Halloween pictures

I am late getting these Halloween pictures up this year. We went with the color green for the boys, which I didn't consciously realize until seeing all these pictures together. Jack was the monster Brobee from the show "Yo Gabba Gabba!" and Jason was a triceratops. Jack loved his costume and insisted on wearing it all day, for the first few days it came home from the store. He even napped in it, the cutie.

Our ward's fall festival (Jon as Sherlock Holmes, me as a crazy cowgirl)

Love capturing the sweet moments between these two...

 Jack eating his prize donut from the donut contest (donut hangs from string, and you free it with only your teeth....after two attempts to bite the hanging donut, Jack trumped the rules and grabbed it. I'm pretty sure that makes him smarter than the rest of us.)

Lil' triceratops and a green monster

Halloween night- going trick or treating!

 all my boys

We ran into our friends the Knudsons while trick-or-treating, and forced 3 of the 7 kids to pose together. We joked that Jacob (on the right) was so righteous that he was kneeling to pray, haha.

We had so much fun trick-or-treating this year. Jack is starting to get into these holiday traditions now, so it's like re-living my childhood thru him. After about 15 mins of going from house to house, it got dark out, and then the neighborhood was packed with kids everywhere! We stayed out another hour, Jack filling his bucket with tasty candy. Jason also enjoyed the brisk night air (and being carried around for an hour). I'm looking forward to the next Halloween with my boys!

The Sticky Sneak

It was a typical Tuesday evening at our house. Dinner included tasty french toast topped with syrup. After dinner, Jon came into our bedroom to help me with a computer problem. While paying attention to the computer, we heard chuckles coming from the direction of the kitchen. Assuming Jack was laughing at a scene from the movie Cars, I foolishly ignored it. A few more minutes pass while Jon tries to get the computer to cooperate, with the laughter continuing in the background, when I tell Jon to give up and go pay attention to Jack. That's when I hear Jon yell, "Jack! Stop it!" This can't be good, I think to myself. It turns out Jack's laughter wasn't triggered by the movie, but by his pouring syrup all over the table and floor. By the sizeable syrup puddle, I can guess that he'd been pouring for a good while too. It turns out it takes quite a bit of energy to clean up syrup, but not nearly as much to pour it.

Lesson learned: never leave a 3 year old alone, for any amount of time, with a bottle of syrup. Thank goodness our dining room isn't carpeted.

Time to lower the crib, and other things...

Jason surprised us with a new learned skill this past week: pulling up! He is no longer content to crawl and play on his tummy, he now must pull up on anything remotely tall and play with it while either on his knees or standing. He is just too darn cute. Honestly, I could have waited for this new skill to develop for a few months, as I don't need another mobile boy in this house. Also, Jason makes for a more enticing target to Jack, now that Jason has a farther drop to fall when he stands.

getting into the bookcase...

getting into his toy basket, with his cute little toosh...

another recent development: baby food! Jason enjoys eating rice cereal and any veggie (peas below)

always willing to smile

in the tunnel at the park

Other things Jason is up to? As of a couple of weeks ago, he has 2 bottom teeth. He is 6 months and a couple weeks old now, and grew an inch since his 4 mos doctor's visit, making him 27 inches long (50th-75th%) and weighs around 15 lbs. So he is long and skinny. He is always a happy baby, unless tired. He naps well and sleeps thru the night; he puts himself to sleep without any help from me or a pacifier (thank goodness). He is the type of baby that makes you want to have another one (not that we are!). Jason, in case you couldn't tell, we love you.

The Pum'kin Patch!



We visited a local farm, which hosts a large pumpkin patch extravaganza in October. They hold a host of activities for kids, and they're all free! We took our obligatory pumpkin pictures, enjoyed a hay ride, watched Jack slide down the bounce house slide, and lots more.

All the boys

Jack holding baby Jason (I thought it was miraculous that they both looked up and happy at the same time, without Jack letting go of Jason!)

Isn't he a cutie pie?

Hey, I'm actually in a photo!

pumpkins galore...

Jack's favorite movie ever: Cars!

Another beloved movie character, the rat from Ratatouille

A classic & favorite of mine too- Scooby Doo!

Jack & I enjoying the hay ride

The wagon ride back to the car; Jack is holding 2 little pumpkins for our 2 little boys

I melted when both boys sat in the wagon together! Seriously, I nearly went out and bought a wagon that week for more such brotherly moments.

A quick video of Jack sliding down the bounce house slide:

I think this pumpkin patch will have to be an annual family tradition from now on. We all had fun, and could have spent the whole day there if we had wanted. They had the yummiest smelling barbecue slow-cooking in the background, but we resisted. Next year I'm thinking we won't.

