3/4 of a year

Jackson is 9 months old!

(as of two days ago)

Photos & update to follow.

Good times

Spring break has been a blast!

Lincoln got to meet the Cat in the Hat

and do some work outside with Daddy.

Jack is becoming a regular bookworm


and is trying to pull up on anything he can!

We love being outside!

Jack is 8 months old!

Jack turned 8 months old on February 28th!

He has been in his new "big boy" car seat for several weeks now:

And loves to play with Lincoln's stuff, like this sword:


Lincoln wasn't in the room at the time, or he would have freaked out!

Jack has been sleeping through the night MUCH better for several weeks--YES!! We discovered the key by accident one evening after going to the store. Jack fell asleep in the car on the way home around 7:45, so of course he didn't want to go to sleep after we got home. So we put him in the crib awake, he rolled around and talked to himself for a while, and then BAM! Fell asleep on his own and didn't wake up until 7 AM. HOLY COW!

Let me tell you, it's about time, after the hellish last 3 months we've had! 'Course, it's our own fault. We should have been putting him the crib awake to fall asleep on his own from day one. Sigh.

Of course, the last four nights he's been waking up at ridiculous times--5 AM, 4:30 AM, 3:50 AM--wide awake, not wanting to go back to sleep. This morning it was 2 AM and then again 3 AM. I let him fall asleep on me at 3 AM, but the second I put him in the crib, he woke up, so we all got to listen to him scream himself to sleep. And then not wake up until 7 AM. Poor kid is teething so hard now that he's miserable! Come on, top two teeth!

Stats

Weight: approx. 19 pounds

Length: haven't done this yet. Oops.

Teeth: two, bottom middle. Had those for a couple of months now

Words: two, Dada and Mama. But he's not babbling nonstop yet.

Clothing size: 9-12 months

Jack's 8-month likes

Lincoln. Link will always be Jack's #1 like!

Food. Oh my goodness, this kid could eat a cow in one sitting!

Especially if that cow were made out of Cheerios.

Jack loves finger foods, but only if they're crunchy and relatively easy to

pick up. Banana, bits of cheese, mango--he likes them when I feed them

to him, but will ignore them if up to his own devices. Grrr.

Bouncing. Loves the Jumperoo, but will bounce and jump anytime

he's being held! My leg muscles get a good pounding when he stands on me.

Being outside, looking outside, anything to do with outside! Come on spring!

Toys that are meant for older kids

(although baby toys are OK too).

Crawling--but only in reverse! Apparently it's just easier.

When Jack can crawl forward, it will be the end of the world as we know it.

Kid will be unstoppable.

Squealing and laughing

Peek-a-boo. This will never get old.

Bath time & splashing. Cracks himself up.

Jack's 8-month dislikes

Getting stuck under things when he crawls backwards

(even though he looks pretty happy under the dishwasher in this photo)

Not yet being able to crawl forward!

Teething, of course. Ouch.

Not being given Cheerios the second he makes a sound indicating he wants more.

Hello, freakout!

Having his face washed or nose suctioned.

On his 8-month birthday, Jack attacked Lincoln:

But don't worry, Lincoln got him back later that evening!


Our boys are so much fun and are the lights of our lives!!

7 months old!

Jackson turned 7 months old on January 28th!

He is an uber-happy, uber-smiley guy when he is awake.

Hey! I'm really excited that it's my 7-month birthday!!

He weighs 16 lbs, 15 oz, so his growth is slowing down; he's only about the 50th percentile for weight. Length I keep forgetting to do, so let's say he's average length for a 7-month kiddo. :)

He's still sleeping in the swing and still not making it through the night most nights. And we thought Lincoln was a challenging baby!! Little did we know how easy we had it.

Three nights ago was GREAT. Jack slept from 8 PM to 5 AM, then went right back to sleep after I put the bubble (pacifier) back in his mouth and didn't wake again until 6:37 AM! WOW!

Two nights ago was the night from hell. He was up all the time, every 20 minutes to an hour, from the time we put him down until 1:30 AM--then we finally just had to let him scream himself to sleep. :( It was awful.

Last night was better in that he only woke up at 5 AM. The problem was that he was totally awake then, so G had to bring him to bed to get him to sleep again. Urgh.

Yes, he is totally pacifier-dependent. Ugh.

Although...the night of January 10-11, he slept 8 PM to 7 AM!! See, kid? YOU CAN DO IT!

Jack's 2nd tooth poked through on the bottom 4 days before 7 months, just to the left of tooth #1!

7-month dislikes

Teething. Poor kid's gums hurt so badly he can hardly stand it.

