Birthday Celebrations

With the arrival of Paxton I wanted to keep things simple for Jack's birthday. We had a little party at his school and then celebrated at home as a family on his actual birthday. A few weeks before his birthday we were facetiming with my mom and nephew. Mason was talking about how he was going to have a ninja turtle birthday party. Jack decided that is what he wanted to. Even though, he doesn't watch Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I thought he would forget about it, but he was pretty insistent. So, I picked up TMNT plates, napkins, and cupcake toppers for his class party.

Jack was so excited about his party at school that he hardly napped and when we arrived for his party he was the only kid awake. We had to keep telling him to be quiet until his friends woke up.

On his actual birthday I decorated a little the night before and when he woke up he got to open up a rocket shirt to wear and then we went on a donut date.

When Ty got home, he opened presents and had cake.

Paxton dressed for the birthday theme!

THREE

Jack,
Happy birthday to my big three year old! I feel like I blinked and you became a big boy overnight. The biggest change happened in the last few weeks--you became a big brother! You have adjusted relatively well and love baby Paxton. You give him short spurts of attention and then move on to the next thing. You are a pretty busy boy!

You love to be outside and ride your tricycle around the neighborhood. You love, love, love it when Daddy gets home from work. You stick to him like glue and don't give him a moment of peace. And he loves it! You are truly the highlight of every day. You love to wrestle, play tag, and hide and seek. Your daddy will make a bird call when he is hiding to help you find him. You have started doing this when it's your turn to hide. It's hilarious. When you play tag or really any time, you will stick your hands out behind you and yell robo powers or turbo powers or super powers. You use them all interchangeably, but it apparently gives you an extra boost!

You have really started pretending and more often than not want us to call you a character from one of your favorite shows. We frequently role play with Mike the Knight, Miles from Tomorrowland, and recently Dash from The Incredibles. Daddy and I are always one of the characters too, and you will ask over and over, "What's your name?" until we say the right character's name.

You love to sing and are pretty good at making up songs. You get that from your daddy. He is real witty like that. You like doing art projects and it is so fun when you come home from school with a drawing and there is a little note written on it from your teacher telling us what it is. You have drawn pancakes and circles for Mommy and a rocket ship for Daddy.  You are pretty into rockets and we had a rocket ship birthday party for you this year. You also had a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle party at school. When you found out that Mason was having a TMNT party for his birthday, you insisted on having that as your theme too. When we showed up at school for your party, you were the only one up from nap time. Your teachers said you didn't sleep long, because you were so excited for your party.

You are a cookie monster and your favorite kind is Chips Ahoy chocolate chip cookies. You prefer these over the much superior homemade kind and ask for them for breakfast every morning. We don't indulge you at breakfast, but you do get one every night as a bedtime snack with your milk. You love snacks and would much prefer to snack over eating a meal. You do love pizza, hot dogs, cheese, pork chops, and applesauce. You eat a lot of fruit, but not so many vegetables, although you will eat peas.
You also love smarties and we save those for church in an effort to keep you quiet.

You moved to a big boy bed several months ago and do pretty good. We are in a bit of a regression now that Paxton is here and your schedule is a little off. You still sleep with bunny and have become really attached to your doggie. Doggie is small and we are constantly looking for him before nap time and bedtime. You do really well with going to the bathroom during the day, but we still put a diaper on you at night and at nap time.

Here are some bullet points from notes I have kept on my phone the last six months:

• You say "Oh dreidels" when something goes wrong. I'm pretty sure you picked this up from Miss Aya at school.
• Your prayer on 2-18-15: Dear God, Thank you for Mommy, Daddy, and keep monsters out of my house. Amen.
• Conversation while rocking before bed:

Jack: Daddy is texting me.
Me: What did he say?
Jack: He's on his way.
(This would have been when Ty was working a night shift and most definitely was not on his way.)

• "I have a question for you." He will then proceed to tell you something and not ask a question.
• "I work in Omahoma (oklahoma) City."
• "What are we going to do today?"
• "Actually"
• "I think so."
• We use the anatomically correct name for private parts. Jack says "peanuts" instead.
• One night during bedtime Jack read to me from his Bible. First he put a little fist to his mouth and cleared his throat and then said "Jesus loves us." Then he put his fist to his mouth again and cleared his throat some more and said "Jesus saves us."
• Your daddy worked 5 weeks of nights, so it was just us for bedtime during the week. I put you to bed, but you kept coming out of your room. You had an excuse every time, but not your usual excuse of needing some water or needing to go to the bathroom. This night on the second time you got out of bed you said "I just want to check on Paxton." The third time you said "Hey Mom, can you do me a favor and turn the fan off?" Such a big sentence!
• You are very verbal and always impress us with what you say.
• You do not like to sleep with the ceiling fan on and if we forget to turn it off, you will yell from your bed until we come back and turn it off. 
• You love Chick-fil-A, but it is mostly due to the fact that they have a playground.
• You love to go on special donut dates with Mommy. 
• We read several books every night before you go to bed.
• You love bath time and will play in there forever. You also think showers are pretty cool.
• You have started saying "This is awesome."

