The Reason

I knew that having Jack around during the holidays would make the Santa part of Christmas more magical and fun. But I didn't quite anticipate that at such a young age he could also give even more meaning to the real reason for the season.

On Sunday night we had a really great Family Home Evening.  We just bought a pretty little nativity set on sale at Michael's. So on Sunday Adam read from the account in Luke 2 and as he read Jack and I put up the appropriate figure. Afterward we sang Joy to the World and talked about Jesus for a little bit. Jack remained surprisingly calm and attentive. Then the next morning as he was eating breakfast he pointed toward the entertainment center and said, "Jesus." All day he kept pointing up and saying Jesus. I'd lift him up to look at it and he just loved it. Then the other day I hung a small picture of Christ above his bed and every morning when I go to get him he points to it and says, "Jesus."

Jack's example teaches me what "child-like faith" really means. His sweet, simple love of the Savior has got me thinking a lot about that tiny baby that was born under such humble circumstances who would someday give His life for me. He made it possible for me to be with Adam and Jack for eternity and for that I'll be eternally indebted to Him.

(Now don't go thinking we're all great and good about FHE, though. This is the first one we've done our whole marriage. But I'm glad we did it and I want to do it more often, because it obviously stuck with Jack for a while.)

Do, Do, Do

Sometimes Jack gets a bad bad case of cabin fever. He'll come up to us and say, "do, do, do" and he'll do the sign for go. The last couple days he's taken his insistence to a whole other level. Yesterday he tried to drag the diaper bag to the door. And today he found both of our jackets and delivered them to me.

 Stir crazy

 He even got his jacket on one arm. He was really ready to go.

Quit taking pictures! Get off the couch. Let's go!

His Pants Are Sooo Smart!

I just made a new game for Jack that I found on Pinterest. He loves word recognition games. Sometimes when he's upset in the car we'll just start asking him to say different words. He loves word books. He's always copying anything we say. So this new game is perfect for him. He could honestly play with this all day. I just took an oatmeal container and covered it in felt. Then I found some animals and things at Target dollar spot and Michael's and put some velcro on. He's picking up on the new words really quickly. My plan is to bring new items in periodically so that there is always a few new words to learn.

I posted videos of him playing with the new toy here and here. And then he wanted to do a shout out to everyone who's names he can say right here.

Ooh! Da Bubbles, Da Bubbles...... My Bubbles.

Jack is not unlike this guy when it comes to bubbles. We've got these touchable bubbles that he loves. They provide endless entertainment. Since they're touchable they last for a long time, so he'll go around the room for five minutes just popping every bubbles he can find. He's like a bubble terrorist. But this time, he didn't realize that he had let a lot of bubbles get past him. They were hiding out, unbeknownst to him, on his head.

We call him bubble head.

It's the Holiday Season

I just can't help it. Around the middle of November I just start getting so excited about Christmas. I start seeing all the Christmas stuff coming out at the retail stores and I can't help myself. Maybe it stems from working at a home decor store in high school where we'd start pricing Christmas in July and start putting up trees before Halloween. We did it last year too. In fact, I just looked up the post from last year to make the link and we decorated almost exactly one year ago to the day. Just one day sooner this year. What can I say? We just get excited. And so does Jack.

 I think the picture of Christ on the wall is just perfect. Reminds me of the true reason for the season every time I walk by the tree.

We've redecorated the kid-friendly bottom half 12 gazillion times already and Jack can't be downstairs by himself for the next six weeks, but it's still worth it. I just love the Christmas spirit. And every time I redecorate the tree I can't help but think of this sweet little thing, who just wanted to stare at the tree all day long. He doesn't do much looking this year. He's more into pulling, yanking, and destroying. But when we turned on the lights for the first time he had the same wonder in his eyes from last year. Christmas is magical. So why not start it off early? Especially when you've got this sweet little guy to make it so much fun.

 

Fall in Zion

Christie and Richard came to visit this last weekend, which happened to be a free admission weekend at Zion National Park. We went on a beautiful little hike called Emerald Pools. The fall colors were just spectacular. Then when you add in the bright blue sky, the perfect jacket weather and the striking red rocks, it was just perfection.

Gotta Go Under It

I've got a new goal. Every weekday, Jack and I will do one fun/adventurous/explorational/silly thing together. I compiled a list of things that I can post on the fridge and check off. Because as much as Jack loves PBS television, I don't think he needs to watch it all morning. So today we made a yarn tunnel. Yep, that's right. A yarn tunnel. It was a blast. We crawled under it, chased each other through it, and pulled on it.

And then we had to clean it up. I was crazy enough to think I could wind it all back up and use it again. So I spent a good thirty minutes untangling and didn't even make a dent. So I gave up and started hacking at it all with scissors.

Stay tuned for more fun adventures and if you're interested in my list click the link on the side of the blog.

I'm Inappropiate

I'm on the planning committee for the ward Christmas party. I'm in charge of the food and we're having pulled pork and chicken sandwiches.

