My hat is off

A few days ago I offered to watch Madison for a couple hours and thought "no biggie, it's only for a little while." Whew! That sure was an understatement! Both kids were really good and played so well together.

Love that smile:)

Here they are at the beginning of the afternoon. Jackson had so much fun pushing Madison in the jumperoo and she LOVED it...just look at that huge grin on her face! The difficulty came when I decided that I would try and get them both down for their afternoon naps. I somehow got Madison to sleep first by just rocking her in J's room. As soon as I tried to lay her down, though, she woke right up and looked at me like, "what exactly are you trying to do?" Then I decided to take both of them for a car ride. As I suspected, Jackson fell asleep before we got half way down the street. This was encouraging, so I drove around a little bit longer, just to ensure he was good and asleep. We came back home and I got him out of the car first, but before I got him all the way into his crib he woke up. At this point I was starting to get a little bit flustered! Now Madison was screaming in the car and Jackson was hollering b/c he wanted out of the crib. Arghhh! After about another half hour of rocking Madison and getting her back to sleep, Jackson decided to start making noise (why he wasn't asleep by now was beyond me). I didn't want him to wake her up, so I went over to his crib. He started whining and asking to be held, so I had no choice but to pick him up, too. And that's how I got myself into this conundrum...

After about 30 more minutes of rocking both of them, they both fell asleep! Only problem with that is that I was stuck in the chair. My mom did come back and rescue me. Hallelujah! My right arm (the one under the 30 pound child) was completely asleep.

My point to this long story is that my hat is off to all of you moms who have two kids. Those of you with more, like Hayley E., I have no idea how you do it on a day-to-day basis! You are AMAZING!

The Miracle of Ketchup

Let me take a few minutes to extoll the greatness of Ketchup. Ketchup really has kept my child from starving the past few weeks. If not for ketchup (and a few pancakes every morning) Jackson really might have wasted away by now. Now, I do like Ketchup...mostly on french fries, chicken, and yes, scrambled eggs. I can hear some of you saying "ewww!" but I promise it really is good on eggs! Jackson has taken it to a whole new level.

Things that just taste better with Ketchup, according to Jackson:
1. French Fries (sure)
2. Meat Loaf (of course)
3. Chicken (go right ahead)
4. Carrots (really?)
5. Toast (yes, he dipped his nice sourdough toast in it last night)
6. Cinnamon rolls (yikes!)

The moral of this story is that there is no need to mess with pureeing broccoli and other vegetables and trying to hide them in casseroles, like Jessica Seinfeld and that other lady have suggested in their books. It's really much easier than that. Just Add Ketchup.

Cookie Mania!

Last Friday Monica hosted a cookie playdate. The morning began with some outdoor fun...

and then moved indoors for a little more domestic flare.

Jackson really loves playing in the kitchens...hmmm, maybe a future chef? Wouldn't that be nice:)

We attempted to let all the big kids make their own cookies. It began with them sitting down and putting on aprons.

That lasted about 2.7 seconds and the apron came off! Jackson was the only kid that flat out rejected the apron.

His daddy was so proud!

Some of the kiddos were really trying to roll out the cookie dough and use the cute little cookie cutters. Jackson pretty much said no thanks to the entire process. Oh well, his mama sure liked the delicious finished products--icing, sprinkles and all!

60 miles...in only 3 days!

Last weekend, Jackson's grandma was an active participant in the 60 mile, 3 day walk for the Susan G. Komen foundation. She was such a trooper and we are all very proud of her. All together, they raised over $7.9 million for breast cancer! Jared, Jackson, Warren and I all went out to cheer her on during the walk on Saturday.

Jackson and I made signs (ok, so I really made them and Jackson mostly hollered at me b/c all he wanted to do was mess with the tape...he even crawled up onto the kitchen table when I put the tape in the middle of it. Who knew scotch tape was that much fun?) Here he is practicing holding the sign for Grandma.

He did so good for the real thing! He actually held his sign for at least 30 minutes while we waited for Grandma. Now that's dedication!


Yay Shelley!

Gigi

Last Friday night Jackson got to hang out with Gigi (my mom's new name...mostly b/c Jackson can say it) while we went out to celebrate a friend's birthday.

Here they are right before I left.

Jackson is really into reading books right now, so he started bringing them to Gigi. After story time, she asked him if he wanted to go get some dinner at Wendy's. He agreed that a good cheeseburger sounded pretty tasty, so off they went. He even waved and said "bye bye." Wow. What a difference! So much for the old days of screaming whenever he thought I might be leaving. I feel so much better and so does he:)

So big!

My Meme bought this for Jackson before he was born. Back then I never dreamed that he would be too big for it! How things have changed.

He really has outgrown his big bear. Oh well...he still had fun sitting on it for a little while. After this, he drug it into the living room and put the new monkey that he got at the zoo on its lap. Then he sat down beside the monkey and was so happy with himself.

Fort Worth Zoo

Jared and I have been talking about how much we would like to take a trip to the zoo for what seems like forever. After Jackson came along, we got even more excited about this little outing. We were waiting for the perfect time and it finally arrived. Beautiful weather, Jackson being the "right" age, etc. were all factors into us deciding it was finally time to go. I'm so glad we did--such a wonderful day.

We began the day with a great breakfast at the Ol' South Pancake House. De-li-cious. Jackson chowed down, as did the rest of us. Here's the crew as we entered the zoo.

Grandpa, Jackson and Jared with a very large gorilla just hanging out behind them.

The silly monkey himself being a little bit goofy.

Grandpa and Grandma Hays with J and the elephants

The fam checking out the giraffes and ostriches.

Grandpa bought some food to feed the fish...Jackson would throw in only one pebble at a time:) Guess he wanted the moment to last as long as possible.

Big daddy lion just roaring at all of us. It was really cool!

Mama lion and her cute little cubs

Enjoying a safari ride

Checking out their wing spans. I'm pretty sure Jackson had no idea why they were all standing there with their arms outstretched, but he went along with it!

We ended the day by taking a short train ride back to the entrance. Our feet were so happy with this decision.

The silly little guy and his new monkey. He was asleep in the stroller before we made it all the way out to our car. Such a big day!