pitter patter to lots of chitter chatter

a while back i wrote this [and never posted it]. i think it was around mid august because i do remember that annie first said mama for the first "real" time on august 18th. so here's what was going on a month ago:

annie has a few words she has added to her vocabulary...they are not your run of the mill first words. i don't think she has said momma in 6 months. her favorite word, of course, is jackson. she wakes up and tries to see if he's in his bed and repeats his name until she sees him. she also likes to say "ut oh", "peek boo", "tank you" - which also sounds like jackson for some reason. she said "kelsey" this weekend. and then a bunch of other things that i have no idea what she's saying. but, if i do ask her to say momma it comes out as "popo"[not to be mistaken with poo poo]??

now...only one month later we hear mama, dada, jackson, no, bye, juice, chicken, mimi, papa, cookie, book, toy, phone, tickle, peek a boo, mm mm mm [when she's eatting food], hi, up, thank you, please, dog, choo choo, train, car, truck, baby, poo poo, pee pee, annie, shoes, boom boom boom [when she falls down], purse, beep beep [when she pushes anyones belly button] and she tries to say her abc's. repitition is so good to get them to learn something like their abc's or 123s. [but she doesn't talk at school for some reason]
when jackson first learned to count he could count to 11. 11?? but then i found out that every time i carried him up the stairs i would count the stairs & there are 11 on our second step. for annie i sing the abc's everytime i put her hair in pig tails - so probably about 6 times a day i'll sing the abcs to her. but most of the time jackson wants to say them instead of me. annie tries to say them but i think that's expecting alot...but eventually she will because she hears them so regularly. hopefully when she's 18 going to prom and getting her hair done at the salon she won't start repeating her abc's while they're doing her hair. tee hee.

jackson likes to spell his name. i taught him to spell his name using a chant like cheer ja-ck-SON. it's fun to hear him randomly start chanting this. of course, i think he's brilliant and adorable all at the same time. kinda like how i like him to do more toddler things but i also like him to be a cute round face little kiddo who likes to cuddle.

i teach math

perry video & photo +
part - time teaching [w. a new book...makes a world of ease into a world of hurt] +
jackson +
annie +
jack at greenwood king
EQUALS
one tired momma!

but one of my favorite thursday people came over today...sylvia so my house is straightened and clean enough for me to relax. these moments are great.check out jack's new hair style: man bangs...haha!
these black pants rock. they had my name written all over them...or just on the tag. they are called "julie" from ann taylor. i might wear these to teach up to 3 times a week. maybe that's horrible but i love them & i only teach for max 2.5 hours.

the kiddos started school about 2 weeks ago. here are some pictures we took that morning. jackson and annie really like to give each other hugs. it's quite the picturesque moment. but this moment can be followed by jackson dragging annie around the room by her arm as if he's a caveman and annie is his conquest. they both like school and are eager to go each monday, wednesday and friday. annie is a quiet, laid back observer in her classroom. doesn't say much just smiles alot and is curious. jackson is the leader of his class [his teacher told us this]. he has to be in charge of something or he gets in trouble. for instance, he wanted to open the door and his friend [i'd actually say best friend] colin opened the door. so, jackson bit him. he's pretty entergetic in class and mrs. padavoni has to tell him cool down sometimes. she's the most amazing teacher i've seen with 3 1/2 year olds. each day i realize how much i LOVE sending my kiddos to school. the patience these women have to help teach and mold my child for the better and their sweet love the have for kids is such an amazing gift.

school tomorrow for all of us...so i have to go and make lunches, prepare my notes for tomorrow and pack bags.

read my blog

sorry for the lack of updates to all of you who sit in a cube all day and check out our blog. i started teaching [part time] and the kiddos don't start school until september 5th. so these past 3 weeks are kinda crazy at our house. pretty much everything has been put on hold - errands, editing, cooking, chores, etc. one week until a routine sets in...hooray!

but for anyone that does blog...check out blurb.com...you can turn your blog into a book. pretty cool. also... enter PARENTSMAG07 in the promotional code for 10% off

Jack and Jackson camping in Brazos Bend State Park

Jackson first waking up Thursday morn


Daddy cooks bacon and biscuik biscuits. Yummy!


