were good with the toilets..the joys of owning a house.

Day after Christmas - Mark finally got home from work so we celebrated Christmas with him that day - we opened presents and I made a Christmas dinner. We had fun and played games and drank a lot. The kids fought over Jack's new dump truck from his babysitter's daughter. Jack definitely told Owen off. Lots of tears were had between them. Gotta love it!

New Year's Eve - Marky had to work again, so Jack, the dogs and I all drove up to Fond du Lac to celebrate the New Year. My aunts and uncles and cousins were there, so we all had a blast, ate too much, drank too much and played games. 2009 is going to be a great year for our family.

New Year's Day - met up with the whole family at the snow hill for some sledding. Jack and I went down a couple times and he laughed going down but it was cold so that got old real quick. I was done but then Dad urged me to go down one more time on this particular sno tube so I did. Big mistake - I slammed my back into a tree and couldn't breathe..it took a long time to feel decent after that. Note to self - when I'm done sledding, I mean it.

Since New Year's Day - Jack's just been learning so many new things. Mark and I finally went out on a date for the first time since Jack was a newborn. Gramma came to babysit while we went to dinner and a movie - we had a great time and so did Jack and Gramma. He talks a mile a minute now - he loves picking up the phone and walking around the house with it. He talks and then laughs and throws his hand down - classic. The other day he had the phone and was talking on it, and then I heard someone on the other line. I looked at the caller ID and it was Mark - Jack had called his daddy! It was hilarious! Have to watch him now - he knows exactly what buttons to push. His new thing is whenever anyone leaves the house, he says Bye bye, miss you, see you soon and waves. He's the cutest!

Sharing Daddy's GuinessWe went bowling - he danced around the lanes..
His vocabulary has gotten so good - he has quite a repetoire of words now. Mommy, Daddy, Nana, doggy, happy, uppy, milk, want this, cat, Lily(pronounced Yih-yee), Holly(Ha-yee), bye bye, miss you, see you soon(see soon), love you (yuv you), baby, shoes, socks, icky, stop, no, cat, hello and so many more I'm forgetting. We're so proud! He is such a helper - he loves helping you with the laundry, loading dishwashers, putting his blocks away, picking up plates, grabbing slippers for you or shoes. His favorite TV shows are Lazytown and Oswald on Noggin - he still absolutely loves the theme from the soap opera Young and the Restless. He dances around when it's playing - it's absolutely adorable. When you put your coat on to go outside, he wants to go too. He'll run into the laundry room and grab his shoes and coat and bring them to you. such a character. I'll be adding photos into this post in the next couple days for all of you to enjoy.

Another new word

Jack said Hello as loud and clear as a bell after I said it to him when he woke up in the morning. He is growing by leaps and bounds and his vocabulary is getting larger and larger. We have his 18 month well baby appt on the 19th(well maybe not if we're going to get the 9-13" they say we are) - so we'll see how much he's grown since his last visit. And we get to see a new dr instead of Dr. P - hopefully she'll mesh better with us than he did.

Gramma and Papa's fleeting visit

Gramma and Papa came to visit and with them they brought our snowblower - what a Godsend!! We had fun visiting and Gramma and I baked a couple things while Jack was running around with Papa. We had Red's Pizza that night and after we were done eating Jack said This Off and was trying to take his bib off - so more things added to his list of words!!

We have a lot to be thankful for

Our dear sweet boy Jack - he's such a miracle and we're so lucky to be his parents. He amazes us everyday and we can't remember what it was like without him. We say this all the time that we'd rather have a messy and loud house with a toddler rather than a quiet, clean house with no pitter patter of little feet, or belly laughs. Hearing Jack laugh just melts my heart and he gives kisses and hugs now when you ask for them. He is an amazing little boy and everyday I'm in awe of him.

Thanksgiving unfortunately was a holiday spent without Mark because he had to work. But Jack and I and the girls drove up to WI on Wednesday afternoon. We dropped in on Gramma at work on our way through and then went to start baking. Thursday we got up and watched the Macy's Thanksgiving Parade together and the family started coming around 1pm ish. Jack was very funny and was just running around with Owen. You'll see a video of that in a bit.. The day after Thanksgiving Owen came over for a little bit in the morning to play with Jack while Jessica went Black Friday shopping - I did my shopping online. Then we packed up the truck and headed over to Gramma's work again for lunch. Then we raced through the office because nobody was there and pushed Jack in an office chair back and forth - he got a huge kick out of that. Then went up and down in the surgical chair. He cried when we left, poor kid. So all in all Thanksgiving was a whirlwind - it was nice to be with family but we really missed Mark/Daddy. Maybe next year we'll all be together.

Jack updates

I know I know it's been awhile. We've all been busy!! We just came back from visiting Gramma and Papa up in WI. We had a nice family get together on Saturday evening and we think that's what brought on his fever because we were outside a lot on Saturday and it was pretty chilly. So Jack just got over a virus - he had a 103.3 degree temp on Monday night and then a 102.2 temp on Tuesday night - took him to the dr on Wednesday and the dr said it was a virus but didn't give me anything for him except medication for a urine infection which he didn't have after they tested the sample. So frustrating! So we still don't really know why Jack had a fever, but it seems to have passed and he's better now. He's back to sleeping through the night and not wanting to cuddle as much as he did when he was sick.

He's also saying so many words! He now says Hi Ya! Socks, shoes, me, milk, cat, dog, mama, dada, baba, nana, stop and a few others that I can't remember. He is such fun!! He loves going to his babysitter's and he only sees her 3 times a week with the way my work schedule and Mark's work schedule is. So it works out really well. He loves playing outside and kicking the leaves around and running around on the driveway. He's fast! He helps when you clean up his toys, he also will bring you the remote when you ask him to or something he's not supposed to be touching - all you have to say is bring it here please and he does. Can't believe Thanksgiving is around the corner..time is just flying by - it's quite sad really but also very exciting at the same time to see what kind of person Jack will turn into. I'll be downloading some pics later...until then - enjoy the update!!

Jack's 2nd Halloween

Well for Halloween Jack was a bumblebee - he was so cute but he absolutely hated the costume. It was a warm costume and it was warm that day. I took him into work that day and everyone got a kick out of how cute he looked. He made quite the haul with candy. Then we carved pumpkins out on the patio table and then went over to Grandma Ethel's for a visit - she gave him loads of candy for his ghost pail. We didn't take him trick or treating this year just because he doesn't know how to say it and he doesn't really understand the concept yet. But we're gearing up for next year - we're not handing out anymore candy to disrespectful kids who don't dress up and just stand at the door holding out their bags and giving babies who look like they were just born candy..there's my venting over. Time is just flying when you have kids!