Bedtime snack nursing. He won't stay on me long enough to make my milk let down--pulls off & cries over and over and over. It's a nightmare. I've taken to pumping to get milk flowing and then nursing him. It is exhausting.

Tummy time. I feel awful because he doesn't get enough, and hasn't gotten enough, hence why he hates it so much! I'm afraid he will never crawl, and I feel so guilty because it's our fault for sitting him up so much.

Being sick. Jackson is still getting over his THIRD cold. Come on! He's not even a year old yet!!

Having his nose wiped/sucked. Both are 2-people jobs, the little monkey.


7-month likes


Lincoln, Lincoln, Lincoln!!
(except when he knocks Jack over or takes his toys away)

Llama, Llama, Llama!!

Eating. Almost anything and everything.
He doesn't care for the texture of meat, especially turkey,
but will eat it when I mix it with veggies.

Baby Mum Mums:

Biting Mommy while nursing
(Mommy is NOT a fan of this)

Taking longer (1.5-2 hour) afternoon naps. YES!!

Cutting out evening cat nap and going to bed a smidge earlier

Wearing 9 month clothes

Splashing in the bath & squealing!

Smiling like mad

On to month 8! I cannot believe Jack is getting so old so fast! I can't think about it or I'll cry.

Come on, springtime!!

Christmas. Better late than never!

Christmas was SO much fun this year (I mean last year). Lincoln had a blast, and Jackson really enjoyed his first Christmas! Although both were a little overwhelmed with all the festivities. We had Christmas at my folks' on the 23rd, with George's mom on Christmas Eve, then family Christmas at home Christmas morning, church and Christmas in Monett Christmas afternoon. Whew!

We were supposed to go to St. Louis for Christmas over New Year's, but both boys were getting over colds and mind was still lingering so we didn't make it. :(

Here are a few photos.

What? You mean your husband doesn't put on your toddler's

Captain America mask for your family's Christmas photo?

FAIL!

Jack is really excited about his first Christmas!

Lincoln is stylin' the 1980s way, complete with popped collar and

"I'm a stud" stance.


My boys. :)

And a sort of, slightly better but yet slightly

more deranged Christmas family photo:

Lincoln is 3!

Happy 3rd birthday to my big boy!

Lincoln had a birthday party on Sunday the 22nd with mostly family and had a great time. We are so blessed with such loving and generous people in our lives!

Cousin Kelli made the most awesome T-rex cake ever seen:

and Lincoln adored it!

On the 23rd, his actual birthday, Lincoln got to choose where he wanted to eat, and he picked the mall so he could see the BIG GORILLA!


Which he didn't want his picture taken with once we actually got there. Of course.

The mall was mostly deserted, which was great, so we walked around some after we ate and let Lincoln play in the kids' playplace. We don't usually get a chance to because it's so crowded with kids snotting everywhere, but that night Link was the only kid playing. Woo hoo!

He also got to sit on the riding lawn mowers at Sears, another of his favorite places.

Unfortunately, he started getting a cold Saturday evening after getting back from Monett (we had gone down for the day to help with the cake), was worse Sunday and absolutely miserable on Monday. What a way to spend your birthday! He still had a good time running all over the mall. It take a lot to slow this kid down!

He ended the night by reading a book with Jackson:

At 3 years old, Lincoln...

-is close (sort of) to being potty trained. It's one day at a time,

with some days better than others.

-knows his colors, ABCs, basic shapes, some presidents

(thanks to his awesome placemat) and millions of animals & dinosaurs.

-can recognize many lettes and numbers

and is curious about words.

-also knows almost every single Star Wars character

(loves Chewbacca) and is familiar with much of

Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter.

-loves How to Train Your Dragon, How the Grinch Stole Christmas,

and pretty much any movie we'll let him watch.

-loves to sing: the Grinch, Twinkle Twinkle Little Star,

Old MacDonald had a Farm, Knick Knack Paddywhack.

-dances to "Can't Touch This" every night at 6:45 when an alarm

goes off on Mommy's cell phone. He calls it "Tan Hox It" and

will mumble along with the words as he jumps around the room.

-is super happy, super friendly and has good manners (most of the time).

-LOVES Baby Jack and is always telling him, "You're so cute,"

and "it's OK, Jackson, I'll protect you."

-BUT. He has started randomly knocking Jack over since J now sits up

on his own. He will also grab Jack's toys and is having a tougher time sharing.

-is a major talker and says such funny things so many times a day

that we can barely keep up with writing them down.

He has been speaking in complex sentences for a while now

and has an amazing vocabulary.

-adores other kids, his age, older and younger. Doesn't matter.

He always wants to play with every kid we see.