Jackso, eggs, and biscuits.


eggs and biscuits
Jackson licks his lips before eating daddy's cooking.


campsite first night. before the ambush.

The Ambush. Jackson bravely shining light on them. He was great!

Jackson digging in Wednesday night to his chicken, peas, corn, and beans.

Daddy making the most of his short reach to include himself in the picture.

More of daddy's short reach with the camera. chest hair anyone?


_______

Raccoons 1
Jack 0

Thanks to our good friends, Ben and Henry Wise, I took a camping trip with my son. Jackson and I spent some male bonding time on a spontaneous camp out in Brazos Bend State Park. Ran to Academy, spent $220 on camping gear, and headed to Brazos Bend State Park. Beautiful Place.

We arrived around 7pm Wednesday, August 1, 2007. We rushed to put the tent up and just as I was putting the tent up, Jackson yelled, "Yook, Daddy, small animals." We were surrounded by 5 raccoons jumping in our car, picking up our food, and more approaching. Like an ambush. This went on every 30 mins until 5am. I did not sleep more than 2 hrs as they attacked our tent. Jackson slept fine.

Lots of funny "WHY?" questions by Jackson:

Why did God make people?
Why did God make rain?
Why did God make our car break down? ( we left the lights on a bit to long while illuminating our fire at night)
Why are we here?
Why did we come to sleep here?

Great to get away from the city and spend some time listening to his "why's"

Happy camping,
Jack

how sweet is it...

here are some pictures from will & emily's engagement session. they are so cute - and i think they had a fun time. will made emily laugh alot. we had everything planned out as to where we wanted to take the pictures....but we went no where we had planned. but, i loved the pictures we took and the places we went.

class of 2026 and 2028

we went to college station at the end of our austin weekend. it was great to go back - i loved college and it always brings back fun memories to visit. it was a quick visit - mostly for me to go to my dear friend's baby shower. sadly enough it was my maid of honor - whom i haven't seen in 2 years! it was great to see her. i wish i had taken a picture with her and her belly. for any aggies you can empathize with this: krista is a staff advisor for fish camp - she'll be at camp 8 months pregnant for about a month. i can't wait to visit her again during football season and meet baby girl bailey!
with lots of universities represented in our family we won't try to persuade our kiddos TOO much to go to a&m. we'll see in 2022 and 2024 if they make the right decision...

austin, texas - mucho fun

who doesn't like austin? jack and i met in austin, it's a great short trip and it's laid back and fun. good food, biking, friends, ice cream and family.

we had a fun time...kinda crazy with 2 kiddos but we managed through breakfast with a squirmy annie, avoiding the ongoing rain in order to catch a very quick swim and fun dinners with our austinite friends.we had dinner with the boones...like old times [minus the wises]. i still remember our fun flying pig dinner when it was calm and we all had big bellies. now it's not so calm...well maybe if you are a boone. they are such sweet girls - i think my kiddos scared them with running around, climbing on things and going 90 miles an hour. funny story that sabra told me is that both her girls [3 years and 17ish months] both weigh 27 pounds. that's so cute. you can see the demeanor in the kid's picture...the boone gals just sat there and we had to act like monkeys to get our kids to pay attention. jackson and lt took a good picture - i think he was trying to hit on her...good thing boone was there to straighten out the situation with a few, "hey, watch it, jackson."
brad [match-maker of julie and jack] came also. i think we wore him out because jack and brad were supposed to hit 6th street that night and brad didn't make it past his couch when he got home.
we went biking around town lake and had a fun time with a few wrong turns. but, it was fun to enjoy austin as if we lived there. jack overheard someone saying, "keep austin weird" as we past with our bikes and buggy. don't know if they thought we were weird or telling us to leave because it was too normal to have a buggy. maybe if we had a dog sitting on top of the buggy then i could see us being a picture of weird. who knows...weird story.