I could write forever about this stage. 2.5-3 has by far been my favorite. You are so much fun! You are such a sweet boy and always get so excited about everything we do together. Your Daddy and I hope you always like us this much. :)

We love you!

Love,
Mommy

Recapping Mother's Day

My Mother's Day weekend was made so special by those that I love! Ty worked 30 hours on Friday/Saturday and another 12 hours on Sunday, so I didn't have many expectations for the weekend. I picked Jack up from school and he was so excited to give me the present he made complete with special wrapping paper!

I wanted to make sure to remember the spider stamp he chose to use! 

 His teacher had snapped this picture on Valentine's Day. I'm not wearing any make-up, as I guess I stayed home that day not feeling well. Jack was so happy to have me come to his class party and I love the way he is hugging on me! So happy she saved this picture and remembered to use it for Mother's Day.

I took Jack to a local grocery store after school where they were hosting a grilling roadshow. We went last year too and had so much fun. They have free grilled meats, pineapple, salad (Yes, salad! Who knew you could grill lettuce?? It was delish!), etc to sample. They also had free sno cones from our favorite sno cone stand and a balloon artist for the kids.

When we made it home later that evening I walked into a house full of flowers. Ty had a few cases at a hospital closer to our house that morning and stopped by the house to leave me flowers before heading to his main hospital. I was so surprised!

My surprise continued later that evening when I finally made my way to my bathroom and saw this mini orchid. It is beautiful!

Saturday morning I met a couple of friends for brunch to celebrate baby Paxton. They both drove a couple of hours from different parts of the state to meet up with me. Our lives are so busy and I felt so loved that they gave up a Saturday morning to celebrate this new baby! 

We got home that afternoon right before Ty. Jack and Ty both took a nap, then I could hear them making plans to give me a present. Ty hopped in the shower, but Jack couldn't wait to give me my surprise. He came out of the bedroom carrying a "Happy Mother's Day" balloon. Ty had a few other sweet gifts including earrings and a "Thank God for Mommy" book for Jack and I to read together. Ty let Jack pick out his own card for me and he chose one of those musical cards, but instead of a song it was of a unicorn farting. Ty said he was pretty insistent that I would like it. Haha. We went to dinner to round out the celebration. It was perfect!

I almost forgot! I saw these cute questionnaires last year and decided that the next year Jack would be able to sorta answer the questions. I printed this off for Ty and asked him if he could do it with Jack. Because, really, it's not like he has Pinterest. 

My favorite part is the last question: I love my mom because...Because I don't like her. Bhahahaha! I laughed so hard I had to get up and walk around to calm down. Backstory: Jack has been on a daddy kick lately. Ty has been gone a lot and when he is home Jack is all over him. Jack has started telling me, "I don't like you. I do love you though." After the first couple of times, I started asking more questions about where he had heard that. It is a lovely sentiment he picked up from school. It cracks me up that he said it for the questionnaire. Ty said he tried to ask him the question several times and got the same response each time. We talk pretty frequently about our favorite colors, so I was suprised by his red...green answer. Neither are my favorite colors. I also think "the I love it when my mom...hearts" has to do with me cutting out hearts for him to craft with. I wanted the questionnaire to perfectly capture where he is at this stage and it so did! Haha.

Sunday morning we went on a walk before church and had a low-key day. 

Life Update

Just a quick update on our lives right now.

Ty is applying for a one year fellowship in minimally invasive surgery. It can be a stressful process to apply, get interviews, decide where to interview, arrange travel and be gone for interviews while working 80 (or more!) hour weeks. I am so proud of how many interviews he has gotten. As it is time intensive and expensive to travel to all of the interviews, he has turned down half of the interviews he has received, and will be or has gone on 12. It is a match process and I'm praying for guidance as we select how to rank the programs. We will find out the middle of June (right around my due date) if and where he matched. If he doesn't match, then we will begin the job search process. Obviously, Ty wants to do a fellowship, but I don't think there will be a huge amount of disappointment about going straight into a job. Either way, he still has year five of his residency training to complete. This means if we are doing a fellowship, we will have a whole year to prepare for a move. We are both excited about the possibility of a year long adventure outside of the state of Oklahoma, where we have both lived our entire lives.

