Keeping Ourselves Busy

Here are a few things the boys and I have been keeping busy with lately:

Making Cards:
Ever since Valentine's Day and my birthday, Jackson has especially enjoyed making cards. Here's one he made with his babysitter for my birthday. I LOVE the picture of the two boys in it!!!



Here's the inside of a get well card Jackson made for his friend Patrick.


Inventions:
Jackson wants to be an inventor when he grows up. Here's one he made out of the "project bag" present I gave him for Christmas. It's Rodney Copper Bottom and Wonderbot from the movie "Robots." He assembled it all by himself.


Of course there are LOTS of Lego creations around here too and Jackson is getting REALLY good at coming up with some very creative designs ... he takes after his daddy!


Anything Musical:
Micah especially loves music. He walks around with his guitar and loves to sing songs. It isn't unusual to have pandora.com playing on my laptop throughout the day around the house.


"Animal Shelter"
It's a game both boys came up with that consists of getting out all of their stuffed animals and putting them in bed or on the couch with them. They pretend to take care of the animals ... Grandma Deb's got her genes in them for sure!



GeoTrax and Cars:
We got a few extra pieces of track for Christmas that allows for a bit more creativity and now the boys play trains almost every day. Jackson loves to build the track and Micah can watch the trains going around for hours ... well for a while anyay.



Getting Ready for a Sister:
Oh yeah ... and the boys have been getting ready for the arrival of their little sister. They are pretty excited to get to see her face to face and teach her all of the things they know and do everyday.

18 Month Old Check Up

Micah turned 18 months on April 25, 2010. His personality over the last several months has just blossomed and the paths of the two boys are now starting to diverge a little (as they should).

The Stats:
Weight: 24lbs 2oz 25%
Height: 33 1/2 inches 75%
Head Circumference: 49cm 80%

Micah's Schedule:
6:30 - some days he'll jabber in his crib and then go back to sleep
8:00 - wake up (sometimes he'll sleep till 8:30 if I'm lucky)
Noon - lunch
12:55 - small snack (we've found that he sleeps better at night and for his nap if he has a little snack (i.e. a cup of yogurt of peanut butter toast) right before he goes down).
1:00 - nap
3:30 - jabber or cry (depending on the day) in his crib until about 4pm if he doesn't just sleep until then ... more on this later.
4:00 - snack (not too much though otherwise he's not hungry for supper)
5:30 - supper
7:15 - bedtime routine including a little snack
7:30 - Bible story time, which he's gotten much better at sitting through over the last several months.
8:00 - in bed
8:30 - usually asleep

18 Month Challenges:
NAPS, NAPS, NAPS!!! Micah was sick over Easter and it took him awhile to bounce back which had a direct affect his naps.

At first he'd sleep about an hour and then wake up frantically crying. If I went in there to calm him down it only seemed to wake him up more, but if Colin went in there he'd go right back to sleep ... go figure ... it was the same if he woke up in the middle of the night, which he was doing during the time he was sick.

Eventually I tried rocking him for the rest of his nap to see if I could at least get him to take a full nap on me ... NOPE. My only choice at this point (knowing that he was perfectly healthy and perfectly capable of sleeping a full nap and through the night) was to let him cry it out. The evening cry outs were short lived, but the day time naps were not seeming to get any better UNTIL...

... one day Micah went over to a friend's house for a play date and came home after lunch, but right before nap time. I had no idea how much he had to eat for lunch, so I fed him some yogurt just in case and HE SLEPT AWESOME!!

Since then we've been giving him a snack before his nap and bedtime and he's been sleeping much better. He still has days where he wakes up early and sometimes he wakes up crying, but other days he wakes up happy (which I can handle much better), either way he stays in his crib until 4 o'clock because Mommy needs to have some down time.

18 Month Joys:
TALKING, TALKING, TALKING!!! Micah's vocabulary has taken off this past month and he's now even streaming two words together. Here are a few things you might hear him say:
"Mees!" - please
"Mee Mama!" - please Momma
"Hi,hi" - hide, hide
"Ah-min" - amen
"Da!" - yes
"No?" -no (I wish you could hear his intonation because it's so adorable)
"Moe" - more
"Up" - up
"Puppy" - puppy or any animal
"cows" - cars
"caka" - cracker
"me-mow" - Nemo and/or fruit snacks
"choo-choo" - train
"Ah-ah!" - monkey/Curious George
"Em-oh" - Elmo, but also elbow
"ni-ni daddy" - good night daddy
"da-di" - Jackson
"wee-oh" - wheel
"bi-boh" - bible
"dee-dus" - Jesus
"oots" - oops
He actually has quite a few more, but I won't bore you with a longer list than what I've given here. He's SO adorable when he "talks" and especially when he mimics his older brother ... thankfully Jackson is eating that up right now.