I was emailing all the ladies about purchasing the Pork Butt and Chicken Breast and about preparing it all with a dry rub.

Here's what I wanted to say, and came ever so close to sending:

"I could probably use a helper or two to make calls about Crock-Pots and things. And I was thinking we could marinate the meat before we freeze it, then it'll be able to marinate and thaw all at the same time. So I would probably want help rubbing down all those breasts and butts...."

I had myself cracking up at the thought of it. But don't worry. I sent a more appropriate version. Oh, the art of self control. I feel I have now mastered it.

But believe you me, if I only knew them all better I just might have done it.

All About Jack

I know. I know. You're like, but I thought 9 out of every 10 posts were always about Jack. True. True. But since Jack turned one and I don't do the monthly posts about him, I feel like I haven't recorded some of his funniest new quirks. So here it goes.

We have a game that we all like to play. Adam and I sit on the couch with Jack in our laps and have a kissing circle. I kiss Jack, Jack kisses Adam, Adam kisses me and so on. After a few rounds of that, Jack will grab mine and Adam's faces and shove them together to get us to kiss again. So we appease him and kiss. Then we start the circle again, but he stops it again to push our lips together. What a sweetie! Between the ages of about 6 and 17 we really plan on using this against him. He'll be like, "pleh, pleh, yuck don't do that!"

He's been a great helper as of late. He likes to help put his toys away. Sometimes putting the toys away makes him remember how fun they were, though. So he ends up re-playing with it. Then when he needs a new diaper, he'll even help us out by bringing us the diaper mat and a diaper and laying down on the mat.

When I catch him doing something bad, I'll tell him no and it just fuels the fire. He gets a big grin on his face and grabs whatever he was playing with that he shouldn't have and run for the next room to get away from me. It irks me and makes me crack up all at the same time.

When it's time for bed, he'll start waving bye-bye to us and heading for the stairs. But when we respond by saying night night he gets the biggest frown on his face. I can't even contort my face into the extreme frowns he can make. Then when you put him in the crib he looks at you with the biggest puppy dog eyes and the huge frown the whole time while you get him his water and blanky. I find myself trying so hard to hold in the laughter then when I walk out of the room I just crack up. Is it wrong to laugh when your kid is feeling so sad and betrayed?

Finally, on Sunday we were going through all the new fun stuff I got for Jack to keep him entertained. I was reading him a fun book all about different words. On the food page there was a picture of a pod of peas. I pointed at them and said, "peas." He looked at me with a big grin and rubbed his belly. As background for this one, a couple months ago I tried to teach Jack how to sign please and thank you. I'd withhold toys from him trying to get him to say please first, which he absolutely hated. The sign for please is rubbing your chest. Imagine Jack's delight when that stupid please sign finally made sense! Oh ok I get it. Peas! I couldn't help but laugh every time he pointed at the peas and signed "please."

Keeping The Boy Entertained

The past few weeks of church and life have taught me a valuable lesson. If you don't keep 14-month-olds entertained, they will entertain themselves whether you like the entertainment choice or not. And I'm not talking same old same old books and "this little piggy." No. If it's old hat, you don't stand a chance during back to back Sunday School and Relief Society in the same room in the same seats. You either end up wandering the hall, wrestling him into your lap while he screams, or being that mom who lets the kid wander during the lesson and then he ends up whacking his head on tables while you're half way across the room. But last week a kind soul next to us handed Jack a magical thing. A quiet book. It held Jack's attention for a good 6-7 minutes. That's a long time. Then when he was over that she had a word book and then a toy truck. I decided it's time I transitioned into that mom instead of the frazzled, apologetic mom.

So this week I made a quiet book for Jack. He's given it a test run and I think along with the other things I picked up to put in my new church bag we'll have a much better week of church this week.

 The Front Cover. I'm going to get iron on letters to say My Quiet Book

 The top page is for pretending to brush the guy's teeth. Jack loves to brush teeth, so he is partial to this page for sure. And then on the bottom the fishies swim across the page on the ribbon.

 A road map to drive his little cars on.

 For the top one the carrots come out of the dirt and for the barn, the doors open to find...

 duck and cow finger puppets. Fun!

For weekdays I've been trying to be fun and creative too. I find that if I have cool things for Jack to explore and play with then I spend a lot less time saying no to him. A couple of his favorite activities have been:

 Pipe cleaners. Imagine that! I picked up a pack at the dollar store and he thinks they're great. I just pull a couple out at a time every so often and he feels like it's Christmas. He's easy to please.

And an even simpler toy that he just loves is his bucket of milk lids.

I found this one on Pinterest and I only use them when I really need him to play on his own because they're my secret weapon and I don't want to overuse it. So when I'm cooking dinner I'll pull them out of the cabinet and hand them to him to play with. I'm not sure why he loves them so much, but sometimes he'll play with them for ten minutes before moving on to the CDs under the entertainment center. Sometimes. 

So those are my latest tricks, but I'm always on the lookout for more ideas. Because someday, I fear, my milk lids will stop working.

But that day is still a ways away I think.