Jackson and Papa

I love this picture of Jackson and my dad, Papa, walking down the pier.

Memorial Day at the Lake

Wayne, Jackson and I went to the lake Friday after I got off work. Jackson and I stayed until Monday afternoon but Wayne had to go home Sunday due to his work schedule. It rained for the majority of the time we were there, but we were still able to get out and have some fun. I can't count how many times Jackson had to ride in the golf cart, which he sometimes referred to as "cart cart" and later named "Maner" (pronounced like tuh-mater, but without the tuh and with a "n" instead of a "t"...... rent the move Cars if you haven't seen it). We also rode on the pontoon boat for quite a while on Sunday. In the past, Jackson has always fallen asleep as soon as the motor starts on the boat or shortly thereafter. This time, he managed to stay awake the entire time, although it was obvious that he was incredibly sleepy! My parents (Mimi and Papa) where there the entire time and Chris and Leanne were there Saturday and Sunday. We celebrated by birthday (that was 05/18) Saturday and had a delicious cake from Edgars. Wayne's mom and stepdad (Nana and Papaw) came down Sunday to celebrate Papaw's birthday. Sunday morning it was pouring and Leanne decided to take Jackson outside to play in the rain. By the time she got him undressed, it had stopped raining for the most part, but they still had fun stomping in the puddles on the deck. (Leanne is such a great sport!)

Overall, it was a fun, relaxing weekend.

(The long, turquoise pillow in the picture with Jackson holding it ended up providing HOURS of entertainment for Jackson- literally. All of the toys we buy him, he has more fun with a long pillow. He loves to play on my parents' king size bed and he threw the pillow all over the bed, wrestled with it, and kept having Mimi hold it over "Body's" (what he calls my parents' dog, Molly) ramp next to the bed so he could go under it and up and down the ramp. He kept calling it his "rainbow." Jackson's other favorite toy of the weekend? Flashlights. He wanted everyone to go to Mimi and Papa's room with him, lie on the bed and play with flashlights. He even wanted them on during the day. He ran down all of the batteries. You can see in one of the pictures of him with my parents in the golf cart, he's holding up a flashlight.)

Who's In Charge?

A couple of nights ago, Jackson was eating applesauce. Jackson is in this stage where he loves to eat with his fingers and loves to squish his food in his hands. He also likes to put his finger in the middle of the food and show you that he has food attached to his finger. Well, eating the applesauce with his fingers is incredibly messy and we kept telling him to stop. Finally, Wayne leaned over to Jackson, pointed his finger at him and said "Jackson, eat with your spoon!". In the exact same tone, Jackson leaned over, pointed and said "Daddy, eat with your hands!" It was hilarious. We both busted out laughing and couldn't stop.... if only we'd gotten that on video!

Day Out With Thomas 2009

On March 29, 2009, we went to "Day Out With Thomas" at the Calera Train Station with Wayne's parents, Jackson's Nana and Papaw. It was a lot of fun and Jackson loved seeing all of the train paraphernalia. He enjoyed his ride on the train and enjoyed seeing Thomas and Sir Top Em Hat up close. I thought he would be afraid of Sir Top Em Hat but he wasn't, he sort of stared at him like he was trying to figure out what that strange thing was standing next to him. Overall, it was a great time.

Mother's Day 2009

We enjoyed our usual Mother's Day outing at Sara & Jerry's farm in Jemison. The family always gets together to fish for catfish and then we cook them and eat them. It's always a lot of fun and really good. This is the first year Jackson was interested in the fish and fishing. Jackson started out fishing with a Snoopy rod that Chris and I had when we were Jackson's age..... I have no idea how my parents kept it for so long! Well, Jackson is apparently a born fisherman- he caught the first fish of anyone there and it was a BIG fish! Jackson kept saying he was going to catch a big fish and boy was he right! He had to have help once he hooked the fish and then he didn't want anywhere near that thing as it kept flopping all around!!!! Jackson ended up catching about 3 nice sized catfish AND he caught a nice sized Brim.... who knew there were even Brim in this pond??? Jackson also enjoyed eating the catfish, which I was surprised by because even though he loves fish, he usually will only eat the fish that comes in Kid Cuisines. Overall, it was a really nice, fun Mother's Day.

Messy Art Party

On Sunday, 05/03/09, we went to a "Messy Art" Birthday Party for Jacob and Dylan Strickland. Jacob was turning 5 and Dylan was turning 2. It was TONS of fun, very messy and very BRAVE of Jenny and Dustin to do that in their house! Originally, it was planned for outside, but we had lots of severe weather that day (as you can see on the TV in the background of one of the pictures) and they had to move it inside. Very brave!

It's Been a Long Time.....

It's been a really long time since anything has been put on Jackson's blog. What does that tell you? The kids are growing REALLY fast and there's hardly any time to devote to posting on blogs. Jenn, who was doing Jackson's blog before and whom I owe a TON to for doing that for me, has 3 kids and keeps up with her own blog- so it's about time I learned how to do it myself, so I can keep everyone updated on Jackson. SO, here it goes:

Since I last posted we've gone through Christmas, the New Year, Valentines, etc. Jackson has grown a lot, is full of energy and like mommy- talks a lot! He LOVES the movie Cars and watches it repeatedly. We have to buy everything we see that has to do with Cars. He also likes Nemo, Dumbo, Mickey Mouse and Spongebob (or as Jackson calls it "Bob Bots Pee Pants", with a little bit of an english accent). Jackson loves playgrounds and the slide is his favorite, but he also likes to swing and play in the gravel. Jackson loves "monkers kyucks" (monster trucks) and we even went to the Monster Truck Rally at the Civic Center- he had a blast! He has about 20 monkers kyucks that he plays with all over the house and tries to run into the dogs with........ ahhh, the dogs. For those of you who don't know, we have a dachshund, Hershey, and a chihuahua, Corona. Both are fairly small dogs. Jackson LOVES them.... or loves to drive them crazy!!! He is constantly wanting to "I peet 'er" and "I huuug 'er". Hershey lets him "peet 'er" a good bit and then he'll surprise her with a bit hug and he about chokes her- all you can see is Hershey's little nose sticking out and eyeballs that look like they're about to pop. So she has to be saved from Jackson hugs quite often. Hershey will play with Jackson and let him chase her around the house and she's just recently started playing with some of her toys with him. She also lets him pick her food out of the bowl and feed it to her piece by piece- this cracks Jackson up for some reason. (What doesn't crack mommy up is when Jackson decides that he'd rather pick the pieces of food up off the floor than out of the bowl and turns the bowl over on the floor and dog food goes EVERYWHERE!). Corona, on the other hand, is very different. She is extremely quick and can get in and out of small places easily, which makes Jackson very frustrated and angry at times. I basically have to catch Corona and hold her down so Jackson can pet her and attempt to get a hug in. What's funny, though, is once he starts petting her, she calms down and seems to enjoy it. Chihuahuas are just strange, though. Both are very protective of Jackson.

I'm posting some pictures and hopefully will be updating much more often and filling in on things missed as I go along........ feel free to ask about anything I may have missed!