Preschool pictures 2012

Say hello to the cutest little preschooler ever! At least to us. :-) Look how handsome he is sitting up so straight and smiling so sweet. He is 2 in this picture but he looks like he's 4. He growing up too too fast.

Technology

I still consider myself new to this whole motherhood thing.  I think I will always feel that way somewhat, since Jax is my only son and everything he does will be a new experience for both of us.  I am having a hard time figuring out how much time Jax should have in front of the TV or playing games on the slider/ipad.  Although Dora the Explorer is educational and the games/puzzles he plays are teaching him stuff, I still don't want him to spend too much time with either of them. 

Right now, we let him watch 2 episodes of Dora while Tony gets ready for work and 2 episodes after we get home from work. Since he has learned to play on the slider, he wants to do that everyday too.  Some days I let him and others I don't, and sometimes I make him choose between Dora and the slider.  We still have a couple hours to play and read and hang out together after work but everybody gets to have some alone time to watch TV or play on the slider or computer or jsut chill out after work/school everyday.

I guess if it works for us, then it's fine. We get plenty of snuggle and play time together. I just don't want him to be behind.  It seems like you need to know your way around the computer by the time you are in kindergarten nowadays.

Noticing little things

Sometimes it still blows me away that Tony and I made this little kid.  It is truly amazing to watch him grow and learn new things every day. To watch him turn from our little baby into the little boy he is becoming.  He is so smart and clever and his sense of humor is growing so fast.

I love noticing new things about him.  Little things he does today that he didn't or couldn't do yesterday.  Little things that show me just how linked we really are.  Like his cowlick in the front of his hair (he got that from me) or his funky climbing toes (he got that Tony).

I usually hold Jax for a few minutes before I put him to bed.  Usually, I rub or scratch his back.  I never know if he likes it because he always puts his hand back there and plays with my hand.  So I stop and he continues to play with my hand.  Well, last night, when he did that, I asked him if he liked mommy scratching his back and he said yes.  I asked him if he wanted me to keep doing it and he said yes.  It made me smile.  This is only a cute story because that is exactly what Tony does when I am scratching his back and I stop.  He starts playing with my hand and tells me to keep scratching.  I am assuming that is what Jax was doing when he kept playing with my hand after I stopped.  I guess he was telling me to keep going.  Just like his daddy.

Everyone who knows me, knows that I have a weird way of eating my food.  I don't eat the ends of anything and anything can have an end. Even circles have an end. This has puzzled people all my life, but that is just the way I eat.  If anything is sticking out of my food, like an extra piece of crust, I have to pick it off, I won't eat it.  Well, I have noticed lately that Jax has some issues with what he will or won't eat too.  I gave him some chicken nuggets that other day and one had some extra crust sticking off of it and he said yucky and asked me to take it off.  I also only like to drink out of specific cups.  Some cups are too heavy or thick and they make the drink taste weird to me.  Well, we found out that Jax will only drink out of specific cups too.  We tried to give him some new sippy cups and he refused.  He likes what he likes. I'm sure he will grow out of this one pretty fast though. So far he doesn't have my "end" issues, but I just think it's cute that little parts of me are coming out in him. Even if they are "issues". :-)

I've got the magic kisses.

We are at the phase that when Jax gets a boo boo, he tells us "Ouwee, I got a boo boo right there."  The only way to make it better is for mommy or daddy to kiss it better.  I didn't know if I had the magic touch but once I bend down and kiss it better, Jax lets me know "I feel better now."  That makes me smile every time.  I'm so glad I've got the magical kisses to make my baby feel better when he needs it.

Are kids born manipulators?

Are kids born manipulators? Sheesh! This kid has my number at bedtime. Mommy, hold you, he says with a sadface and sniffles (Okay, one more time) Covers! (well, he can't sleep without being covered) Say prayers again? (no but I'll give you kisses again) Mommy hold you! (I'm gonna get daddy to put the gate up). Jax is finally asleep. :-)

This is our routine almost every night.  Some nights it's annoying and others nights I can't help but smile about it.  He is so cute...even when he is manipulating me.

Thanksgiving

We always have a big group for Thanksgiving.  This year is was about 25 people at my sister's house.  It's always nice to see all the cousins, big and small.  Here is how it went down this year.