Micah's also showed some beginning signs of potty training readiness. The day of his 18 month check up he told me that he was poopy during lunch, but when I went to change him his diaper was empty. I asked him if he wanted to go poopy on the potty and he said, "Da!" (see above for translation) and to my surprise he went poop and pee on the potty! I've tried several times since then with no luck and it seems he has lost interest, so I'm not going to push potty training at this point, but it's a glimmer of hope for the future.

PLAY TIME! Micah and Jackson are now starting to play together ... okay well at least in the same room next to each other without me having to be present. It's been fun to watch them develop their relationship as brothers. Since this has taken place here are a few phrases you'll hear me say to both boys at various times and most likely several times during the day:

"You need to use your words if you want that toy and not just take it from him."
"He doesn't like that, you need to stop."
"Tell him 'no thank you' if you don't like what he's doing."
"Let him have a turn."
"Are you being loving?!"
"Go play in Jackson's room!"

Playing "together" at a children's museum.

Micah has caught Jackson's love of cars, but he also loves trains and puppies. He has a stuffed puppy that he sleeps with now (mostly because then he can play with it in bed after his nap until I'm ready to get him up). He'll walk around the house cuddling, kissing and talking to the puppy. He really is a cuddly little man and it is not uncommon for him to stop playing and find me just so he can cuddle for a minute or two (I LOVE THAT!).

He's starting to get more interested in reading entire books even with more than just a few words on a page, but he loves anything that he can take apart and put back together or that has multiple buttons on it. His absolute FAVORITE pass time is sitting in the parked car and playing with the steering wheel and all of the buttons and levers with Daddy. I may have to invest in a few more small motor skill toys in order to keep him busy in church and occupied on the potty once we're serious about training.

Micah's favorite thing at the children's museum.

Micah's personality is free spirited, adventurous and even at such a young age has some great comedic timing (although I'm not sure he's aware of that quite yet). He's shy around strangers, but once he warms up he can be such a HAM! He's a Momma's boy when he's out of his element, but when he's up for an adventure he runs straight to Daddy or his brother! :)

What more can I say?!

You are such a treat and a delight Micah! We love you SO much!

United States Flag

Our next door neighbors (the ones that I've blogged about before) are both in the military. When we moved in the father was deployed and now the mother has been deployed since August. We've become good friends with them and their daughter and Jackson are inseparable. So, we sent a thank you letter and picture to the mother soon after she was deployed and yesterday she sent us this in the mail:



Yes, that is Jackson using the USA flag as a blanket.

The certificate says that the "flag was flown over the skies of Afghanistan on the 9th day of February, 2010... in a Close Air Support mission in support of Operation Enduring Freedom in finding and destroying all those who threaten our very way of life. With great appreciation we present this certificate to those who support the few that fight for the freedoms of many: Colin, Corinne, Jackson and Micah.

We thought that it was WAY cool to receive that gift and what a wonderful teachable moment for Jackson to learn about our country and what we stand for. As a result we are now beginning to work on memorizing the "Pledge of Allegiance." I'll be sure to post the video.

Video taken on 3/10/10:

"It's a Hard Knock Life"

Jackson has started participating in chores around the house. He doesn't get compensated for doing them, it's just part of being in our family.

Everyday he makes his own bed and helps clear the table after supper.


He's also helped dust the living room shelves and vaccum the kitchen floor, but I don't expect him to do those regularly ... not yet anyway. ;)

Jackson prides himself in "becoming more of a man."

Jackson's First Big Purchase

Jackson has been receiving allowance for quite some time now. (You can read more on our views on allowance here.)

When he first began getting an allowance it burned a huge hole in his pocket every time we went to the store. It was important to have that time though. He quickly grasped the concepts of cost and payment for material goods.

Then we decided we needed to teach him a lesson in delayed gratification/saving. So Jackson picked out a toy in the fisher-price catalog and we cut it out and made a little count down calendar of how many weeks it would take to have enough money to make his purchase (9 weeks to be exact). Every week he could rip off a piece of paper and the last piece had a picture of the toy of his choice.

