A Short Haircut!

We took Jack in today to the Cookie Cutters (a salon specifically for children). This was for his second haircut. (The first time, the stylist did a wonderful job and left most of Jack's beautiful curls).

Today I asked (a differnt stylist) for a cut that was shorter on the sides, but longer on top and asked her to leave his curls in the back (but NOT to give him a "mullet"). She gave him a short boy's cut.

He is so cute....but I guess I was just not ready for this haircut. He looks so much older now. (And because he is so big, now with this haircut....he certainly looks older than 21 months.) I know that I will get used to seeing him without his little curls....I just wasn't prepared for this drastic change today.

My Little Talker.

Jack has been adding new words to his vocabulary every day. But as of last weekend...talking has really officially kicked in. He is putting words together all of a sudden. "dark outside" "red balloon" "eat Zoro" "Daddy doctor" "no, no Zoro, eat" "pumpkin seeds" "trick or treat" "pink pop please" etc.

It is amazing. Almost over night Jack just began trying to make short sentences to communicate.

One thing that I have been thinking about (and it may be totally unfounded) is that Jack doesn't seem to move around a lot. In the house he sometimes runs around...but often he is happy just sitting down looking at books, playing with toys, etc. When we are outside (or out anywhere, really) he almost always refuses to walk. He will take a step or tow and then want to be picked up. If I won't pick him up he cries. Paul does take him out during the day to parks and gyms but I just wonder whether he is getting enough exercise.

Jack is currently totally infatuated with trains. All he wants for Christmas is a train set. (We already bought the set with a big train table and trundle drawers.....he is going to LOVE it). So last weekend we took him to a Haunted Train ride at the Ohio Train Museum.

When we got there, Jack was able to climb all over some very old train engines and cars. There were kids everywhere....he was having so much fun. We all walked through a decorated vintage train and then got on an old trolley that took us for a ride along the train tracks. They turned out the lights and told a ghost story about lost conductors...and then stopped the trolley and two people dressed as skeletons got on and punched everyone's tickets (if you didn't have a ticket they were going to throw you off to live with the hobos.) Jack was scared and hid his face in my hair when the skeletons came our way. But when I told him what happens if we didn't have a ticket he turned right around and held out his ticket to the skeletons. At the end of the "ride" they gave all of the children suckers.

Jack just LOVED it. All week he has wanted to look at his ticket where the skeletons punched holes in it...and wants Mommy to talk about our ride ont he trolley and about the skeletons that came on in the dark. (He is very infatuated witht he dark and the moon).

On Sunday we took him to Boo at the Zoo. (They had the Zoo decorated for Halloween and had candy stations where the kids could get candy throughout the zoo.) Jack wore the hood portion of his little Monkey costume and he was soooo cute. Everyone kept pointing at him and comenting on how cute he was. He was having so much fun until I let him walk along a wall that was about 3 feet high. He wouldn't let me hold his hand (Mr. Independent) so I was walking along beside him ready to catch him if he started to fall. Paul called out to me to point out another candy station and when I looked to see what Paul wanted, Jack misstepped and fell on to the hard cement right on to his face!!!

He was screaming hysterically and I ran over and held him...we were all distraught! it was so horrible. We weren't sure how badly he was hurt. His lip was a little bloody and his cheek began to swell up. We ended up getting some ice and holding on his cheek and it seemed to be much better so we let him go to a few more candy stations and take a ride on the Haunted Train. By the next day he had a bruise, but he was okay, thank goodness. It does go to show you how careful you have to be with these little ones...and how you really can't take your eyes off them for one minute.

Jack continues to do great with his potty training. He wears training underpants all of the time now (except at night). He does still have an accident here and there (and the poops seem to be the hardest ones for him to predict) but he is trying so hard. He hates the diapers, though...and loves his underpants. He still does not tell us when he has to go regularly, so we try to take him to the potty pretty regularly. But sometimes, he will tell us when he has to go BEFORE he goes...and we are so proud of him for that. He is doing really really well. I love his little heart.

Potty Training...20 Months...WOW!