 

Here we are eating our turkey dinner

 

 Now it is time to go play

 Daddy helping Jax cross the balance beam

Giving Caleb a swat on the booty

 Have a grand ole time playing by himself

Looking at the planes with Ahma

  

The Ricciardo, Burgess, Taylor clan

All the little kiddies

Halloween and Veterans' Day Parade

I'm running behind on my holiday posts.  Here is a compilation of Halloween and the Veterans' Day Parade.

 

My little Fire Chief 

 

With daddy on the haystack

 

At the pumpkin patch

 

I'm a snow bunny

 With Ahma at the Veteran's Day Parade

 Waving his flag

 Waiting for the parade to start

 Watching the soldiers go by

 I love my little boy

Cute things he says

Jax is at the age where he's got a lot to say.  Most days it amazes me how much he can talk and communicate now.  Half the time I don't understand him because he just has so much to say but can't quite get the right words to come out. Most of the time if I can figure out 2 of the words, then I can figure out what he is trying to say.

Some things he says:

Mommy hold you = Hold me mommy.

Where'd dat come from? = What is that?

Say Prayas? = Say prayers mommy.

I frow it? = Can I throw this?

Bobble = Bottle

I pooted = I farted...I'm assuming someone at daycare says this because we call it a fart not a poot.  We get confused when he says it because we aren't sure if he means he farted or if he pooped since they sound so similar.

Move cars! Go! = Get out of our way cars, I want to go home!  He usually says this on the way home from daycare.

Dare she is! Dares Dora!  Hi Dora! = There's Dora!  Dora's on!  He gets so excited when he gets to watch her show.

Watch Dora on TV Please? =  Can I Watch Dora on TV Please?

Dats tasty! = That's tasty!  I don't knwo who taught him the word tasty but it is the cutest thing ever.

Mommy, help you! = He really means, Mommy help me, but he just can't get that concept yet.

Some things I've learned so far.

You really do forget all the pain of giving birth.  I was so medicated I felt nothing but I really don't remember the first few weeks after having a c-section and all the yuck and pain that went along with that. 

Poop stinks.  No matter how big or little, runny or firm, if it is your 1st or 1000th poopy diaper, it just stinks.  Sometimes the littlest poop is the deadliest and sometimes you don't know what you've got until you look.

Toddlers are bipolar. Happy go lucky one minute and a screaming, growling, running away like a crazy person freak show the next minute.

I now understand why parents watch their babies sleep.  They look more peaceful than I could ever imagine myself to be.  I love watching Jax sleep.  The last thing I do before I go to bed is look at him for a few minutes.

I never knew I could be friends with a 2 year old.  He is so funny and fun. 

I still love nap time.  I loved it as a kid and I love it as a mom for the same and different reasons.  He gives me an excuse to take naps now and if i don't, then I get a few minutes to myself.

I CAN survive on 6-7 hours of sleep.  Sometimes even 4 hours of sleep but it doesn't mean that I will never get back to sleeping 10 hours straight again.

Potty training is not fun.

He gets more fun and complicated every day.

Loves and stuff

Lately, I've noticed that Jax is ALL BOY.  He loves to wrestle and fall down. He loves jumping on and off the couch. He loves rough housing and when Tony throws him in the air and catches him.  He will run across the room and jump into your lap, and I mean literally run and jump so you better be ready to catch him or you are both gonna have a fat lip.  He is so full of energy.

He has started using his imagination quite a lot.  His dinosaurs have begun to roar more often and hide under the pillows on the floor.  His Dora doll got thirsty the other day, so he gave her a drink from his sippy cup. She can have water but only Jax can have milk.  He is reading aloud to himself a lot too.  He loves hiding his toys and asking you where they went.  We go from place to place looking for them.  Most of the time, he hides them under pillows.  I have to look in at least 3 places before I can find them or he makes me look some more.

He says hi to Dora when she comes on the screen as if she is real.  Maybe she is real to him.  I don't know how that works in his little head. 

He has a few hiding places now.  He will hide in my closet behind my clothes and say, I'm hiding mommy.  Where am I?  Or when he wants to be alone, he will hide in between the couch and chair.  He has made himself a little fort with some pillows over there.  He can also crawl behind the couch.

He loves us to chase him around our little circle from the living room to the dining room to the kitchen.  He is so fast.  It's so cute how his feet kick out the the sides when he runs.

He loves to watch people dancing on TV and he dances right along with them.  He loves to be tickled.  He has the cutest little laugh when you tickle him in the right spots.

He is growing up so fast right now.  So many words and sentences are coming out of his mouth.  His new word is Tasty.  I was chewing gum last night and he asked, What's that mommy?  I said gum.  He said is it tasty?  I said yes, yes it is.  So cute.  Tasty, where did he get that?