This week was the last week!! We are so proud of Jackson. He had many opportunities to spend his money before the end of the 9 weeks but he stuck to his goal. When he got his allowance on Saturday he and his dad sat at the table and counted out the amount he needed for his toy. (That was a good lesson too.)
All of the money he used to purchase his toy I put into an envelope and labeled it "Allowance $$" so that I could just keep using the same money over and over ... it makes it a little easier on Colin and me come Saturday (before we were scrambling around the house, car, couch, etc. for loose change because we weren't very good at planning ahead).


I pre-bought the toy (which I'm glad I did because they only had one left at the store) so that he could "purchase" it from me that morning and then play with right away (I even made sure we had batteries for it). He was SO excited and proud.



While counting what he had left in his bank I had the idea to start using dry erase markers directly on his piggy bank to keep track of his money (at least a rough amount) and it works great!


Jackson's already starting to talk about what he's going to save up for next. Did I mention that we are very proud of him? Delayed gratification is hard for most adults let alone a 3 year old.

Exercise for Toddlers

It seems like when Jackson turned three something happened. Mysteriously my content-sitting-and-reading-books-child became my spontaneous-bursts-of-energy-running-around-the-house-like-crazy-child.

We are pretty good at taking regular walks, but Jackson was needing more than that in order to get out his excess energy. It's been hard to get him outside to exercise when Micah is still taking two 2 hour naps during the day and I don't have a fenced in backyard to let him run around in. As I mentioned in a previous blog our neighbors were gracious enough to let us use their trampoline. That has really done the trick and here's how I get him to jump on it.

Every morning at around 9:30am (when I'm putting Micah down for his morning nap) I put the trampoline in front of our computer and let Jackson watch playlists on sesamestreet.org. It's really cool! You can pick a character, theme, subject and videos and/or games.

Each playlist has about eight games and/or videos and runs for about 20 minutes (although I've never timed it). I usually let Jackson pick which character(s) he wants and I select sports/physical activities for the theme and do only videos. I figure that way he'll at least get some videos that encourage him to be physically active.

The deal is that he needs to jump on the trampoline for every other video and rest on the alternate videos otherwise I turn it off and he can go play with toys (I don't want it to become an opportunity for him to veg out in front of the computer all morning).

There's also a playsafe feature which prevents Jackson from being able to navigate away from his playlist and from accidentally deleting anything on our computer. It's just a quick download and really easy to use.

Jackson loves his new workout routine and we can definitely tell during nap time and night time when he hasn't had his exercise for the day. Not to mention the fact that he's also getting really good at jumping which is fun. We still get out for walks (and runs), but it's nice to know I have a back up plan on those days when we just can't seem to make it out the door.

Humble Parent Moment

Jackson has collected three Lego cars from McDonald's Happy Meals.

Today, while I was getting ready to take the boys to the park, Jackson suggested he take one of the cars he had a duplicate of and give it to a child at the park. I didn't want to discourage his generosity so I said that would be very nice.

On the way Jackson asked, "why do I want to give this car to a kid at the park?" and we'd then recite one of his memory verses: "Do not forget to do good and to share with others for with such sacrifices God is pleased." (Hebrews 13:16 NIV) Like most 3 year olds he insisted we repeat this dialogue at least two or three times.

The park is a good 15 - 20 minute walk from our house, so I totally thought he would forget about it or chicken out once we got to the playground, but he didn't. There were two girls around his age playing and the first thing he did was run over to them and give them his car.

I had to reassure the parent several times that it was really what Jackson wanted to do and that there was no coaxing involved. I think both the parent and I were completely shocked, the little girl was excited to have a new toy (and friend), Jackson was proud of himself (but not too proud) and because of what the Bible says I know that God was pleased.

I was originally going to title this blog "Proud Parent Moments" and I am proud. Yet, God uses my children every day to humble me and remind me of the lessons I should be learning and applying in my own life as well.

Completely Random But Fun

Just some randomness... enjoy.




"Ask and ye shall receive." I mentioned to our neighbors that I was thinking about getting Jackson a trampoline because he's had SOOOOO much energy lately and they pulled theirs out of the back of the closet for us to use! How cool is that!!!




Colin had his company picnic last weekend and Jackson got his face painted like a monkey. I was surprised he sat for it. This is his best serious monkey impression.





It looks like Jackson chopped off some of my hair in the front... nope... it's just finally growing back in after falling out... ah motherhood.




I didn't really have anything randomly new about Micah, but I thought I'd include this fun picture.

Eating on the Go!