Sweet Surprises

A couple of weeks ago, Jon returned home from work to a stressed-out wife. I pleaded with him take our oldest boy out of the house for awhile, so I could enjoy a quiet home while I finished some chores. Not only did Jon immediately agree to take Jack out, but he returned home with a couple of sweet surprises: 

a divine chocolate silk pie,

and a dozen roses

Later he told me that the whole day he had been planning on taking Jack out and about after dinner, and to surprise me with flowers and dessert afterwards! Thank-you to my husband for the thoughtful and romantic gifts; they were wonderful!

Our computer died...

....a few weeks ago, the poor thing. So my blogging has taken a hit in the midst of us getting a new computer, and dealing with getting to know said new computer. I am trying to catch up over the next week with all that we've been up to lately, so check back for more posts, since I know you're dying for more of us! P.S. To all of you fellow bloggers, is it just me, or is blogger acting especially retarded lately?

Jason update

My little man is no longer rolling to get where he wants, but crawling to get there! It started a few weeks ago with him strenously pulling his arms, and a slow progress to get to his desired toy. Now he is much more adept and getting faster and faster by the day! Soon, I won't be able to leave the room because he is getting too fast at getting into trouble. Ah, Jason, I figured I'd have at least another month before you'd be dangerously mobile! Little man is also starting to sit without help, using his long gorilla arms as support...as seen in the last picture.

Dear Jason, you are now just 1 week shy of your 6 month birthday. You are growing too fast and at times, not fast enough; one thing is for sure, you are the best baby to be around with your peaceful and sweet demeanor. These past 6 months have been wonderful, and we can't wait to see what the next 6 bring!

....more crawling footage

Addendum--Jack's language boom

Since writing the recent post on Jack's growing language skills, we've had a couple of more exciting developments. A week ago, while at speech, his therapist tested his skills by having him point to pictures she named, and having him say words for other pictures. The results were better than I had hoped for.....in his receptive language (what he understands) he is now considered at the language age of a 2 year 1 month old, and his expressive language (what he says) is equal to that of a 2 year old. To put this in perspective, his therapist showed me his test results from 6 months ago, and he had tested in receptive language at 12 mos old, and expressive language at 12-15 mos old, meaning on average he has gained 2 months of language per 1 month time period, and he's closing the gap between his chronological age and language age!!! I am a BIT excited about this, if you can't tell.

Then, on the following Monday, Jack had an audiology appointment and did beautifully. During audiology, the audiologist tests his implants' inner electrodes to make sure they are working and then tries to pinpoint Jack's thresholds for the softest and loudest sounds he can hear, so she can set his "ears" to the perfect level for him for optimum hearing. This can be a tricky process since it involves relying on a 3 year old for feedback on what sounds he can hear. With Jack, we do conditioned listening and when a sound is presented to him, he throws a ball in a bucket upon hearing the sound. He has gotten really good at this, and now gets m&m's as a reward for listening. He sat so patiently for his audiologist on Monday, for about 30 minutes, listening to the sounds she gave him and cooperatively throwing the balls in the bucket (and eating endless amounts of m&m's). She was able to pinpoint his thresholds on each electrode in both ears, a total of 44 electrodes. This is so important because we now know that Jack is hearing the soft speech sounds clearly, sounds like the letters 'p' and 't'. To sum up, she made small adjustments to his left ear and bigger ones to his right ear, and thinks that this should be his final "map" or setting.

The reason that I went on so much about his audiology appointment is because 2 days after it, Jack said the 't' sound for the first time in his life! I pointed out a picture of a star to him, and he clearly said "star" back to me! Typically, he would have said "saw", but this time he said the entire word. I'm pretty sure I scared him a bit with my excessive clapping and shrieks of excitement. And in speech a couple of days later he said the 'ch' sound which is a difficult sound to make. Another difficult sound to make is the 'sh' sound, but that is one of Jack's favorite to say. Way to go Jack!

Dear Jack,

Why is it that during the school-week I'm rushing into your room at 7:10 a.m. to wake you up, but on Saturday and Sunday mornings you bound into our room at 6:30 a.m.?

WHY?!

Sincerely,
Your annoyed mother

Jack's language boom

I've been meaning to write an entry on Jack's progress with his cochlear implants for awhile now, but just haven't gotten around to it. One reason being that I used to keep a running list of the words he understood, and the words he said....and now he knows so many and learns so quickly that the list has gone out the window! Let's see, the last time I posted about Jack's progress was months ago, I think in January; at that time he understood about 5 words plus varying sounds that animals make, and was starting to say a few words like 'bye' and 'up.' Fast forward to September, and it's becoming really difficult for me to quantify how much he understands & says! If I had to estimate I'd say he understands at least 100+ words, and probably more like 150-200. He says around 50+ words, which doesn't include his imitation of speech that's modeled to him.