Nipples

Well, Jax asked about nipples last night.  Tony and I were watching TV and Jax kept getting out of bed so we let him stay up a little longer.  Tony didn't have a shirt on and Jax pointed to Tony's nipples.  Tony said those are my nipples.  You have them too.  We told him everyone has nipples. Then Jax started counting them. Daddy has 1 nipple, 2 nipples.  Jax has 1, 2 nipples and then he looks at me with sort of a questioning gaze.  I said yes mommy has nipples too. So he points to my boobs and says 1, 2 nipples. 

Can't wait for the more intimate and embarrassing questions that are sure to come soon.

Daddy do...Jax do

So Tony and I are sitting on the floor in the living room watching TV and all of a sudden Tony farts.  I get all disgusted and yell at him and Jax comes over to us and I say Jax, daddy farted!  Ewe, Yucky!  He looks at me and says daddy fart, Jax fart and he stands there and sticks his butt out and pushes out a fart, smiles and leaves the room.  Tony and I busted out laughing.  Tony was so proud and all I could think of was this is what my life is going to be like now.  Boys!!!

Pacifier and sleeping through the night

Somehow, after 2 years, we have maybe finally gotten rid of the pacifier.  Good thing too, because we only have 1 more of the kind that he likes and they don't make them anymore.  3 days ago I put him to bed without it and he didn't ask for it.  Then he took a nap the next day and didn't ask for it and so on and so forth.  I have heard it takes 2 weeks to kick a habit.
Maybe just maybe we have nipped it in the bud.  Fingers crossed.

Also, he has been sleeping through the night in his bed for the past 2 weeks.  We told him he was gonna have to stay in his bed until the sun woke up from now on.  It took a couple of nights to get adjusted but now he pretty much makes it all night until about 7am in his bed.  Then he wanders into our bed and either goes back to sleep for a bit or asks to watch Dora.  I miss him being next to me all night but finally after 2 years, we have our bed back.  Amen.

Acceptance

Not by choice, but over the past year, I have had to accept the fact that Jax will be our only child. It is only recently that I have really come to accept it.  It tears me up inside just writing about it because it makes it that much more real.  I really wanted him to have a sibling, someone that even when they didn't get along, they would always have that brotherly/sisterly bond and someone to be by them even when we are gone. I don't talk to my sister everyday or see her every week but I know if I needed her she would be there.  She knows things no one else knows about me for the simple fact that she is my sister.  We haven't always gotten along but we have a bond that is forever, no matter what.  I just wanted that for Jax but I can't give it to him and that sucks.  I wish he had a closer relationship with his cousins but that hasn't really happened yet.  I don't know if it is because he is younger or what, maybe when he is older they will hang out more.

When Jax was 3 months old, I tripped over the dog while holding him and I saved him from getting hurt and not me.  I got 3 bulging discs in my neck and back and have tried everything from Icy Hot to shots to massage and chiropractors and medication to take away my pain.  I had hoped that my pain would go away or we could find a solution to fix me but the only thing that works is medication.  Medication that I cannot stop.  If I do, I cannot pick up or play with my baby and I am in terrible pain 24 hours a day.  How can I get pregnant or be pregnant if I can't stop the meds?  The answer is I can't.  At this point, there is no end game to this medication.  I am on it for the long haul.  Adoption is not an option for us.  Some people are made to adopt and some people are not.  We are not.  So this is the situation we are in.

I have been trying to focus on the positives of having only one child.  We can spoil him (if we want).  We can send him to the best schools. He won't have to share our attention or clothes with anyone else.  We can be there for all the important stuff and not have to split it up or alternate between another kid.   We can save more money for our future and for his college.  He will be more independent.  I know there are more things, these are just some of them.

Jax is imperfect perfection to me...if that makes sense.  He is as stubborn as Tony and I put together and has my temper and hates vegetables, and is scared of loud noises and loves to throw things he's not supposed to but he also gives hugs and kisses and tells us he loves us and sleeps just like his daddy and has my chin and a giggle that makes me laugh so hard and I love all of it.  Every little bit of him, I love. 

If he is the only little baby I get to have, then I am blessed beyond what I deserve.  He is everything I hoped and prayed he would be.  He got the best and worst of Tony and I and I love all of it.

I am sad and happy right now.

First REAL haircut.