I'm sure I'm not the only Mom who makes meals intended to be eaten in the car or in a stroller. Often times, when I do, I struggle with how to make it a nutritious meal without having a million different baggies of veggies and fruit. So, I thought I'd share what we did for our meal on the go today:

Ingredients:

1 flour tortilla
1 Tbs. peanut butter (although I think cream cheese could work too if there are allergy concerns)
shredded carrots
raisins

Warm the tortilla in the microwave for about 30 seconds. Spread peanut butter on one half to 2/3 of the tortilla and put desired amount of raisins and shredded carrots on top of the peanut butter. Roll up like a burrito and serve immediately.

FYI: I actually ate one of these myself and it was really good. Jackson loved it and as long as you don't stuff it too full it doesn't make a mess at all.

8 Months Old and 3 Years Old

In order to organize my thoughts about these ages, I thought I'd write out a typical day in the life of my eight month old and three year old.

7:30am - If Micah's not already awake (which he usually is), I wake him up to feed him before Jackson wakes up because once Jackson is awake and vying for my attention Micah has lost all interest in nursing regardless of how hungry he really is. Micah nurses pretty fast now. Even in the morning when I'm pretty full he can drink everything in about 10 - 15 minutes and only needs to burp at the end of the feeding.

7:45am - I can hear the pitter-patter of Jackson's little feet as he comes running out of his room ready to start the day. He goes potty (usually he'll go all by himself, but still needs help putting his clothes back on when he's done) and I change Micah and we all head downstairs for breakfast. Of course there's usually some time to cuddle a little or read a quick book or play cars for a few minutes.

8:00am - Our breakfasts usually consist of scrambled eggs or oatmeal with some sort of fruit and a glass of milk. Micah is taking a mixture of pureed fruit (he's had applesauce, apricots and blueberries so far) and oatmeal cereal (rice tends to stop him up)about 3/4 of a tea cup full.

8:30ish - Micah plays in his saucer until he gets bored and we've picked up the toys he's dropped for the millionth time and then he rolls around on the floor. (I haven't baby proofed yet, but that time is coming VERY quickly. Luckily Jackson has been very good about keeping the big kid toys out of Micah's reach.) Jackson usually wants me to play cars with him. He sometimes drives them around on the couch or floor or makes them fly around the house, but most of the time he just wants them to talk to each other. He has quite the collection of hotwheels and pixar cars, most of which he paid for with his own money (he's now getting $3.00 a week for allowance... plus he got a bunch of birthday money).

9:30am - Micah goes down for a nap. I love how he snuggles up to me right before I lay him in bed. He's no longer taking a pacifier and whenever I give him one he treats it more like a toy than an object to sooth himself with (I can sometimes here him clanging his pacifier on his crib like a jail bird with a tin cup ... it's pretty funny). Jackson and I usually have some play time together during Micah's nap. We pull out the toys that are not safe to play with when Micah's awake like Legos and Play Doh. Some days Jackson will play by himself while I get things done, or he'll play on the computer while I take a shower. More and more Jackson wants me to play with him though and is very disappointed when I tell him I've got other responsibilities to take care of before I can play. It'll be nice when the boys can play together ... I hope.

11:30am - Micah wakes up and I nurse him. I'll usually let Jackson watch a video while I do this feeding because otherwise he's in and out of the room a lot and Micah gets too distracted. Micah LOVES Jackson and is mesmerized by him whenever he's around. Right now Jackson's favorite DVDs are "Thomas the Tank Engine" "Curious George" episodes and "Mickey Mouse and Friends." They have several short episodes on each of them (perfect for his attention span) and no "scary parts" as Jackson would say.

12:00pm - We all eat lunch. Jackson will eat just about anything. I try to serve him a variety of foods. He likes all of the regular things like hot dogs, peanut butter and jelly and chicken nuggets, but he also eats salmon, black beans, avocado, asparagus, etc. Micah usually has about 1 tea cup full of a mixture of pureed meat (so far he's just had chicken), a starch (like sweet potatoes) and a vegetable. Sometimes I'll mix in a fruit, but sometimes I'll serve the fruit in a different tea cup depending on what I'm mixing.

12:30ish - We finish lunch and play for awhile and then head upstairs to read books and get ready for naps (change diapers and go potty). If we do have the car for the day this is usually the best time for us to go to the library or store (I'll even pack a lunch for Jackson sometimes and take it with us).

1:30pm - Both boys are in bed and I get some time to blog, facebook, read, make phone calls, sleep, etc.