Jack continues to use the potty completely on his own! We purchased some training underwear this weekend...and he wore underwear all weekend (though we put him in a diaper at night since he sleeps with us) and he only had one accident and that was during his nap in the crib.

He is consistently going number one and number two on the potty. This morning, before I left for work, we asked him if he was going to come outside to say goodbye to Mommy, and he said "uh huh" and then gasped and said "Mommy Poop". He ran back into the bathroom (his underpants were already off as he had just gone number one) and he sat right on the potty and went poo poo. I know he will have accidents...but he is basically out of diapers except at night now.

I can't believe this! We really have done nothing to encourage him until he started sitting on the potty and actually going. Then we just started asking him if he had to go, and then giving him one M&M when he went number one and two M&M's when he would go number two in the potty (as well as kisses and encouragement). What he started on Friday is to go pee pee just a little bit....so he could get an M& M and then go right back in to go a little more to get another M&M...etc. He was holding it to try to get as many M&M's as possible! He is my amazing baby.

His vocabulary is growing like crazy too. He astounds us by saying words we didn't know he knew ("spoon", "sausages", "Yay," "casserole", "house", "ghost", "pizza", "Wow", etc.) Last night when we were at the store Jack was amazed by all of the Halloween decorations....and just kept repeating..."Wowweee". It was so cute.

Potty Training at 20 Months!

Well, we hadn't planned on working on this yet.....but Jack has jumped into potty training all on his own. We have a little potty in our master bath and he has been sitting on it quite often lately. So on Tuesday (two nights ago) I took off his diaper and he sat on the potty. I asked him if he was going to go "pee pee" and he stood up and began to go. I helped him sit back down and he did the rest in the potty. I left his diaper off for the rest of the evening...and later he began to go on the floor, so I scooped him up and told him that we do that on the potty as I sat him on the little potty.

Then yesterday, I took off his diaper when we got up and sat him on the potty. He immediately went Pee Pee. Then Paul called me while I was at work later that morning to let me know that Jack put his hand over his mouth and gasped and then ran into the bathroom and sat on the potty and went pee pee all on his own. Since that time, whenever we take off his diaper, he does all of his pee pees on the potty.

In fact, yesterday we started giving him one M&M each time he successfully used the potty. By this evening, the little stinker has figured out that if he just goes a little and holds the rest, he can get an M&M and then he can go right back to the potty and go again and get another M&M and so on and so on. I am telling you....he is so smart!!!

(I will note that he is not the neatest baby in the world...as he hasn't mastered keeping his pee pee pointed down while he sits on the potty and we end up with a bit of a mess each time he goes on the potty....but we can work on that later.)

I am pretty amazed at how early he is able to grasp this concept and actually begin potty training.

Back From Disney...We Had So Much Fun!!!!

Oh My Gosh....we had so much fun!

We ended up leaving for Disney on Friday, September 23rd (after having rescheduled twice due to Hurricane Frances and Hurricane Ivan) despite the fact that Hurricane Jeanne was now turning back and heading toward Central Florida.

We arrived on Friday afternoon...after an easy 2 hour flight. We checked into the Boardwalk...and were thrilled with our beautiful 2-bedroom villa. It was beautiful and huge....and we couldn't have been happier. We spent that evening at Epcot (just a 5 minute walk from our resort) and then everyone else called it a night while Paul and I went to the grocery store to get food for the entire group.

We woke the news that Hurricane Jeanne was headed right toward us and that Disney would be closing its parks early that day and would remain closed on Sunday as well. We spent a somewhat rainy day at the Magic Kingdom and had a ball. Jack was afraid of many of the rides that involved "animated people and animals" but loved the rollercoaster, the Dumbo ride, and anything not involving "scary characters."

That night we ate at the resort (they had a buffet available as all of the restaurants were closed due to the looming hurricane. It was amazing....that night all of the news was about the storm....everyone was preparing and all of the state was wondering how bad this was going to be. It was scary as things became dark...and we heard that the hurricane would come ashore over night. However, down in the lobby the staff had coloring stations for the kids, a volleyball net made out of tape and balloons, characters walking around, etc. People were sipping drinks, and the kids were running around screaming and laughing and playing as the sky grew darker and Hurricane Jeanne got closer and closer. It reminded me of a scene from the Titanic...where the danger was approaching and everyone knew it was there...but the activity and celebration continued in the beautiful setting. Erie.

