Little Jack's Corner » 6-9 Months

Hey Mama!

Lisa — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 04:17:35 +0000

So this past Sunday morning, I stepped off the stage at church when praise & worship was over (I control the powerpoint slides that show the words to each song) and began walking towards the pew in the back where my family was seated.

The pastor was now at the pulpit, opening his Bible and waiting for all of the music team to take their seats. Because of my position on stage, I was the last one reach my pew, and everything was extremely quiet.

Too quiet.

Two feet away from my seat, I raise my head and make eye contact with Jack-Evan who is seated on his dad’s lap. And what does the little 9 month old bugger do? In his loudest voice, he says, for the very first time…

HEY MAMA!!!!!

Then he grinned as if all were right in his little world.

Where Jack-Evan Meets Mother Goose

Lisa — Sat, 24 Jan 2009 08:45:25 +0000

Our local library offers a weekly Mother Goose Storytime for children under 12 months of age and their mommies. I’ve been saying since before Jack was even born that I was going to take him to reading circles and play groups, but wouldn’t you know it – here he is 8 months old and I hadn’t even been once.

So, this week I decided it was high time I got over my mundane shyness of all things social and force myself to sign him up.

You see, I’ve always been a pretty shy person in intimate settings. When it comes to larger functions (such as giving speeches) or performing in the business world, I do quite well. But when it’s time to show the “real me” and socialize, I get as tonguetied as a turnip in winter. I just don’t do the “talking to random people” thing very well.

But now I have a son who will depend on me for his social life for the better part of the next decade (especially since we plan on homeschooling).

So I need to start somewhere, right?

If I don’t start now, I may end up in a rut of hiding ourselves away from the world and Jack-Evan will be grey headed before he learns that there are “others” out there.

Ok, maybe I wouldn’t be that detrimental to my son’s future social life, but I did really want to take part in the Mother Goose Storytime this spring. All thoughts of “but he’s only 8 months old, Lisa” aside, I swallowed the huge gulp in my throat and called the children’s department at the library to sign up.

Our first class was this past Thursday morning at 10:30 am.

Upon entering the children’s section (which, BTW, is wonderfully decorated with life size “Where the Wild Things Are” illustrations by Maurice Sendak), I was greeted by Ms. Heather, a bubbly little lady who asked me if we were there for Mother Goose Storytime, and then wrote Jack-Evan’s name on a little mitten name tag. She even hyphenated his name and said it correctly – which is a big plus in my books. Most people upon hearing Jack-Evan’s name let their faces gloss over with a “I-didn’t-understand-what-you-said-so-I’ll-just-smile” look. The fact that she even knew to hyphenate eased my social anxieties tenfold. Her 60 foot wide smile helped a lot too.

I then took a seat at the tables in the back for a few minutes to await the start of the class. Soon, Ms. Heather (the resident Mother Goose, sans the outfit) gathered up all of us little ducklings and we waddled..uh..followed her into the story room. It was a comfy cozy room with nice, soft lighting and 4 huge quilts spread on the floor. In all there were 11 babies, 1 grandmother, and 9 mothers (one mother had twins). Plus Ms. Heather.

It was the first time Jack-Evan (and even I for that matter) had been in a room with so many babies his age. He’s been around smaller groups of toddlers and bigger children, but he’s only see one other “baby” in his life. Talk about being fascinated! For the first 7 minutes he sat almost motionless on my lap, letting his eyes roam around the room at all of the other babies who were goo’ing and crawling and (some) running amuk.

We started out storytime with a little “hello” song in which each child was welcomed using their name in the verse. Then we did a couple short finger play rhymes, another little song, and then a sweet book about daddy’s going to work was read. We repeated the pattern and read another book. By the end of the 2nd book, the kiddies were getting restless so we finished up with the most active poems (such as “Ackabacka Sodacracka” where we lift the babies in the air at the end) and they all seemed to love the motions. Ms. Heather then passed out the same colorful board book to all of us and we read the story outloud in unison, pointing out the words to the babies. Then it was time for the “free for all”. A few large tubs of books were passed around on the quilts, and we were encouraged to take them out and spend some time reading / looking through them with our babies (or just letting them crawl on them, as some did).

All in all, the whole thing lasted about 30 minutes. Jack-Evan seemed to enjoy it very much, and was very alert the whole time. He even tried to do hand motions along with Ms. Heather during a few rhymes. Now that he’s a “big boy” and knows how to wave bye bye and hello, he tries to do anything that has a “lifting the arm” motion to it! When he got ahold of the board book, he sat with it trying to turn pages and vocalizing. It was his way of reading to me, I assumed. Then he promptly tried to eat it. I’m so proud of my little reader! (Minus the eating the book thing though.)

So anyways, that’s what we’ll be doing at 10:30 am on Thursdays from now on. I know that according to experts, kids really don’t need a “interactive social life” until after 2-3 years of age, but it’s pretty cool joining in with other moms and doing (FREE!) activities alongside my son. I kind of think of it as “social life in training” (for me!). Perhaps after a few years of learning to socialize with stranger-moms at storytime, I’ll be ready to hit the big leagues and enroll Jack-Evan in Teeball without wanting to hide under the bleachers.

Jack’s Recent Holiday & 8 Month Photos

Lisa — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 20:40:03 +0000

The Christmasey ones were taken on December 30 and the orange Clemson ones were taken this past Monday night!

He’s just started to pull up and stand on his own. Kinda makes me all sniffly inside…my big boy.. sniff.

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Hello, hello hello again!