3:15ish - Micah talks to himself for awhile in his crib. Sometimes he'll go back to sleep and other times he'll stay awake until his next feeding.

3:30pm - Micah nurses and we have one on one time. He's figured out how to roll to where he wants to go, but he hasn't figured out how to creep yet.
He's getting there and he gets frustrated when he doesn't get or can't get what he wants. He's also starting to get frustrated when I take something away from him that he wants (particularly books).

4:00pm - Jackson wakes up groggy from his nap. He LOVES to cuddle after his nap and is usually pretty sweaty from sleeping so hard. This is probably one of my favorite times of the day. Then we all head downstairs and have a snack (all except Micah). Then we may go for a quick walk.

5:00pm - The past couple of days Jackson has befriended the girl next door. She'll be 5 in September, but they play very well together. Jackson has played at her house once and she has come over to our house a couple of times. This is the first friend that Jackson has had that I WASN'T good friends with the mom first. It was kind of weird, but a good reminder that I should be expecting that in the near future when he becomes school aged. Anyway, it's been a nice break to not feel like I have to entertain Jackson until Colin gets home. Jackson's been getting good at putting on a pouty face and saying, "but you said you would play with me Mom." Oooo ... it gets me every time. Micah's usually content enough to play by himself at this time and I can start working on supper.

6:00pm - Colin comes home and we all have supper. Micah eats with us in a high chair. I was feeding him in the Bumbo up until this week when he was insistent on bending over backwards (literally) to watch the TV (whether it was on or not) and it was very difficult to feed him that way. At the end of supper Colin and Jackson usually work on catechism or Bible memory work.

6:30pm - Micah starts getting a little fussy as bedtime approaches. He doesn't take a third nap, but he's definitely ready for bed when bedtime comes. However, he's been getting better during this time more and more every day. Jackson and Colin usually play outside while I clean up supper.

7:00pm - We get ready for bed. If they take a bath it's during this time.
After we're ready for bed we read books or play until Jackson's night light comes on at 7:30pm. Then Colin reads the Bible story. We try and get Micah to stay all the way through the Bible story, but sometimes he's just too fussy and I nurse him and put him to sleep in his own room while Colin and Jackson have one on one time.

8:00pm - Colin's already said good night to Jackson and I get some one on one time with Jackson in his room before bed. We usually talk about the day or talk about "Dis-a-neyland" (yes, Jackson STILL talks about it almost every night). I sing him one song, pray with him and say good night.

To end, here are a few of Micah and Jackson's favorite and least favorite things:

Micah's Favorite Things:

His brother.
Rolling, rolling and more rolling.
Experimenting with the sounds he can make with his mouth.
Putting anything and everything in his mouth.
Sucking on the collar of his sleep sack and or rubbing the collar on his cheek.
Playing tug of war with any fabric hanging above his head (it makes him giggle).
Going for walks in the stroller or in the wrap.

Banging, banging and more banging.

Micah's Least Favorite Things:

Vacuums
Blenders
Coffee grinders
When his brother cries.
Strangers (although he's getting much better)
Bottles

Jackson's Favorite Things:

His brother (making him laugh).
Cars, cars and cars!!
Books
Puzzles (he's mastered his 25 piece puzzles)
Legos

His Cool School computer game.
Trains (particularly Thomas although we have Geotrax toy trains).
Watching movies.
Playing outside (he pretends the lamp posts are rockets and launches to outer space)

Jackson's Least Favorite Things:

Having to stop playing to go to the bathroom.
Mr. Incredibles boss (the short guy) in the the movie "The Incredibles"
When Sully "roars" in "Monster's Inc."
Playing cars by himself.
Being stuck in a car or airplane for too long.
Getting his hair cut (although he's getting better).
Bees (but he's not at all afraid of spiders)

It's an adventure every day with my boys ... some might thinks it's kind of a boring adventure at times, but I like it ... no ... I LOVE it!

7 months

My Recovery

If you don't want to read about all of the female stuff that comes with having children, skip to the section titled Micah.

Micah will reach the 7 month mark on the 25th and I still have not started my cycle. I'm not complaining by any means, but I remember starting sooner with Jackson. However, I did start Jackson on solid foods a little bit earlier than I did Micah.

My libido is still pretty low, but I remember that with Jackson too. I don't think that it really became normal again until I was done nursing.

My hair loss seems to be slowing down finally too! (SIGH) It started to REALLY fall out when Micah was around 4 months old. I seriously thought I was going to go bald, but now it's slowing down and I desperately need a haircut.