To keep this in proper perspective, I have to constantly remind myself of his hearing age, which is currently 9.5 months. It's hard to judge where his current language level would place him, but we know it's somewhere between the language of an 18 month old- 24 mos. His speech therapist said that about 2 months ago, so I would say Jack is approaching the language level of a two year old now. I was told that one of the hallmarks of a 2 year old's language skill is putting two words together and using sentences, so I'm looking forward to that.

One of the biggest changes I've noticed is in my trust that Jack hears and understands me. I used to have to repeat myself, while pointing emphatically at things to get him to understand what I wanted. And now, I trust that he understands so much more of what I'm saying to him, minus any visual cues. It's awesome! Just the other day while riding bikes with friends, I told Jack to share the bike with his friend, and he did it when I asked. A few months ago, I would have had to get in Jack's face and explain to him to share, and *hope* that he understood why the bike was going to the other kid and not flip out over it, because he thought I was just taking the bike away from him. Now he has the language to understand the situation and it is so much easier. While riding bikes that same day, Jack was riding down the street and getting too far away- about 5 houses too far- and when I yelled his name, he turned around. I literally thought, what a miracle, my child heard me....my deaf child heard me from such a distance.

Jack loves learning new words, and pays attention to things we point out to him. We can now teach him a word in a single conversation, instead of repeating it over and over again for days. For example, at dinner he pointed to the honey mustard sauce on the table, and I told him "sauce." He loved that word so much that he wouldn't stop saying it during dinner that night. He kept saying "sau...(long pause)....ssss." It was hilarious and very cute.

Jack's favorite toy as of late has been a set of puzzles, and when he finishes one Jon and I exlaim "yay, Jack, yay!" So now Jack eagerly completes his puzzles so he can praise himself as he says, "yay, Jah, yay!" He's learned all of his colors, can count to 10, and names everyone in our family including himself. He usually either leaves the beginning or ending off of his words, but says the vowel sounds correctly. He loves to say the 'sss' and 'shh' sounds. When he pays attention to me and concentrates, he will say the entire word back to me correctly. But typically, he copies the vowels in the words. He doesn't quite understand yet about us asking him questions. For example, we'll be in the kitchen looking for a snack, and I'll ask him "what do you want?," while throwing my arms up in the air and cocking my head to the side. Jack's response? He cocks his head to the side, throws his arms up, and says "wha you wan?" It's really funny and maddening at the same time. Because, then I'm thinking- 'no, really, what do you want?!' So we're working on understanding questions.

Well, I could go on forever about Jack's progress with his CI's, but it's enough to say that he is learning at an exponential rate the longer he has them. To think, just a year ago, Jack was diagnosed with a profound hearing loss, unable to hear or understand a word we said to him. And earlier today, while playing a game of chase at the park, he called out "Mommy!" while looking for me. It's literally my dreams come true.

Lil' Engineer

Over the past week Jack has been really into his train set, building endless combinations of train tracks. He then connects every train he has and runs the track. His only problem was his insistence on using 6 or 7 trains connected together, causing him to derail on every curve. After the first hour or so, he finally figured out that he needed to slow down on each curve and was much more successful in staying on the track. It was really fun to watch his creativity flow as he built different tracks; he has a l-o-n-g attention span for such things, and built the tracks for a few hours every day for about a week.

On another note, Daddy loves that Jack is now interested in building instead of destroying things, and loves to build train tracks with Jack. It's quite amusing since I have to remind Jon that he needs to let Jack help him and not to take over. Jon is now eager to buy more tracks for Jack. I think it's cute, because I think the new tracks are for Jon and his dreams of creating an incredibly elaborate railroad. I guess when you think about it, we're all just really big kids at heart.

4 months and counting!

Jason turned 4 months old this past Monday, the 22nd. Time is flying by with our second boy. He is just developing so quickly, I can hardly keep up with him! His stats from the doctor's office: 13.8 lbs (25th %) and head circumference is in the 25th % too. They mis-measured his length though...saying he was 24.5 in (25th %), meaning he only grew 3/4 inch in 2 months....I don't think so! Once home, I got out my fabric tape measure and Jon helped me measure him from head to heel and he was 26 inches long (75th-90th %). That is consistent with his previous height percentiles. Do ya'll ever get irritated with your doctors' offices for mis-measuring your kids? One time they shrunk Jack's head circumference from one visit to the next, seriously.

Anyways...he also got his latest vaccines, poor little guy. He gave a good scream- he has the most blood-curdling scream you have ever heard. Or maybe you did hear it, it was around 9am this past Thursday; if you heard a baby screaming, chances are it was Jason. Haha.

For memory's sake here is what Jason is up to now:

-easy to smile

-he is charming with his killer combination of blue eyes, smiles, and endless coos

-ticklish in his ribs, and has a quiet laugh that almost sounds like hissing when he wants to laugh really hard (it's too funny)

-has a sweet and sensitive spirit to him

-rolls over from back to tummy both ways

-pushes up onto forearms while on tummy, holds head level to floor and looks around

-reaches for and grabs toys

-loves to eat his fingers

-puts himself to sleep without a paci or any help from me (AWEsome!)

-knows his name and looks up when you call it

-locates sounds when heard

-grabs his feet

-loves to stand up

-loves to be sung to, spoken to, or cooed at....he just loves sound!

-converses with anyone within a 10 ft radius who happens to be speaking at the time (this boy is a talker)

-lets me put him down and plays with his toys contentedly

-sleeps thru the night 70%ish of the time, and the other times wakes up once to eat

-born with tons of hair...now he is rubbing lots of it off sadly, making me have to cut it soon to keep him from looking crazy with long hair and bald spots alternating on his head

-he is all eyes- big, round, blue eyes that just lock you in....irresistable

-he is a peaceful, happy baby to be around and is the *perfect* addition to our family

back-bending curl, don't know how he does it

We love, love, love our Jason.

1st day of school

I can't believe it. I officially have a kid in school. Jack started preschool this past Monday and attends every day for 3 hours in the morning. Because of his speech delay, he qualified for our district's preschool, so I'm excited to see him learn even faster than he currently is!

Monday morning I walked him to his classroom and spoke with his teacher for a few minutes and told him goodbye, at which point the tears and freak-out ensued. To be honest with you, since he's so independent all the time, it was kinda nice to have him cling to me for a bit. He gave a few good screams and I gave him one last hug and left. Talk about hard! I just wanted to soak up his clinginess for awhile, but I knew it'd be harder on him so I didn't draw it out. 3 hours later when I picked him up, his teacher reassured me that about 1 minute after I left he was fine. That sounds about right. Glad he recovered. The second day back- zero tears, zero clinginess. We kissed goodbye and that was about it.

Below: Jack is a little unenthusiastic to have been walked back inside the school after dismissal to have his picture taken with his teacher:Once we walked back outside the school and towards the car, his smiles started back-up:

What a little model! He posed about 4 different poses for me with his cool new "Cars" backpack.

He has not taken off that backpack except to bathe (and that was a fight) for the past several days. I'm so proud of my little man. I can't believe he is in school!

Brothers

Anytime we wake Jason up in the morning, Jack asks me "up" so I'll put him in Jason's crib. He then wants a blanket to be put over both him and Jace, so they can cuddle. Just give this boy a blanket and he's tamed. I love how it looks like Jason is telling Jack a secret in this picture!

And three years later, Jack finally wants to play with his baby playmat. Hmmm, I wonder what could possibly be motivating this change of heart? It couldn't be that his baby brother, unlike Jack at that age, actually enjoys the mat. No, that couldn't possibly be it.

Jason loves to grab for the hanging animals and coo at them. Jack is also much obliged to knock the animals around for Jason's pleasure. I'm just amazed Jack was able to get under the arches without smothering Jason, or collapsing the whole mat.

Field trips around town:

Over the past month, we've had fun visiting a couple of trusty favorite spots and then tried out a new one.

We ate at our local BBQ place which has the best bread ever, and afterwards chilled out in their fabulous lawn chairs on their shady lawn. We not only love their food, but love the atmosphere of sitting beneath the trees and feeling the summer breeze. We went to a tried and true favorite: The Zoo! (twice!)
I love the look on Jack's face in the above picture, classic Jack. He has the best faces.

Below, I made him pet the bronzed frog. On our second trip back to the zoo, he must have thought you were supposed to pet the frog because he went out of his way to pet it that time.

I let Jack pet the snake, even though they are my least favorite creature in all the world.

Jack posing with Jon's brother, Uncle Brian, and his younger cousin in action behind them.

Jack and his cousin Eloise, looking at some type of monkey

me with my friend/sis-in-law Aslinn

swans....

I like this shot since it shows my 2 boys in their differing physical stages, with Jack on top of the fence and Jason looking on while in the stroller

The new spot we visited- our local flying museum!

This was Jon's favorite plane there, as he's picture below with it:

Bomber plane with super cool graphics on the side, called the "Pacific Prowler." (Its propeller is in the above picture)- this plane was quite intimidating to stand next to, it was BIG, with guns all over it (Jon would probably be embarrassed that I don't know what type of guns they were, but there were lots of them)

a navy plane....'hey Jack, look at the camera!!'

Since there are 3 boys in my family, I figure I had better learn about all the boyish activities/sights in our area to do. The airplane museum was a success, and I bet will get even more popular the older my 2 little ones get (Daddy already loves it). The zoo is a classic favorite. Next stop is the Children's Science and History museum downtown!