13 Months Old

Jackson turned 13 months old 2 days ago. Here is the latest on him....

Sleeping: He sleeps for about 9.5 hours at night when we are in school and around 10.5-11 hours at night when we are out or on weekends. He takes 2 naps (usually - he is currently screaming in his bed refusing to nap) per day, both anywhere from 1 hour to 2.5 hours.

Eating: Wacko has become uber picky! All he seems to want is bread or some sort of carb. If he never sees it, then he will eat anything else, but if someone else is eating a biscuit, roll, tortilla -- forget about it! He HATES ground beef. I'd say he will have a long life ahead of him considering half of what we cook has ground beef in it. His favorites are Cuties (clementines), pizza, & mac-n-cheese. He loves yogurt too.

Words he says: "Dada", "Mama", "Yaya", "Hi", "Bye-bye", "Cat", "Leyla" (our dog's name, but it sounds more like Lah-la) and I think he has been trying to say "light" too.

Tricks: He can tell you where his nose is (he has been doing this for about 2 weeks, but just recently started doing it consistently); when he hears a phone ring he will put anything up to his ear & say "hi" - very cute!; he can take 2-4 steps by himself and is getting much more brave about it; he will give kisses or sugar & he wants to kiss pictures all the time especially his own baby pictures; he will blow kisses, but usually just puts his hand over his mouth & doesn't actually "throw" the kiss; and rocks in his rocking chair by himself

Favorites: swinging; riding in the wagon; rocking or standing (shame, shame!) in the rocking chair; playing ball; chasing the dog or cat; climbing the stairs (supervised, of course); eating Cuties

I can't wait to see whatelse is to come! He gets cuter & cuter everyday and Aaron & I simply adore him!
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I went for my 14 week check up today. It was very quick. Dr. Cone said everything is going perfectly on schedule and we have a healthy little one with a strong heartbeat. We go on January 28 for the big ultrasound when we find out the sex and can start working on the nursery!

Christmas #1 & 2

**Disclaimer -- mammoth post with lots of pictures!**
We have had a fun filled week! We started off last weekend on a trip out to west Texas via San Antonio. Before we left we got Jackson a new big boy car seat -- it was time he turned around to see the scenery! He seems to like it, but wouldn't cooperate to take a good picture. This was the best I could do.

We stopped off in San Antonio for a visit with the sweet Williams family. Hailey is getting so big and she's absolutely beautiful with this big green (sorry, Tiff) eyes & gorgeous long eye lashes! They gave Jackson some fun little cars and some puzzles. Tiff's mom, Linda brought over a gift for him too -- a precious book with a doggie bookmark. Thanks guys!

Here is Jackson stuck in Hailey's play mat. I guess that's why those things have age limits.

We then went on to Denver City (about 80 miles south of Lubbock) to see my Mimi (Jackson's great-grandma), Aunt Christie, Uncle Hoot and cousins, Leah & Lisa. This is Jackson being tickled by Leah. Unfortunately, Mimi was sick the whole time and so we didn't get to spend as much time with her as I would have wished. We did get to have a lovely visit with the rest of the fam! They showered him with Christmas presents, including a stuffed Elmo, a workbench, some bath toys and Leah & Pete bought him these adorable John Deere camo boots. It was COLD, COLD there, which was nice, I thought!

Uncle Hoot helping Jackson unwrap his presents.

Lisa showing Jackson his new stuffed Elmo pillow.

Aunt Christie playing carpenter with Jackson. Jackson is pretty good at swinging that hammer!

We then went back through Abilene on the way home. Aaron's grandad & Aunt and cousins live there. Aaron's aunt Jean had never met Jackson so we met her & Shaylee for lunch and had a great visit!

Shaylee, Jackson & Jean at El Chico's.

Santa came to see Jackson. One of his UPS elves did not deliver his main gift in time, but he had plenty. We still were pretty upset about it, but Jackson didn't seem to notice. Jackson woke up Christmas morning VERY grumpy, but was ok while checking out what Santa brought him. He fell apart again as soon as we got to my parent's house and stayed that way until nap time.

Some of what Santa brought him -- a soccer ball and more balls for his ball pit he got for his birthday.

Apparently, Jackson was a very good boy because Santa came to see him (and us!) at my parent's house. He got a wagon, a bear, and 2 cute hats and mittens. Santa would have taken them back if he could have seen his breakfast behavior, but after a nap he was a different child!

Here is Jackson with all of his loot from the first 2 Christmases. He wasn't too happy about taking his picture, but I wanted it! His little rocking chair is adorable and contrary to the picture, he starts immediately rocking away when he gets in it. We got a video on my parents' camera and I'll post that later.

Video of Jackson's first wagon ride.

Our 3rd & final Christmas will be on Wednesday or Thursday of this week once Aaron's brother & sister-in-law get into town all the way from Arizona. Jackson can't wait to see his cousins and we are looking forward to visiting & spending New Year's Eve with them at Gabby & Papa's house.

Nuchal Translucency

We got preliminary results back today & the numbers look good. They gave me a 1/10,000 probability of this baby having Down Syndrome and a 1/10,000 chance of having Trisomy 18 (Edward's Syndrome). Even though I wasn't worried, it sure is a relief to hear those words! I will have one more round of blood drawn in a couple of weeks and then we will get the final results. Because these results are good, they expect the next ones to be also.

Drumroll please.....