I've been working out about twice a week doing 30 minutes of aerobics and 30 minutes of anaerobic. I'll also be starting a community class next week (Belly Dancing for Moms ... we'll see I guess). My pre-pregnancy clothes fit, but I'd have to say that the pants (particularly the jeans) are still not very comfortable to wear. Maybe I've just gotten used to loose fitting clothes?

Micah

We've spent a lot of time tweaking Micah's schedule over the past month and here's what it is now ... we'll see how long it stays this way, but we are definitely in a groove (BUT we are traveling this weekend, so we'll see what happens):

7:15am nurse
7:45am solids
9:15am nap
11:15am nurse
12:00pm solids
1:15pm nap
3:15pm nurse
5:15pm nap
6:00pm solids
7:15pm nurse and bedtime

I know it goes against Babywise to have a gap between nursing and solids, but my logic is that I want Micah's solid food intake to align with when we eat meals as a family and starting Micah's day at 8am has been difficult with the days I need to take Colin to work in the morning. We'll see if that bites me in the butt later on.

So far Micah's had rice and oatmeal cereal, acorn squash, sweet potato, yam, avocado and peas (all of which I've successfully made on my own). He's been eating about half a tea cup full or about 4 cubes of food at each feeding (less at breakfast because he drinks a lot more milk for that feeding).

It felt like nap times were hit and miss this month. There were times when I felt like we were doing great and then other days I'd be so frustrated because he'd wake up 30 minutes to an hour into his nap crying and the only way I could get him to go back to sleep was by putting him in the swing. (I have to remember that he had a TERRIBLE ... make that TWO TERRIBLE colds in a row this month).

However, this week has been much better. I'm also pleased that I haven't had to give him his pacifier much unless he's over tired. I think that's been the key for Micah ... getting him down for a nap BEFORE he gets fussy. For right now that's been about 2 hours after he wakes up from a nap.

He has been taking three naps a day, two of which are about 2 hours long and one that is about an hour long. BUT the past couple of days he's been waking up in the middle of the night (1 or 2am) wide awake (at least he's happy) for about a half an hour. He puts himself back to sleep, but then he wakes up for the day around 6:30am. SO, we decided to cut his third nap down to 30 minutes rather than a full hour. So far that seems to be working, but this is only the second night we've tried that.

Micah's sitting up and rolling over consistently. He loves sitting in his exer-saucer and under his play gym. However, his favorite activity is going on walks in the Joovy Caboose stroller we just got off of craigslist (Jackson loves the new stroller too). Micah's favorite toys right now are teething rings because I'm pretty sure he's starting to teeth.

He also started babbling a lot more in the past couple of weeks. His first babbles were "bah-vah" which sort of sounds like "brother" (of course Jackson just ate that up). It's possible that his newly discovered babbling, teething and a growth spurt may also be factors in him waking in the middle of the night.

Stranger anxiety also kicked in this month. I was surprised to see that he was fine at church last week when we were all sitting down, but as soon as the service was over and everyone was walking around he lost it. I'm also surprised that he tends to cry when young girls or young women look at him rather than men. We had a babysitter about a week ago and I guess he cried almost the whole time. BUT he took the bottle just fine! YAY!

Jackson

Jackson continues to surprise me everyday with how much he is growing up. He's taken the initiative several times now to go potty by himself. He has been playing by himself VERY well lately too, which makes it easier for me to get things done when Micah is napping.

Lately Jackson has really picked up on the concepts of phonics and it's been fun to watch him explore words and make up his own words. It's a bummer though that he's also developed motion sickness, so books in the car are no longer an option.

Jackson loves his little brother and prides himself in being a loving big brother. I couldn't have asked God for anything better than that!

Library Cooking

I KNOW I just posted a blog with baking in it, but we had so much fun doing this I thought I'd post it anyway.

We LOVE going to the library regularly and every once in awhile we'll get a book that has a recipe at the end. This week we got "Wild Boars Cook" by Meg Rosoff and Illustrated by Sophie Blackall and there's a Massive Cookie recipe at the end, so we decided to make it.



















Cooking with Jackson has been a GREAT way to teach him the importance of following instructions and it's just plain FUN!

However, between the cupcakes and the massive cookie I could get myself into some major caloric trouble!!!

Here are a few other books that we've read that have recipes at the end. We didn't make all of the recipes, but I still hope you enjoy the books as much as we did!