Jack's house

 

 Ever since Jack could pull himself to a standing position, he's loved little playhouses. Our friend has one in their backyard and there's one at the local indoor playground...and he LOVES them. He'll spend literally 30 minutes just opening and closing the door, shutting the windows, walking in and out and around. It's weird but he loves it. So Grandma and Grandpa were nice enough to buy Jack a house of his own which we put together this weekend. (By "we" I mean my very skilled husband.) It was a huge hit!

 

 

 The next morning was so funny. It was early around 6:30 and Jack was still in his pajamas when he went to the back door and started pounding on it like he wanted to go outside. I don't usually let him go outside that early when it's still wet out and he's in PJs. But this morning he just wouldn't let it go. He started screaming and crying and throwing a massive temper tantrum. So finally I just opened the door and he raced out. He got to the grass, pointed at his new little house and started giggling uncontrollably. He raced over to that thing so fast...it was pretty darn adorable.

 

Favorite Photo of the Week

"No pictures, please."  

The epitome of hipness.

Week in Review - 4/28/12

 

 This week Jack was sick so there's not much to report. We stayed in most of the time with occasional trips to places I thought he couldn't make other kids sick. There was a lot of playing in our backyard. He certainly likes to do that so that passed some time.

   

 We also put a bird feeder in the backyard and, man, the birds certainly found it. Every day there are tons of birds (of all types) hanging out in the backyard. Jack loves them and occasionally one will even stay put long enough for him to get pretty close.

   

 This week he did something for the first time that was pretty funny. All of a sudden he marched me over to the garage and insisted we go in. Then he walked over to the car and banged on the door. Okay, so maybe he wanted to play in the car. I let him climb in the back seat but he insisted on sitting in the car seat. I asked him if he wanted me to drive somewhere and he said "yeah". Okay, so out we went. And about two blocks from the house he fell asleep. I guess he was just asking for a nap. Damn, he's cute.

   

 Okay, more pics from the week:

 

Being pensive in his little seat

sitting in the bushes

just thought this position was funny

hiding in his tents

getting dirty as usual

Five for Friday: Over-rated Movies

My top 5 over-rated movies:
i.e. movies I think are overrated but people seem to love...

5.  Blade Runner
4. Scarface
3. Avatar
2.  Citizen Kane
1.  2001

(I couldn't include many others like Crash, Inception, Lost in Translation, and Breakfast at Tiffany's)

Sick...but staying afloat.

 

 Sickness has struck the household again. Jack wasn't sick the first year of his life but now he's been sick twice in the past two months. And he's passed it along to his caring and loving mommy and daddy.  I know this isn't the worst thing in the world but he is just so damn miserable that it's hard to take care of him from 5:45am to 8pm by myself. And by "hard" I mean that I run out of patience after hours of alternating crying, whining, and throwing food. But we're hanging in there. It'll all be over soon.  

On a positive note, here are some cute pics of Jack and his daddy enjoying some pool time this past weekend.

 

My future rock star

My husband shot this video and he has been wanting me to post it for a long time.  (I apologize for the vertical-ness of it).  But Jack sure does love a guitar.  He totes around his toy guitar everywhere and also loves to play John's guitar.  It's so darn cute.  And, as you can tell, his daddy thinks it's hysterical and awesome.  

Reading is for nerds

And I think my son is a nerd. The kid is so into books. It's really fantastic. I mean, I was a crazy book nerd when I was a kid so I guess that makes sense. He will read books in the car sitting in his car seat. He loves going to Barnes and Noble and pulling every book off the book shelf. (That part actually isn't that awesome for me.)

But mainly, he just constantly wants to read when we're home. If we're not outside playing in dirt, he wants me to read him a book. He'll bring me book after book and hand them to me and pound on the cover, making it obvious that I need to start reading. At bedtime we read about 5 or 6 books...he'll tell me what order he wants to read them in by pointing at them. If a book is new to him and he's particularly intrigued by it, he'll have me read it literally 7, 8, 9 times in a row. I hope his interest in reading doesn't wan as he gets older. But I will have to start learning what books are good for school age boys! All I know are girl books like Nancy Drew, Babysitter's Club, and Sweet Valley Twins. :)

Favorite Photo of the Week

Tunnel vision

Week in Review - 4/21/12

There's my little 14 month old playing in the dirt, as usual. He found it particularly comfortable to sit in the middle of the flower bed. I didn't mind since he had picked most of the flowers anyway.

What a fun week we had. We started last Sunday by taking daddy to Lake Balboa. It was a beautiful day and they got a lot of quality time.

He loved seeing all the swans and even fed the ducks.

This week we went to a mommy and me class (free demo) at a very neat place in Silverlake. Jack had a lot of fun playing with all the new toys and seeing all his friends. There was a circle time with music where he showed everyone how good he was on the ukelele. Then they had a snack and story time where everyone sat at this little table in big boy chairs with their snack in front of them. I truly couldn't believe my eyes when I sat him in his chair and he sat still, ate his snack, and was mesmerized by the woman reading a book at the head of the table. It was amazing. There's hope for him surviving pre-school.

The class also had this amazing giant cardboard rocketship that Jack was obsessed with. I don't think I've ever seen him so excited. He was in and out of that thing all morning.

At the end of the class he even helped clean up. A little.

He wore his badge of honor from the class all day with pride.

He's such a curious kid that it's neat to see him exploring new things. At our nearby store, he discovered that the metal plates on the ground make a clanging noise when you walk over them.

I am not lying when I say he proceeded to walk back and forth over them for about 15 minutes. Then when we went to the store 5 days later? He remembered the plates and ran back to them. Laughed every time they made a noise too.

Next to the metal plates is a pet store with a ton of cat scratch posts and stands on display outside. I didn't think anything of it until I turned around and saw this.

I couldn't believe it! He got up there all by himself. I told John this was the closest he was going to get to owning a cat. (not a big fan). But I was proud of my climbing boy.

He really is understanding more and more every day and I'm getting better at understanding what he's trying to say. He still doesn't really have any vocab but he gets his point across. Last night he was playing with a Sesame Street toy with Elmo and I said, "oh are you going to play the Elmo song?" And he stopped and walked towards me with his arms up to pick him up. So I did and thought we were done playing and he started crying and whining and banging his hand on my phone. Ohh!! He wanted me to play him the Elmo song video that I play him on my phone. Stupid mommy. But I got it and we sat and he cuddled up while watching the video. Too cute.

Okay, now LOTS more pics from our busy week.

One last ride on the bouncy seat before we packed it up and put it in the attic

Somebody thinks hiding in the shower is hysterical

Box rides are really fun

He looks so old here. And sullen.

More truck fun

Fun with a friend's water table. Helps beat the 93 degree heat!

Cart surfing

Dorky hat makes him ready for summer. Needed something to keep the beating sun off of him.

Enjoying the massage chair at the mall

Twins! Unfortunately it was unplanned and I didn't' realize it until someone pointed it out at the mall.

Playing near the trash cans. His favorite.