Those of you that don't know already, I think it is finally time to announce it. Jackson is going to be a big brother. Yep, that's right, I'm pregnant again. I am 12 weeks and 5 days as of today and I figure now is "safe" to spill the beans. The baby is due June 29th and that makes my babies 20 months apart. Our neices are the same distance apart in age and it seems to work out perfectly! I love that they always have someone to play with even without inviting a house full of friends over. I am a little nervous that this might disrupt Jackson's potty training, but we'll make it work. Everything has been pretty good through the pregnancy so far -- I have been WAY more nauseous & sick than with Jackson (I never got physically sick with Jackson and it has been the pits with this one!) and the headaches have been worse, but overall the first trimester was pretty smooth. Looking forward to more energy & nausea relief!

Monday I went for the Nuchal Translucency ultrasound, which is a 2 part test that gives you the probability of having some funky genetic disorder. It is a no-frills sort of ultrasound and they don't even let the father back there, so Aaron didn't even go. They simply meansure the fatty pad on the back of the baby's neck and then let me go. We did a test sort of like this with Jackson, but this one is suppose to be more accurate due to the fact that you repeat it all again a month later. I pray that everything is normal, healthy and the baby stays safe and comfortable in there. The only real reason we opted for this test was because we get 2 extra ultrasounds than you do if you don't do it. That's 2 more peeks at my "bean" before his or her arrival. We are hoping that this baby is a girl, but we just want a healthy baby either way. Aaron's aunt, Anita says that she will be "thinking pink" for us. I love it! Here is what I got to see Monday--

Jackson is NOT Santa's Biggest Fan

Santa came to Jackson's school yesterday. I was not there, but it was reported to me that he did not care for Santa AT ALL! They said there were lots of tears and reaching for Miss Autumn, his favorite teacher. He was not alone though. All but one child in his class cried. Guess it's the age group. We had planned on taking him to see Santa sometime this week, but I'm sure it will just be a repeat. Hopefully, he will remember that he survived his first meeting and then won't be so scared. I won't hold my breath though!

Wacko is a weirdo!

Jackson has still been feeling a little under the weather. He's very fussy and wakes up with giant boogers caked to his nose - ick! Usually, I let him eat breakfast at school, but lately in order for me to put him down without him crying I have had to give him a clementine. He loves them and gobbles them up! So this morning he finished his clementine while I was still eating my Fruit Loops. He was pointing and whining for some so I gave him some dry Fruit Loops (very sugary, I know, it's bad). He would eat all of them except the green ones. He would put the green ones in his mouth just like the others, but then spit them out. **Side note: He has been doing this spitting food out thing a lot lately and it is driving us bananas! It is mostly with meat, especially ground beef, but sometimes he'll do it with foods we know he loves. It is an enigma!** The Fruit Loops all taste exactly the same so I have no clue why he wouldn't eat them. What a weirdo!

Update on the 12 month shots

So not only was the 12 month visit traumatic with the blood draw & shots, but the fun continues.... Apparently, it is not uncommon for a child to run a high fever after getting the MMR immunization. This is exactly what happened to Wacko! Thursday night he spent the evening with my parents so that Aaron & I could go to his office Christmas party. My parents said Jackson was not acting like himself - not playing as much as he normally does, but of course ate normally. He started running a fever that night & when we woke up in the morning, he was burning up. I called in a sub & stayed home with him (twist my arm, right!?). He was relatively fever free all day, but then that evening his started getting worse. At 6:30 I gave him some Motrin, but at 7:30pm we took his temp and it was 103.5. OMG! He had never run a fever that high and of course we were freaking out. I called the on call Dr. and she said to give him lots of cool liquids to drink, give him a bath and then at 10:30 give him Tylenol. This is what we did, but we didn't sleep much that night. I was worried sick. She said to take him to the ER if he acts listless even when the fever was down, if he's so sleepy he can't be awakened, or if he is inconsolably crying. Luckily, none of these things occurred and he woke up in the morning sans a fever. When he woke up, it was clear his fever had broken sometime in the night because this is what he looked like:

This was short lived. He began running a 102 fever yesterday afternoon and refused to nap. He did lay on my chest on the couch just watching TV with me for like 2 hours. That is so unlike him to be still for that long. Again came the worry. Finally, about 5pm the fever seemed to subside and he has been fever free since. We did give preventative Tylenol/Motrin throughout the night just in case, but he hasn't been warm today yet and this is what he is currently doing:

Catching up...

I am finally uploading some pics from Jackson birthday party weekend. Here you can see Jackson already adores Hailey. I showed him her picture as I was uploading & he got a great big smile on his face & said "Hi." Too cute!

Here is the video of Jackson's birthday complete with an injury at the end. ;(

12 month check up

Jackson had his 12 month check up yesterday. Dr. Pielop said he was on schedule developmentally, so we were happy! He was impressed that he can say "hi" & "bye-bye" and that he has taken a handful of unassisted steps. Oh, how we love to brag!
These are his current stats:

30" tall - 55th percentile
19 lbs 15 oz - 10th percentile
46cm head circumference - 50th percentile

I do not know where this skinny baby came from -- Lord knows his dad & I do not have the "skinny" gene. And many of you have witnessed the boy eat. It seems almost gluttonous! But, Dr. Pielop said feed him until he's full. Sometimes I feel that isn't possible, but we'll do it!

Jackson also got 3 shots, which was bad enough, but then....he had to have blood taken. Mommies with little ones take note: I did not know this was going to happen & so I was not prepared. It is totally routine -- CBC and lead count, but still. It was horrible! Luckily, Aaron was there and could hold Jackson while he screamed and the phlebotomist did her thing. He kept reaching for me with his free hand. I almost had to leave. God forbid something serious ever happen to him. I won't be able to take it. I think about those parents who watch their kids struggle with cancer or other horrible diseases and see them in pain or scared everyday -- breaks my heart and makes me thankful God has kept my child safe and healthy!

Overall, the appointment went really well and we don't have to go back until 15 months. Yea!