Birthday Pictures

From Annaka and Jack 2009

From Annaka and Jack 2009

From Annaka and Jack 2009

Christmas Musical at Church

Not for the faint of heart...11 minutes of our Christmas Musical. Cherub Choir was the opening act.

Napping Time

Jack and Oliver fell victim to a Saturday afternoon spontaneous nap.

From Annaka and Jack 2008

Mascara Jack

What did you get into?

Nothing

From Annaka and Jack 2008

Jack Playing Baseball

Jack Turns to the Dark Side!

Jack is 3

From Annaka and Ja...

Today Jack turned three years old. He wanted a baseball cake and a bicycle was on his top of his wish list. More birthday pictures in the photo gallery.

Finally we rake some leaves

Helicopter at Clemson

Last Saturday it was Military Appreciation Day for the disastrous Clemson / VT game. One bright spot was watching this Apache land and takeoff from the campus. Jack really liked it!

Jumpin' Jack Flash

Jack likes to jump in the water. Now, he is not the most graceful jumper, but he is animated jumper. Every time he jumps, he has to say "1,2,3, Blastoff"

Attack of the Frog

Last night I found a frog crossing the road near our house that I was able to put into a bag. This frog was not a typical frog we usually see, but it was more of a tree frog variety. The kids loved it. Annaka and Jack watched it jump around in the backyard as they were building up enough ambition to finally to touch it.

Soon Kristen let the frog crawl up her hand and as the kids stared intently and without warning, the frog jumped and blasted off Kristen's hand in what was definitely a leap of faith by the frog. The frog landed on Jack's face over one of his eyes. Jack looked like he literally had a patch over one of this eyes. The frog was able to hold this position using its suction cups on his toes.

With a jolt Jack reared back screaming and waving his hands blindly. In a battle between a two-year old boy and a seemingly innocent frog, Jack was able to finally claim victory by knocking the frog off his face with his hand. It took several minutes before Jack could calm down.

Interestingly, he was talking about the frog that landed on his head as we put him to bed last night. He also has brought it up several times today. I guess time will tell if he develops a fear of frogs.

I hope not.

Puzzle Man

Last weekend Jack was getting dressed, however, he soon disappeared. We found him later downstairs working on his puzzles without any clothes on. What a dedicated problem solver.

Boys and their Fire Trucks

Jacks loves his fire trucks. He has a favorite fire truck puzzle that he disassembles and assembles for what seems like an hour each day. This is a picture of Jack playing on a fire truck at William's Birthday.

Another Jack Milestone : The Crib is History

From Annaka and Ja...

Today Kristen and I took the crib apart and put together Annaka's old toddler bed for Jack. While Jack has never tried to climb out of his crib, he probably could get out now if he wanted. I am going to miss the crib. A crib is sorta like a safety deposit box. Your child is safe inside and they need you to get them in or out.

Jack was actually pretty excited about going to bed tonight. Who knows? Maybe he realized he was now going to experience some new freedom that would allow him to get out of his bed in the middle of night to go visit his toys downstairs. I guess we will see.

Good Night!

From Annaka and Ja...

Jack's New Big Chair

From Annaka and Ja...

This week was a milestone weekend for Jack. We finally gave him his own big chair (Thanks IKEA) for the table. This is good for him and good for us. No more lifting him up each time for dinner. Now let's eat!

Happy Birthday Jack!

From Annaka and Ja...

I can't believe Jack is two years old today. He enjoyed his birthday celebration which involved making his own pizza, eating the train cake that mom made, and opening his presents. I am not sure if he appreciated the step-by-step instructions from his big sister on how to celebrate his birthday.

No I do it!

Jack is asserting his independence these days and will not let you help him with anything. His new favorite phrase is "No I do it!". This transformation occurred seemingly overnight. He will now not let you help him:

• Walk upstairs
• Walk downstairs
• Open any food packaging (as documented in the video above)
• Let you get him in the car seat
• Get his socks off
• Get his socks on
  

This is a good thing, but our family efficiency rating has declined...

A tired boy

From Annaka and Ja...

Poor boy. Jack could not make it through lunch today. I could not believe he could sleep while keeping his head up. I did manage to put him in his crib without waking him.

The Mini-van Bandit

In tribute to the one minute movie trailers, I clipped some misc. clips together to create Jack's own movie trailer. Not sure what the subject of the movie or the title would be. One thought for the title was "the mini-van bandit".

Cars

Jack is obsessed with the movie Cars. He will come out of the blue and tell you "cars", which means "Hey I want to watch Cars". I made the mistake several months ago showing him the trailer to the movie and he wanted to watch it over and over again. Now that the movie is out, he finds the dvd and drags it around the house wanting you to play it.

Uncle Brian this week showed off his new ipod which plays movies. We put the Cars movie on the ipod and Jack had a new toy. Within 20 minutes, Jack figured out how to play and pause the movie and how to put on headphones. He was totally enamored. Don't worry he will not be getting an ipod for Christmas. I think we will stick with the analog joys of dumptrucks and firetrucks.

From Annaka and Jack