I am 29 weeks pregnant. I haven't done monthly updates like I did with Jack. This pregnancy has been so similar to my experience with Jack and in many ways has been easier. I never got sick, just nauseous, with Jack and this has been the same, but better. Maybe because I was more willing to take medications to help with nausea this time around. I have had a good appetite the entire pregnancy which is leading to more weight gain this time. There was some concern with Paxton's growth not being where it should be, but that has all worked itself out and has been attributed to something going wrong with my placenta. But as my doctor loves to tell me the placenta renews like 3 billion cells a day or something crazy like that and has recovered. I'm getting extra ultrasounds just to make sure everything is right on track. I certainly don't mind that! With Jack the 3rd trimester was the hardest part of pregnancy and I'm starting to remember why. It is just plain uncomfortable. I carried Jack really high, but with Paxton everything is really low. Some of my favorite under the belly maternity pants can't be worn this pregnancy, because of how low everything sits. The low bands seem to cut into me. The most uncomfortable thing so far has been a rotated pelvis. It causes a lot of pain in my right groin area and I have to be careful about doing too much physically and then doing something simple like standing on one leg to take off a pair of pants. It's too much pressure and pain.

Picture taken at 28 weeks

I wanted to document how Jack sits on top of my belly, but the black didn't show it the best. 

Jack talks about Paxton being in my belly and we talk a lot about Paxton's room. He definitely notices my growing belly. It's hard to miss these days! Jack is full of energy and is talking so much. He does a good job of using sentences and has been saying the funniest things. He is pretty into telling you that you are his best friend. We have been enjoying the nice weather and are trying to burn some of his energy with walks/runs.

I'm trying to soak up the time alone with Jack. Things are so easy with him and I'm relishing in these last months of no diaper bag and being able to leave the house on a whim and without much planning in regard to schedules, necessities, etc.

Dinner Date

Sesame Street Live

Zoo visit

Jack-isms

I try to keep a running notes page of cute and funny things Jack says or does and do one big update on here every six months or so. This story was one I didn't want to forget.

Jack is now sleeping in his big boy bed. We still rock him at night, but him in his bed before he is fully asleep. (Really, thinking we need to invest in another chair--one for Paxton and one for Jack.) When Ty is home Jack clings to him and insists that Daddy rocks. Ty has been gone a lot for work and fellowship interviews, so when he is home Jack is his constant companion.

Ty rocked him last night, put him in bed, and shut the door. He paused outside the door and immediately heard rustling. He opened the door to have Jack get back in bed and Jack was standing up, leaning against the side of his bed. Ty told him he needed to get back in bed and Jack responded by saying he was just talking to Jesus. Bless his heart! So, Ty told him to finish his prayer. "Dear God, Thank you for Mommy, Daddy and EMMA!" (Emma is his best friend at school.) Then Jack jumped back into bed. Silly, sweet boy!

I don't think he is old enough to be sneaky and use prayer as an excuse, but either way it worked. Haha.

These pictures aren't from last night, but from several days ago. Jack woke up in his bed in the best mood.

Jack is telling Nuts he can sleep on this pillow. 

Jack: March 30, 2015; 2 years and 9 months

Big Boy Room

In preparing for Paxton's arrival, we knew we needed to move Jack out of the crib and transition him to a bed. I was not excited about this. Jack did great in his crib, but we didn't want to spend money on another crib when it wouldn't likely last long with Jack sleeping in it. But the idea of new big boy bedding got me on board!

Last weekend, Jack woke up and said that he didn't like his crib anymore. We took that as a sign to switch out beds and not wait any longer. Since we are losing our guest room with the addition of Paxton, Jack got the queen size guest bed. The room arrangement is a little odd with french doors and the short wall behind his chair, but we are making it work. We basically pretend there aren't french doors in the room, so Jack can't sneak outside. He was pretty excited about all the new bedding and new arrangement in his room. He has slept a week in his bed and it is going better than I could have ever imagined. I hope I'm not jinxing us!

We still have our rocker/recliner in Jack's room, but it will eventually move to Paxton's room. I also need to move some of his wall decor around, but who knows when that will happen!

Jack: 2.5 year update

Jack,
You are two and a half! You are a funny, sweet, loving, little boy! Your speech has taken off and the things you say are hilarious. You talk about our trip to Boston a lot. I love that you have some memories of that trip! Twice, you have randomly said "You're the best!" to me. It is truly the best compliment. The other day you told me I was sweet.