-can undress himself on his own except for his shirt but has trouble

getting dressed on his own.

-loves to be outside to run around and ride in his Cozy Coupe, which he's

getting too big for! He should be able to reach the tricycle wheels

this spring.

-is in the "what?" and "why?" stage and asks those questions about

EVERYTHING, even if it is obvious to him/he already knows

the answer!

and a million other things which I will post as I think of them. :)

6 months old!

Jackson is half a year old (as of December 28)! Where has the time gone?

He is SUPER smiley, SUPER happy baby--he may even be smilier than Lincoln was as a baby, which I didn't think was possible. Or maybe just about the same. Who can tell??

Jack is 27" long and weighs 16 pounds and 4 oz. That's the same length, but almost a full 2 pounds less than Lincoln did at this age--who knew Link was such a porker?

He was a trooper at the doctor's office. He cried when being weighed & measured, but didn't have a problem getting pocked and prodded by Dr. Griesemer. Kids. Who can figure them out?

Jack has a tooth! His bottom right tooth starting poking through the day after his 6-month birthday. That explains SO much, and he's definitely getting ready to cut more based on his behavior, chewing on his own fingers/anything at all, and waterfall of drool.

Here he is looking at a book with Lincoln:

Jack has been on solids for about a month. This child is an eating MACHINE. He will eat everything and anything in sight if we're not careful! And he likes everything, although he's not a huge fan of all-natural applesauce unless it has cinnamon in it. He's had cereal, peas, green beans, sweet potatoes, carrots, acorn & butternut squash, pears, applesauce, avocado, banana, and several spieces...that may be it.

He really liked carrots on this particular day:

I'm not following the "feed one new food every 3-4 days to see if an allergy develops" for 2 reasons. One, we hardly have any food allergies in the family. Two, I read an article a year or so ago that said that babies who were fed new flavors rapidly tended to be better eaters as they got older. Since Lincoln has become averse to pretty much any fruit or vegetable, and I did follow the "3-day" rule with him, I want to see if not waiting between new foods has any impact on Jack.

Unfortunately, solids haven't really had any impact on his sleeping habits. UGH. A couple of weeks ago we (I. I was so desperate) were so desperate to get more then 2-3 hous of sleep at a time every night that we started putting him back in the swing to sleep. Sometimes it helped, sometimes it didn't. He's been doing a bit better lately, but again, he's still in the swing. The transition back to the crib is going to be the stuff nightmares are made of.

We'll have to do it soon, though, or else it will just get worse as he gets older.

6 month likes

Lincoln, Lincoln, Lincoln

Reading books

Turning pages of books (he's great at it!)

Exersaucer & Jumperoo

Sitting up on his own. YES!!!!

Squealing, cooing, babbling ("gagagaga" "baba").

Jack tries SO hard to form words.

Pulling self up while holding on to people's thumbs

People. Jack is a charmer who distracts people in church

because he's so adorable! (we don't want him in

the nursery until after cold/flu season is over)

Peekaboo. Best. game. ever.

Mirrors

Pooping in new diapers Mommy has JUST put on him. Grrrrrrrr.

Wearing 9 month onesies and sleepers, and already outgrowing some of them!!

His feet! Grabs them compulsively & is about to start sucking

on his toes. Yum.

6 month dislikes

Teething. Who wouldn't?

Not getting to eat until he explodes. He nurses and then has
solids, and when he's finished the solids and sees us take

the bowl or jar from him, Jack freaks out!!

Sleeping through the night (although getting better recently),

past 6 AM or longer than 45 minutes for naps

Soon to come: Some Christmas photos (better late than never) & photos of good times around the house!

We wish you a

Merry Christmas!

Lincoln wouldn't cooperate & put his Santa hat on, so that's the best we can do right now. :)

Pain

Last night Lincoln burned his finger on the electric griddle. This was after my millions of warnings that it was hot, moving the step stool away from it, him moving it back, etc. I looked at him just as he put his finger on it, and Oh. My. God--the look on his face as the pain hit him was something I'll never be able to forget. He started crying, I grabbed him and headed to the sink to run his finger under cold water.

Maybe it's because just a couple of months ago I plunged my hand into just-boiled water (forgetting it hadn't cooled yet) to grab a spoon and I remember VIVIDLY the ensuing half an hour of pain, crying and thinking I might just die that I felt Lincoln's pain so keenly. Maybe it's because I'm super-sensitive and emotional anyway. Maybe it's because I'm a mom, and I probably love my boys so much that my heart aches every day that I have to be at work away from them.

