9 Months!

I've been a little delayed on my posts due to illness and Dallin working endless hours of overtime. But Luke is 9 months!

He's turned into a little busy body, crawling here there and everywhere. He wants to climb up stuff, especially the 2 stairs in our house and up onto the treadmill. But he hasn't figured out how to get down without falling.

He pulls himself to standing and sometimes even tries to stand without holding onto things. He's brave.

He likes to play with toys and his favorites are balls and cars. He will try to put anything he can find into his mouth, so I'm trying to teach Jack to be more diligent about not leaving paper, crayons, and little things on the floor.

He just started showing he's mad clenching his fists and screaming. Hopefully it's not the start of tantrums.

He still likes mommy more than anyone. In fact he doesn't like many people. He will go to one man at church and that's about it. He likes his brother sometimes. But he can get frustrated with Jack.

He likes to eat watermelon, corn, pancakes, yogurt melts, pasta, fruit bars, bananas, crackers, and graham crackers. But he will only eat if he can feed it to himself.

He takes 2 naps a day and wakes up in the night still. He goes to sleep as soon as you put him in his bed. But we did have to take his mobile out of his crib yesterday because he got distracted trying to take it down instead of napping.

He has 5 teeth. One of the top teeth is coming in with a chip in it. Look closely at the picture and you'll see it. It's just missing a chunk.

I can't believe how big my baby is getting!

My Big Three Year Old

Jack has become such a big boy!

He's always busy. Busy playing. Busy making up games. Busy making messes. Busy teasing his brother. He never seems to stop moving, from morning until night.

He loves playing Wonder Pets, driving cars, shooting guns, and jumping off things.

He also has a love hate relationship with his brother. He always wants to play with him. Yet his idea of playing is taking every toy Luke tries to play with or sitting on him. Oh brotherly love!

But he can also be very compassionate. If I am sad or upset, he will pat me and say its ok. One day my back hurt. Jack said, "Sit down and be still. Me going to rub your back!" And he gave me a nice back rub.

He still has a bit of a temper. Or should I say he has a strong will. Hopefully we can teach him to channel it into positive things.

He loves going to nursery every week at church and adores his teacher, who he calls Sippy Malone. He likes to play with his friend John.

He loves to read books. After reading a book to him a couple of times, he remembers most of it and can read it pretty well back to you. He can count to 10 and knows some of his letters. He loves to sing songs and knows the words to a lot of songs.

Jack is definitely a water baby. He loves swimming and playing in the bath tub.

His favorite foods are pancakes, waffles, Goldfish crackers, carrots and graham crackers. But he is getting better about eating most everything you give to him.

He generally sleeps through the night and takes a nap about 4 days a week.

He has been completely potty trained for about 3 months. No diapers, no pull ups, not even at bed time. Once he decided he was going to do it, he went all the way!

He never stops talking. He has to comment on everything. He has a lot of interesting observations. He has become very polite. He thanks you for everything. But my favorite is when he says no please instead of no thank you.

We love our busy, blonde haired, brown eyed dude!

When the Bug Bites

I remember last year, just days after Jack's birthday, a bug hit our house and he got really sick with a stomach virus.

Now I'm feeling a sense of deja vu. It's a few days after Jack's birthday and we are dealing with another stomach bug. But thus far Jack has remained unscathed. Instead poor Luke has had it. Bad. We've gone through so many diapers. And spent many sleepless nights dealing with his stomach pain. It has been no fun.

What's up with getting sick in the summer? I hope this isn't becoming a tradition.

Summer Camp

Some of the cute Young Women in our ward put on a summer camp for their Personal Progress. They invited kids 3 and up, and luckily Jack just made the cut off.

He had a blast! They were divided up into age groups and each group made a poster. They swam, played, made puppets, and even took naps! (I was very impressed they got them to do that!) Jack named his puppet Jack. Very creative! I was very impressed with how organized the girls were and how great they were with the kids. They could be professionals!

Now when is the next summer camp?

And the Birthday Goes On

Jack's actual birthday fell on a Sunday, but we still managed to have some fun.

He slept in until almost 7:30, which is late for him. Then we made up pancakes, eggs, and bacon. He insisted on having 3 pancakes since he's 3 now. And he ate almost all of it.

He played with his new toys until church started. At church, they sang to him in nursery and his nursery teacher even gave him a gift. He loves her do much and was so happy.

He did a little practice on his bike. He's still trying to get the hang of it.

That night we had meatballs and carrots. He had a requested this earlier in the week, but then claimed he didn't like it that day. We still managed to get him to eat some.

Then we sang to him again. He had a hard time blowing out the candle, so he did the biggest inhale ever and then blew it out. We had cake and ice cream and he got to open some more presents from Mom and Dad. It was some shirts, shorts, and pajamas.

He had fun playing some more with his aunts.

And then today he was so excited to get more packages in the mail from his cousins. Birthdays are amazing!

Happy 3rd Birthday!

Happy Birthday to my handsome, smart, loving, strong willed, playful, exciting, chatty, adorable Jack! I can't believe three years have passed! We love you too much!

The Party of the Year

Jack had his Lightning McQueen birthday party today. We were a little anxious because it stormed really heavily the night before, leaving branches everywhere, and there was more rain in the forecast. Fortunately it held off until after the party.

Jack loved having his friends over. He got a double Cars slip n slide from Mommy and Daddy. They played on it and swam in the pool.

We had hot dogs, wheels and cheese, watermelon, and chips. Luke's favorite part of the day was lounging around, munching on watermelon.

Jack got lots of cool gifts, including a new bicycle, helmet, knee pads, a gun, cars, and a cool puzzle.

Dallin made an amazing Lightning McQueen cake. He has skills!

Jack has been so excited about the pinata. It's been the highlight. He wasn't too thrilled about other people having turns, but we survived and gathered lots if candy.

It was a great party and we were so happy everyone came to celebrate with us.

That evening we went to Target to spend his birthday money. He loved picking out a toy and handing his money to the cashier. He's getting so big!

Day Tripping

We were busy on Friday.

We hit up the mall. The boys played on the toys while the girls checked out the stores. Then we ate some lunch.

That evening we went with the Young's to Holly Beach. We grilled up boudin and burgers and showed our visitors the Gulf. There was lots of swimming and digging.

On the way home we took the ferry and showed them some of the area hit by the hurricane.

Another fun day!