You know you will have a baby brother soon, but you have no idea what that really means. I love to make you say all the names on the short list to help us determine which name to pick. You make them all sound so cute that it isn't very helpful! You came with me to a doctor's appointment in early December, because you had run a fever the day before and couldn't go to daycare. You were so well behaved and sat still in a chair while the doctor was in the room. We were able to go to your Daddy's hospital the week of Christmas and have an OB resident determine the gender. As we were walking in you talked about how you were going to sit in your chair. The things that stick with you are so surprising to me.

For a while when we would place you in your crib at night you would unprompted (because neither one of us talk to you at this point for fear of getting you riled up!) say "love you too" and blow a kiss. You sleep with your bunny each night and we take it to daycare for your naps. We got rid of the pacifier in September right after our trip to Boston. It went a whole lot better than I thought it would. We cut the tips off of all them and they eventually all made it into the trashcan...except for one. The wubanub puppy dog has stuck around and you have recently become attached to it and like to carry it around and call it Paci. The other night we went to eat dinner with your daddy at the hospital and you told me that Paci was sick and he needed to go in with you. You were very adamant about having doctor Daddy take a look at him.

We have a few movies saved on the DVR and you were on a Tangled kick for quite a while. You would pat your hair and say "I've got long hair" or your would touch mine and say "Like Tangled." I think it's a cute movie, so I didn't mind watching it over and over again. I took you to your first movie at the theater while your daddy was out of town at a conference. We saw The Penguins of Madagascar and you did okay. I won't be taking you back for a while though! We went to the theater with the big recliners. You didn't want to stay in your seat and at one point somehow managed to get your legs stuck in the chair. I thought I was going to have to leave you in the theater and go get help just before I finally got you free. You talked about the movie for weeks afterward, so I guess you enjoyed it!

You love to sing! Your favorites are Twinkle Twinkle Little Star and the ABCs. You have learned the words to all of the lullabies we sing you and now it is a sing-a-long at night before you go to bed. You can count to ten, love to color, and use scissors.

You love your Batman shirt, any sort of boots, playgrounds, "adventures", and bandaids (ban-ban). You love to play with cars, go on bear hunts and sword fight. You like to say that you've seen a dinosaur or a monster and we run and hide. You also see these things when you are in the car and we pretend to draw our swords and get them. You love Nuts and especially like to give him hugs.You love to go to Target and we let you go down the toy aisle and play. We don't buy anything, but you have so much fun looking. Your newest thing is going to dance class in your room, an idea you got off of Despicable Me and having super powers. Not necessarily connected, although sometimes you do need super powers to dance. :)

You like school and your teacher Miss Aya. Although, there are a lot of mornings that I go to get you up and you tell me you aren't going to school today. I know you have fun there though and it is fun to see you interact and learn. Your favorite part about school is the extra activity we pay for-- the Fun Bus! It comes every Thursday and is a school bus that has been painted green and converted to a mobile gym. You talk about it frequently and are so excited every Thursday when I pick you up to show me the stamps you get on each hand for visiting the Fun Bus.

You are very in tune with others feelings. Anytime I sigh or mumble something under my breath, you always ask, "What happened, Mommy?" I have to be pretty careful about expressing my emotions while driving. Haha. You are very concerned if people are sick. Your daddy has become the "church doctor" and helps a lot of people when they get ill during church (which is suprisingly a lot of people). One day we waited after church was over for an ambulance to come pick someone up and you talked about the lady not feeling well the rest of the day.

The biggest thing that has come with you being 2.5 is you are potty trained! We had been introducing the idea to you here and there, but really worked with you the week after Christmas. You had a sticker chart and got to pick out which stickers you wanted at the store (Bubble Guppies). You had also gotten to pick out underwears (you call them underwears, plural) and chose super heroes. You weren't quite as motivated about the stickers as I thought you would be, but you were excited when the whole chart was full and you got to pick out a toy. You chose a set of hot wheels cars and have played with them a lot. You wear a diaper at nap time and at night. We'll conquer that when you are ready.

You are a pretty good eater, but prefer snacks to actual meals. You like pizza and french fries, but will eat healthy things too! You love to help make smoothies and request them quite frequently. You snack a lot on squeeze pouch applesauce and cheese sticks. It is so cute to hear you say the prayer before dinner. 

You are a happy, go with the flow, sweet boy! Each new stage with you is my favorite.

We love you so much!
Love,
Mommy

A couple of recent videos that we just love:

"I'm going to jump!"; "Amazing, Amazing!"; "C'mon super powers."


We did a countdown to the new year several hours before midnight and you absolutely loved the video! We did it over and over for about a week. 
"Happy New Year!"


Now get ready for a picture overload from the last six months.