Lisa — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 07:02:31 +0000

Shaboom, shaboom…

Wow, I didn’t realize it had been so long since I updated here! My my my, how fast time flies. I’ve been backlogged on everything it seems (the worst being our property tax which I..um..forgot to pay until today..but that’s another story).

Christmas was awesome. I must say that I believe this was the best Christmas I’ve ever had. Kevin and I have now enjoyed 4 Christmases together as a couple, but there was just something magical this year – having Jack-Evan as part of our Christmas morning was the most precious gift we could have ever wanted. Children truly are the best part of life!

Over the past couple of years, Kevin and I have started a few Christmas traditions together, and this year we added a few more. For one, we always go to a Christmas tree farm to cut down a live Christmas tree. This year, Jack-Evan was with us and we got video of him helping his dad “cut down the tree”. He also had a surprise meeting with Santa too, and true to his easy going nature (Jack’s, not Santa’s), he didn’t cry a lick when we begged asked Santa for a impromptu photo shoot with Jack right there on the farm grounds.

We sang a lot of Christmas songs, enjoyed a few family-friendly parties and our church play (which Jack attended all of them), watched some Christmas videos, drove around with “Grammy and Papa” (my mom and dad) to see the decorated lights on houses, and read numerous Christmas books together.

On Christmas eve, Jack-Evan helped me get out (chocolate) milk & cookies for Santa and celery for the reindeer, which we placed on a special santa cookie tray that I’ve been saving for years, awaiting it’s first use. Jack & I then laid down to nurse one last time, only to be startled a few minutes later by sounds of thumping on the roof. Kevin then ran inside, yelled that he spotted some reindeer land, then came in and all three of us danced excitedly around the room singing a final Christmas song to Jack-Evan.

He had a blast being caught between his two goofy parents!

The next morning, we awoke to smells of “Daddy’s Annual Christmas Morning Breakfast” cooking in the kitchen (a tradition Kevin and I started the first Christmas we were married). The first thing we checked was the Santa plate, and I made a huge goofy fuss over the crumbs Santa had left scattered beside the plate, and then we read aloud the “Thank You” note that Santa had left for Jack-Evan. Then we enjoyed prayer and Christmas breakfast….and then opened presents. I had always thought that I wouldn’t have trouble with wanting to give a baby a lot of gifts at Christmas. After all, the box ends up being more fun than the toy and he’ll never remember them….but lemmetellyou, when the time actually arrived and I had to decide which gifts to buy, I felt like buying out the whole store! There were so many cool toy whatzits that I wanted to get for him, but alas, our pocketbook isn’t quite as deep as Walmart’s shelves. But we did end up with some nice things that he has really enjoyed playing with, such as a little teeball set for babies and a little real working keyboard (although that was a bit more of a “for mommy” toy than anything! ha!).

After Christmas at home, we headed to my parents for Christmas with my mom’s family, which lasted till evening. Turkey, relatives, chocolate cake and Guitar Hero are a great combination!

Christmas festivities were then extended a week later as we headed off to upstate New York on January 1st to enjoy an after-Christmas party with Kevin’s family.

And we drove the whole way.

14 hours in the car.

With an 8 month old….

But that’s another post.

As for now, I best get to sleep. I’m sitting here in the bed with my computer testing out the limites of my new wireless network. This is the first time in my life I’ve ever had wireless anything and I’m as giddy as a hungry dog in a butcher shop (dork that I am..)!

Being Santa…

Lisa — Sat, 20 Dec 2008 17:00:31 +0000

…will wear you out!

Just ask Jack:

Our favorite waitress at our local buffet gave Jack-Evan this little Santa suit for Christmas and he wore it this past weekend to church where he was passed around like a little football. I grew up in the small church we attend and everyone there is like family, so of course Jack is the baby of the church. Everyone just fusses all over him!

This is what he looked like just before we left church!

Playing in Boxes!

Lisa — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 17:00:38 +0000

He’s only 7 months old.

Should he be enjoying boxes yet?

I’m going to have my hands full…

Lil’ Santa and DaDa

Lisa — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 17:00:49 +0000

Doesn’t this just put a smile on your face? It does me! Kinda makes me go gushy all over.

I’m such a dork…

Lisa — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 05:43:47 +0000

I have succumbed to THE most. cheesiest. thing. on earth. eva.

I have entered Jack’s photo in week #4′s Baby photo contest album over at ContestforMoms.com. The urge to do it was just far too powerful for me to resist. I fought the temptation for 2.7 seconds and couldn’t stand it any longer. I mean, I do have the cutest baby in the world, right? (C’mon, what kinda mom would I be if I DIDN’T think that??). Regardless, I had to do it.

I just hadta.

So I pressed the upload button and away the photographic megapixels went…soaring through cyberspace until they magically recrystaled in their proper format in the contest album. Waahlah. It was sickening how easy they made it.

So. well. anyway. I don’t think there are any prizes offered (I didn’t read enough about it to determin), but it’s still nice to see my baby’s face sitting there amongst the other kiddos.

Even if that’s not your kinda thing (and until a few moments ago, I swear it wasn’t MY kinda thing either), go take a looksee at my sweet little poopie head Jack-Evan and leave us a comment.

Just look for the photoin that album called “Jack-Evan” (of course).

Spanks.

Fantastic Fun Fall Foliage

Lisa — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 05:49:28 +0000

(Note: No leaves or babies were harmed in the making raking of these photos.)

An Urgent Video Message from Jack-Evan

Lisa — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 15:00:26 +0000

(Voiced by 6 month old Jack-Evan, Typed by No One)

Dear Family and Friends….

Sincerely, Jack-Evan

Little Jack's Corner » 6-9 Months

Hey Mama!

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