I had been putting Jax's haircut off for too long.  I tried to cut it a couple times at home but the sides have just gotten out of control.  So it was time for the real deal. We explained to him what was going to happen and he seemed okay with it.  He said no a few times but didn't put up a fuss when it was time to get it done.  

 We tried to have him sit in the chair by himself but he wasn't having any of that.  So mommy sat in the chair and Jax sat on my lap.  Tony was getting his hair cut right next to us which I think made it easier seeing daddy get it done too.  So I told the lady not to cut too much off, just clean him up a little.  So she started cutting and Jax just sat there and we talked and played while she cut away. 

 Jax did a great job and he looks so handsome and grown up now.  

Still my sweet cute little baby boy.

October 7, 2012  5:15pm

Gross story

Here is another gross story from the land of Jax.
Last night I was getting dinner ready so I told Jax to go play in his playroom for a little bit.  I went into the living room for a few minutes while the water was boiling and I realized I hadn't heard anything from Jax in a few minutes so I went to look in the playroom for him.  He wasn't there.  So I continued to look and I found him on the kitchen floor, squatting over the dog/cat water bowl with Sadie's chew bone.  I looked at him and asked him what he was doing?  I already knew the answer wasn't gonna be good.  He looked at me, took the chew bone, put it in the nasty water that I had asked Tony to change for the past week but he didn't, used the chew bone as a spoon, swirled it in the water and proceeded to put it in his mouth and suck it all in. This water was nasty as you can imagine. I almost puked right there.  He had probably been having a nice little drink for about 3-5 minutes before I found him. I immediately told him to stop what he was doing.  I got down to his level as I am still dry heaving and he proceeds to pull a wet dog hair out of his mouth. (Insert puke in mouth.) 

Why oh why is my kid obsessed with the dog's water bowl.  It can't taste good. Hopefully he can't contract any dog germs from it.  Ugh!  It still makes me sick just writing about it.

I have to wonder if this is just something that my kid does or is it a common occurrence?  I'm probably just lucky. ;-\

Videos

Waddle Waddle

I love you 

 

Sippy cups and pacifiers

We have a very particular boy.  He likes what he likes and will give you the stink eye and pitch a fit if you try to give him anything else.  We are are having a situation with sippy cups and pacifiers.  Throughout Jax's life, we have probably bought about 25 pacifiers, yet we can only find 3.  To make matters worse, the kind that Jax's likes are discontinued.  And when I say the kind that Jax likes, I really mean the only kind he will allow within a 5 foot perimeter of his mouth.  I have looked everywhere for these stupid things and I've come to find that they have changed the design.  There is only a slight difference in color and shape of holes on the sides but Jax is no dummy.  He knows if I try to give him one of the updated versions and he will through it across the room and yell at me if I even offer it.  Such a predicament.  Do we buy the last of his kind that are online or do we just decide this is the end of pacifiers once we lose these?  I think we are leaning more towards the latter but we got a preview of what no more pacifiers looks like and it ain't pretty.

Same thing with the sippy cups.  Jax likes a certain kind and they no longer sell it.  I tried buying him some with Dora and Elmo and Cars on it but he is smarter than I give him credit for.  Either the top is too hard or too soft or too big for his little mouth and he throws it on the floor.  He will go without drinking just so he doesn't have to drink out of those cups.  Such a particular little boy.  Such a little butthead! :-)  Gotta make it harder for us.  I really don't know what to do about this issue.  I guess he is gonna have to switch to big boy cups sooner than later.

I still wonder where all those pacifiers have gone.  I guess we will find them when we move in 20 years.  I'm certain the house has eaten them.

2nd birthday video

click on the link below and turn up your speakers for an awesome video of all the things Jax has been up to this past year. :-)
Jaxson's 2nd birthday video

Happy 2nd Birthday!

Two years ago, I became a mama.  It is the best job I have ever had.  I love being your mommy and everything that comes with it.  From the good night cuddles to the freak out of nowhere tantrums.  I love it all.  You are growing up way too fast.  But I am so proud of the little boy you are becoming.

This year we had a Mickey Mouse party for you. You woke up and saw the Mickey Mouse banner on the wall and you were so excited, you were jumping up and down yelling Mickey! Donald! Goofy! Like they were really there in front of you inperson. It was the sweetest thing. Once again, the wrapping paper was more exciting than your gifts at times but you really had fun playing with your new toys once things settled down. You were really excited to see everyone.

 

 

 

 

 

 Happy Birthday Jaxson!