We spent the next day in the resort. Jack had so much fun with his cousin Olivia and just being with Mommy, Daddy, Nana, Uncle "kiss" (he makes a kissing sound for Uncle "kiss") and his Aunt "Aaayna". (He just adores his Aunt Aaayna"). The kids had a bath in the garden tub...and played downstairs with the other children. We ate at the buffet served at the resort...and all carried juice and cake back to the room to eat and drink later..."just in case". We watched the hurricane arrive and stayed safe a protected and thought about all of the people and animals out in the storm...and hoped this storm would pass quickly. It did.

The very next day, the parks were open and you never would have known that a hurricane had gone through. Jack, Paul and I stayed and spent the morning/early afternoon at the pool while the rest of the group went to a character breakfast. (Jana ended up being rushed to an emergency room due to a terrible pain in her side...but was released a couple of hours later when blood work and everything else appeared normal).

The rest of the week was a blur. We spent most of our time either at the pool (Jack loved it...and wanted to swim kicking his arms and legs and going under water for hours!) at Magic Kingdom or Epcot. (We spent a day at MGM which was fun.) As the week wore one...Jack began to love the animated rides! He loved Peter Pan, and Pooh, and the Pirates of the Carribbean, the Tikki Room, the Jungle Cruise, and just about any we took him on. However, his very favorite ride was the Barnstormer rollercoaster at Toontown. We would ride that 4-5 times in a row...with Paul, Mom and I alternating turns waiting in line and handing him back and forth. We must have ridden that ride 50 times by the end of the week. He also adored the space orbiter in Futureland (the rockets on top of a building that go up and around...they scared me to death...but he rode that ride 3 times with Daddy).

By the middle of the week, each time Jack saw the bus that took us to the parks, Jack would gasp loudly and say "Mama!!" pointing at the bus. And each day when we would enter the Magic Kingdom and as soon as he would see the castle he would say, "Oh, Mamma!!!" He loved the train so we often rode that to Toontown as soon as we arrived (so he could immediately ride the rollercoaster)...but he never fully warmed up to the large characters. He would be shy when they paid attention to him and hide his face in my chest or hide behind my legs (very unusual...as he is so outgoing most of the time) but as soon as the characters would walk away or pay attention to someone else...he would follow them and was very interested in them.

During this trip, Jack definitely developed a personality. He figured out how to scream and how to demand. I am not sure if it was because of all of the stress and the continual movement and action, but he began throwing screaming and crying fits when things were not going the way he wanted them to go. He loved the monorail adn would beg "pease, pease...whenever we would leave begging to ride on the "choo choo" as he called it.

This trip also turned in a true time to bond and get to know my baby boy and for him to get to spend time and bond with Jana, Chris, Mom and of course Daddy, too. (Although Jack made it very clear that he is Mommy's baby when it comes right down to it...only Mommy can push his stroller, only Mommy --sometimes Aunt Jana--can hold him on the rides, only Mommy can pick him up...etc.) All in all, we all had so much fun....Jack so much more fun than I thought that he would have and so much more fun than I would have expected to ever have myself. Paul was a bit stressed because we were spending so much time taking naps during the day that he felt we were wasting our trip...but I thought it was wonderful and perfect...and would love to do it again tomorrow if we could!!!!!

First Haircut!

On September 22, 2004, after much thought and consideration, we decided to have Jack's hair cut. His hair was so long and beside the fact that everyone who didn't know him thought he was a girl, we didn't want him to have to suffer in the heat with hair down his back in Florida...so I snuck away during lunch and we had his hair cut at the Cookie Cutters (a special salon just for little kids.)

We asked the stylist not to cut it too short and she did a fabulous job. We were so proud of him as he was so good. Surprisingly, I think he is even cuter with shorter hair! Maybe next time we will get even shorter.

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AFTER: