Jack-isms

     Jack is the smartest two year old in the world. I'm absolutely convinced of this truth. He's also the most adorable.
     He hasn't gotten pronouns down yet, but I think I like it better that way. When he wants us to catch him at the bottom of the slide, "catch you!" When he wants us to hold him, "Hold you!" or sometimes, "stand up, hold you!" When he wants us to chase him, "Chase you me!"
     He has been experimenting with emotions lately and will often come up to me, fake sniff, and say, "I sad." I give him hugs and kisses and he'll be happy again and go off to play, just to come back a few minutes later sniffing again.
     A new emotion he's learned just in the last week or so is mad. He'll huff and fold his arms and say, "I'm mad!" and that only ends after we ask him why and acknowledge the feeling.
     He's also discovered shadows, and when he notices one he'll say, "Ah! Shadow!" He'll get into a mood where he is absolutley obssessed with his shadow and will follow it all around the house. If we're outside, it gets even more exciting noticing all the shadows of the trees and slide and stroller.
     One last thing: we have a big, soft reclining rocking chair in Jack's room that has compartments in the arms. In one of the compartments there is an extendable reading light. The night before last, Jack pulled out the light as far as it would go and started singing into like a microphone! We have no idea where he got this from, but he sang us two or three songs (expecting us to clap between them) before he would go brush his teeth. Oh, and he sings the cutest version of "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star" you've ever heard ("twinkle lalla alalaba star! Ahh lahah ama are")

Terrific Two!

     Our baby boy is two! It really is insane to look at photos from his birthday last year and compare them to the boy he is today.

Jack on his first birthday

Jack on his second birthday

     He talks in sentences and can reach things from the counter, and instead of a baby, he's turning into a little kid. It's so fun to see his personality and even have small conversations with him. One of his knew things is to ask us: "Guess what?"

     It was so fun to plan out Jack's birthday celebration. I wanted to day to be absolutely perfect full of all of Jack's favorite things to do--but Michael was (again) the voice of reason and helped us have a nice, more simple day. We of course DID try to do a lot of Jack's favorite things, but it wasn't a crazy, schduled minute by minute day like it might have otherwise been.
     Michael and I decorated the house the night before, so Jack was able to wake up to streamers, birthday notes and wrapped presents. Now that he actually knows what presents are, we actually had a hard time keeping him from opening his presents as soon as he saw them though.
   

Basketball cupcakes

Some of the notes we left around the house 

 We went to lunch at Costco to have hot dogs (one of his favorites--especially with root beer!). While we were at Costco though, he fell out of the cart and flat onto his back. He was terrified and hurt and crying and I got scared and I started crying (those floors are cement!), and a nurse who was just shopping came and checked him out because we weren't sure if he had hit his head or not. It was dramatic--but no concussion and after we got the soda, he calmed down to eat and be his happy self again.

     That night we had my brother's family, Michael's sister's family and sister Kacy over for waffles, cupcakes and presents. His main present from us was a basketball hoop and BYU basketball, so that was sort of the theme we went with. He loved it. He's been spending hours since his birthday just shooting the basketball and even trying to dribble. His free throw percentage is better than mine. Seriously.
     We love our boy!


Height: 34in (50%)
Weight: 24.5 lbs (10%)

Basketball Clementines

Jack discovering his presents in the morning

Our silly boy

Playing with cousin Gabriel before the party

Kitchen Aid

For Christmas, I was lucky enough to receive a Kitchen Aid stand mixer! I've been wanting one forever, and it was a complete surprise! As soon as we got home, I wanted to use it and knowing my older sister to be an accomplished bread maker, begged her for her recipe. She gave it to me and we've been eating yummy homemade bread for the last few days. (So much for that New Year's diet...)

So nice to let the machine do that hard work

Rise!

About to be baked

And done! I think they might have cooked a little too long, but it was my first attempt and overall I'm happy!

18...er...19 Months!

Hello, Hello!

Typically, I would have an 18 month post for Jack... but because of a funeral and some crazy rain action, we didn't get out to take pictures until today. And it is only 4 days until Jack is 19 months. He's still super cute though. So it's okay.

18 months! Already in the last few weeks he has changed so much. All 4 of his canines are popping through, so even his smile has changed in this 19th month of his. He has gotten so good at letting us brush his teeth, most of the time.

