happy birthday, daddy

daddy ... you do so much for me. you are the best friend a guy could have.

i love it when you come in to my room in the morning and pick me up out of my crib.

i love it when you tickle me until i laugh even when you've stopped

i love watching golf and baseball with you and i can't wait until i'm big enough for you to teach me how to play.

and i know you'll teach me how to play because that's the kind of dad you are.

happy birthday, daddy. i love you.

the weekend update

this weekend update is so chock-a-block, it requires not one but *two* slideshows to share everything we did!

after an early saturday morning walk on the trail with friends sneetch and jellybean, jack and mommy headed home and received a phone call from grandad and nana inviting us to farm days. so after lunch, we headed out ... green acres we are there!

jack *luurrvved* the watermelon he ate and was obsessed with the 1968 john deere tractor. the turkey was a little scary at first when he gobbled, but after that it just cracked jack up. grandad bought jack a bag of dried corn to feed the goats, and jack watched intently as mommy demonstrated how it was done. he then took a handful of corn from the baggie and prompty shoved it in his own mouth. take that you greedy goats!

that alone would make for a full and fun weekend. but around our parts, the fun never stops ... so sunday it was time for lucy's gymanstics birthday party!

wow. who knew gymnastics could be that fun (for kids *and* adults) and who knew pizza could be that yummy (ditto).

and who knew a weekend could be that much fun!

flotsam

just the quickest, flottiest bit of flotsam & jacksam today ...

with the nicer weather of summer, we often leave our front door open and just have the glass front storm door closed.

and jack always wants to go outside. even when the storm door is closed and locked.

jack understands the rule that if he wants to go down a step he needs to go down backwards, on his belly, feet first. so in trying to break free and get out-of-doors, he dutifully turns around and pushes his feet against the locked door.

poor git (potter-speak) -- he hasn't figured out that's not all it takes. undoubtedly he'll soon be shouting "no" at the door. something to look forward to.

potter-mania

everyone around our house is pretty tired these days.

jack is not napping, ergo he is tired

but why would mommy and daddy be tired? (more tired than usual, that is)

one word.

potter-mania!

maybe that's two words. whatever. i'm too tired to parse it.

anyway, daddy has been tearing his way through the new harry potter book, which arrived on saturday afternoon. and mommy, having to wait until daddy is through with his early birthday present, is re-reading the last harry potter book so she can remember what happened (what with having her memory erased by pregnancy and birth) and then begin reading the new volume. this has meant many late nights for mommy and daddy. and, as regular readers know, the days with jack always start early. ergo, we are tired.

but ... daddy is finished. mommy is finished and now starting.

and jack?

well, today he was flipping the newly minted printed pages in which that famous young wizard resides (albeit upside down). too bad mommy was too slow with the camera -- it was cute (in mommy's objective opinion).

fine ... jack can flip, but mommy called next dibs! is jack too young to read it to him at bedtime?

the "n" word

jack has become quite a little character. lately, one of his favorite words seems to be "no."

in fact, roxana reports that tuesday passed without a nap. not a single, solitary moment of shut eye.

when jack was put in his crib, he threw his lovey and other little animals out, grabbed the bars and shook them with all his might, yelling, "no! no! no! no!"

mommy had heard of "the terrible twos" but "the terrible ones"?

who knew?

like a hole in the head

we need this to happen like we need a hole in the head!

(see next post)

tardy weekend update

our weekend update was delayed ... but here's a quick summary of how we passed our "time off":

jack and mommy met with our playgroup at friend tyler's house. tyler and his parents were featured recently in a piece on nbc news about how products from china are found all over people's homes -- from clothes to toys to food. jack enjoyed consuming and playing with many of these fine sino products ...

saturday also brought the aforementioned swan dive into the mulch and the scratched up face. if it's not one thing, it's another. invest now in johnson & johnson stock because their band-aid sales are guaranteed to be high for the next 10 years of jack's life, at least.

saturday also brought a fun trip to the park with daddy.

on sunday, mommy and jack embarked on a long walk to visit and bring breakfast to our friends, sneetch and jellybean. it was 4 miles each way -- probably just the thing to work off the ham, egg and cheese croissant we consumed at the midway point!

and later in the day, we had play time with nana, who came to visit and celebrate her birthday. (happy birthday, nana!) nana loves to take pictures of jack, and jack loves to strike a pose, so it's a very symbiotic relationship.

here jack demonstrates his zoolander "blue steel" pose for nana:



the sand and water table is always a favorite:



jack's hammier than the morning croissant:

tormenting the cat never gets old (speaking only for jack, not floyd):



and we're still working on sitting on the trike, but we've perfected ringing the bell:



after a good (and implausibly large) meal of hamburgers, cheese, peas, peaches and caprese salad (including fresh basil, yum!), jack finds a bedtime book is always a good way to relax from a full day:

is it friday again yet?