Regardless of the reason, it was all I could do to keep from freaking out as well. I didn't--I stayed stoic and as calm as possible, trying to sooth him and get him to calm down enough to be coherent. It seemed like he wailed forever, but he eventually calmed down and was able to eat, although he had a difficult time eating left-handed while keeping his right hand in a bowl of cold water!

He would occasionally start wailing again when burning in his finger flared , but would calm down after I hugged and kissed on him for a few minutes. It was after supper, when he thought about taking his finger out of the water so George could bandage it that he really melted down.

Eventually we got the bandaging done (it involved bribery with a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup) and even more hugs and Link determined he wasn't going to die, but would, in fact, be OK. Even after both boys were in bed, I didn't have a meltdown--I wanted to, but who has the time when there are eight thousand other things to be done???

But oh, my gosh. I feel Lincoln's pain so keenly that I can't imagine how I can go through years and years of watching my boys hurt, physically and emotionally. I'm just not strong enough for that! I've managed to get pretty stoic about my own pain, but theirs? It cuts me more than anything else in the world. I'm not sure I have the strengh to watch them get hurt, make mistakes, fall down and screw up over and over in the coming years; I'm just not that strong.

It was an exhausting, emotional night, and that was just a little burn on one finger! Imagine if it had been something worse...except, no, I can't start imagining worse because I WILL break down. All of the dangers, problems, temptations and evil in the world make my head spin, and if I think about it, Lincoln and Jackson will never leave the house!

Miss Kathy, my old Sunday School teacher, commented on Facebook that God starts mothers out comforting and healing the little hurts to ease us in to comforting the healing the bigger hurts that are down the road. She is so wise, and that totally makes sense.

Still. I'm not sure I can handle the big hurts.

Are you listening, God? Charmed, safe, full lives for my children, would be GREAT.

I know this is every mother's prayer. I know every mother hurts almost beyond words when her children hurt. I know my love for the boys is not in any way unique. It's just that this is the first time I've really experienced such major pain in one of my kids (colds and skinned knees don't have the same effect!). Lincoln is fine--he is already recovering and will be fascinated when the blister falls off. He'll forget about it completely in a few months, although let's hope he doesn't forget the lesson of never touching a hot surface.

But learning lessons is painful, and I never realized how painful it would be for me as well as my boys.

Still, I wouldn't trade being a mommy for anything.

5 months old!

Jackson is 5 months + 1 day old!

And he is a happy, smiley, hysterical, FUN baby...when he is awake.

Asleep, it's a whole other ballgame!

He loves to sit up in the boppies:

And is starting to sit up on his own, at least for a few seconds

before he topples over. :)

He'll be SUCH a happy boy when he can sit up on his own without falling over!

He weighs about 16 pounds, according to the "weigh myself, then stand

on the scale holding Jack and subtract the two numbers" method.

WHY won't this child sleep???? After sleeping 8:30 PM-4:30 AM by around 2 months, and then 8 PM-7 AM at 3 months, WHY are we back to waking every few hours at night? Why, why?

I'm not feeding him in the night; I'm not about to go backwards, and plus he doesn't need it. But he wakes up every few hours and has to have the pacifier to go back to sleep. He's still swaddled, so I thought maybe he wanted to be unswaddled to suck on his fists. Well, one arm out makes no difference, and unswaddled completely is just a nightmare.

I moved the swing up to his room, but it doesn't help him stay asleep for naps, so I haven't even tried it at night. I. AM. EXHAUSTED. Because guess who it is who gets up every few hours when Jack cries to stick the paci back in his mouth? IT AIN'T GEORGE!

Jack's naps have been short (30-45 minutes) since I stopped putting him in the swing to nap around 1.5 months. So really, we have 2 sleep problems: night and naps.

Teething is having an effect, I know, because the poor kid gnaws my finger off and chews on anything he can find. Plus he's a waterfall of drool every second of every day. No sign of teeth yet. PLEASE, God, let the teeth break through!

I'm going to start Jack on cereal this weekend and am praying that it helps him sleep. Again, PLEASE God!

It's hard to get a decent picture of Lincoln and Jackson together--this is usually what we end up with. :)

Jack's 5-month favs:

The Exersaucer (SUCH squeals!)

Sitting up in the boppies

Lincoln, Lincoln, Lincoln. Jack adores him!

Grabbing/smacking faces

Grabbing anything--he has a very strong grip. It's kind of annoying sometimes.

Kicking and flailing

Smiling

Squealing, laughing and cooing

The baby in the mirror. He's so funny! Jack likes to smack at him.

Being tickled

Reading books/batting at the pictures in books

Pooping out of outfits. All. the. TIME!

5-month dislikes:

Sleeping through a 1.5 hour nap

Sleeping through the night

Teething. Ugh.

Not being paid attention to