Jack loves to jump--off things, or simply jumping around the house. He can  bend his knees and jump all the way off the ground too, which is way advanced, developmentally speaking (yes, I'm bragging). He still loves any fruit I throw at him, though his taste for vegetables has declined some. (I blame Michael.) Some new favorites are peanut butter sandwiches, pretzels, and raisins.

At last count, he says over 30 words (yes, I've kept a list) and it seems like he is learning a new word every day. He still can't say B's, but he is only 18 months old. He has even started putting words together like, "welwo fass" speaking of his favorite yellow slide (which is fast), and "ball up!" when he wants us to throw the ball in the air.

Just in the last few weeks he has really started to play with cars--I think maybe our long road trip to Washington helped that. To keep him entertained we had to point out passing cars and trucks. And of course, he still absolutely loves to throw anything he can get his hands on. He has even started calling certain balls ball their real names (footballs, particularly).

During the day, he will often bring me my phone and say, "Dadda? Hello? Dadda?" and keep bugging me until we call Michael. And if I am ever on the phone with anyone else he grabs a hold of me and yells, "Dad! Dad!" That one is actually sort of annoying :-) He loves his dad so much, and it makes me so happy. When it is getting close to the time Michael gets home from work, we sometimes go outside and wait for him. When Michael comes into view, Jack gets so excited! He loves when Daddy gets home.

He loves just being outside. If we're outside and he can run around, he's happy. We try to take a walk to some park or field everyday to enjoy these last few weeks of nice weather. 

At his doctor's appointment he was 22 pounds exactly (4%), and 33 inches (56%).

And of course, because it is me, I have a whole lot of pictures:

He's signing "more" because he wants us to give him more rocks to throw.

Notice the rock in his hand?

Again, "more rocks?"

Rain, Rain...

If you are from Utah, you know we've been getting a ton of rain this last week. If you're not from Utah: We've been getting a ton of rain this last week! Jack loves rain. So today, instead of being able to go slide on the yellow slide--or as Jack says, "welwo fass!" (yellow fast)--we went into our front yard and played in the puddles!

Our Beautiful Boy

I took a few videos, which I then turned into a movie in iMovie. It's 2 minutes long, but it's worth it--I promise. If you don't want to spend 2 minutes watching the cutest 18 month old in the world jump in puddles and run from thunder, skip to 1 minute, and you'll get the best of the video.

As you can tell, Michael got home from work while we were still outside playing. I wish with all my heart I had kept recording for 10 more seconds because Jack broke into a huge grin and yelled "Dada!" when he recognized Michael. But you'll have to take my word for it.

Michael is a great dad. My favorite thing in this world is watching Michael and Jack play together. As soon as Michael parked the car, he jumped out and started jumping in puddles with Jack. It's adorable--and you can tell Jack was loving it. Enjoy!

Home Improvements

For a while now I have wanted to paint our front and garage doors. A noticed had been taped to them before we bought our house, and when removed, took with them big sqaures of paint. They've always bothered me, but I just thought that it must be a really difficult job and so never went further than a sigh as I passed by.

Then I found this and this on pinterest. Both these tutorials claimed that the job could be super easy, so I decided it was time. We went out and bought paint (same color for the garage, and a super dark brick red for the front door. (If we wanted to change the color drastically we would have had to go through an HOA approval process. No thanks.)

Both jobs really were easy! I did the front door by myself during one of Jack's naps, and Michael and I did the garage door in under an hour--prep included.

Before

After

Oh, and I made this wreath. And I think you can see the color better in this picture.

Before

After

Splash Park

Have we mentioned yet how much we love living in Eagle Mountain? I mean seriously, running trails, great people, and awesome parks. Who could ask for more?

All summer I've been meaning to take Jack to a splash park that is seriously a 10 minutes walk from our house. I've tried only once before yesterday--which happened to be the week the splash pad was closed for Pony Express Days.

It was AWESOME. I'm not just saying that either. It was one of the best splash parks I've ever seen, and Jack had a blast. He was running around laughing and screaming and Michael and I had a fun time chasing him around and watching him. (Next time we'll be sure to dress to be able to get easier.)

Enjoy some pictures and videos!

Jack and Michael's favorite game