we got some cute pics on our bike ride of the kiddos at our stopping point:
here's jackson's "natural" smile...
jackson made a friend who was feeding the squirrels. his new friend gave his a piece of bread to feed the squirrels. he must have been hungry because he ate the bread instead.here's a disappointment to us...annie hates swimming pools [and baths for that matter]. jackson loves swimming pools...maybe next year she'll warm up to them because it's way to warm outside of them during the summer.
we stayed at the omni - which caters to kiddos. they knew our kids by the time we left. [or maybe after being there for 5 minutes] i'm thinking it was their job...but maybe it was because how much our kids make themselves known at the hotel. but the swimming pool is on top of the hotel [not kid friendly]. but they were extremely catering down in the lobby. they gave us kids backpacks when we got there and always were offering us water or whatever we wanted. i tend to think that i'm a pretty easy-to-please person but i am a self-proclaimed hotel-snob...and i like staying in nice hotels and the omni was really nice. as compared to the last hotel we stayed at in austin. jackson was about 6 months old and we went to a ut game with holden. holden made us some reservations at the super 8 hotel. never go there...and believe me - you do not want any stories except that i would have rather stayed at holden's house with his 4 male roommates.
we ate dinner with my oldest friend critter - or amy stoker if i want to be proper - & her fam. it was "fun" and she knows why i included the quotes. we have a list at home of things or people that make us laugh so if we are ever in a bad mood we can go look at the list and crack up. after a night with the stokers and others we added a new name to our list....story not included.

the boys had fun with their bathtub mohawks...that never gets old. sometimes i find jack making his hair into a mohawk in the shower. [i'm trying to see if jack reads these...so far no comments from him]at the end of the trip we went to "God's country"....next post...

what else i found

first of all...i'm waiting patiently for my new favorite thing to arrive. so in the meantime i thought i'd update a little more...

we went to baton rouge for [jack's cousin] paul's wedding on april 20th. so, we haven't had our everyday camera since that day. at least there were pictures on our camera so they knew who it belonged to. wonder what they thought of jackson posing in his underoos...at least it wasn't jack posing in his underwear...haha...just kidding. but once i did dare jack to run outside on our porch naked and he did, i locked him out and took pictures of him. i'll post those tomorrow. what? no way...i think i deleted them.
we took uncle pootz' car because it had a dvd player. that is the reason we had a calm trip...they loved the dvd player. mind you it is now july 11th and in this picture jackson was potty trained on april 19th. today he is still struggling with going #1 on the potty. i think we have #2 down...but i said that about #1 in april. this little guy likes to do what he wants to do. jack is introducing him to peeing in the bushes. jackson loved it. if only i had a green thumb he might be fully potty trained - but we'd have dead plants. we took jackson to lsu [cookie's alma mater] to see mike the tiger. unfortunately this one passed away a month or so ago - maybe it was from all the energy he exerted trying to get jackson while holden put him over the cage. haha...just kidding...that one was for my mom. she probably had a heart attack right now. feel free to check on her: dascrowe@consolidated.net
sidenote: jackson can say the lsu fight song which most of the sages will be proud to hear and he's in the process of learning hot boudin, cold couscous, come on tigers, push, push, push. i tried to teach him the a&m fight song but yelling "sounds like hell" will have to wait until later. we'll let his uncle teach him the ut fight song next and then save the best for last.

we had a blast at the crawfish boil - it was so good [understatement]. they know how to do it there. the process of boiling crawfish is like us scrambling eggs. they make it seem so effortless and just part of their every week routine [during crawfish season] - andy [paul's brother] even made a special table for paul as a wedding gift...a table just for eat ting crawfish. it was a table for 12 or more to stand at with a hole in the middle for the trash. coolest table ever.

jackson played with cars that nancy had given him and annie just had fun exploring and maybe eating some rocks. they both ate lots of raising cane's. we had a brief bout of addiction of raising canes right before going to louisiana...mostly because it reminded me of layne's from a&m. anyhow...funny situation that the owner was a groomsman in paul's wedding. yummy!no pictures from the wedding - but a funny story. jackson had a great time at the wedding. he loved dancing, eating the food and running around with wes [his 4 year old cousin]. well, he saw what he thought was coke. this was holden's coke so it had some crown in it. jackson took a tiny sip from the straw and instead of the little attitude look he thought he was going to give me of "i just had a sip of coke" looked at me with this horrible look of "that's not what coke is supposed to taste like" with his eyes in almost a teary state. he was so confused. i think he slept pretty soundly that night...haha...again just kidding. but he probably did sleep well in his king size bed. jack and i had to leave at 5am the next morning to head to houston for a wedding so we slept on the pull-out couch to not wake the kids up in the morning. so, i'm sure jackson got a good night's rest.