Do you remember?

Here I am with Jack, Abby and Devlyn minutes before bedtime one night this week. Abby and I were taking turns reading a book about bats and Jack kept begging for his picture to be taken. Once the camera was out Abby & Devlyn insisted us all being in the picture too...

My sister Melanie and I took all the kids out for a group photo on Monday. (A Mother's day present to ourselves.) I cannot explain the nightmare that was. Minutes before we left the house Wy found a sippy cup with RED juice and dumped it all over his WHITE shirt. I managed to get him changed and headed out to the hall in time to see Jess had some big black blotch on her shirt.

In order to get Jack to cooperate for the photo, I had to promise him we would get chicken and fries for lunch. Wy proceeded to have the biggest meltdown of his short lifetime. I had to drape myslef in a white cloth and hold Wy in my lap just to get him in the photo. (So even though I'm not in the photo - I'm there, I'm just under a mondo white blanket holding an hysterical little fella.) The girls were pushing each other, throwing shoes at each other, and who knows what else while Mel and I were picking out photos. Connie made a point of telling me "I'm hungry" every 5 minutes. Devlyn followed nearly each of those comments with "I have to pee." After we were done with all the photo buesiness, Mel and I took the crew to Chick-Fil-A - another nightmare. Near the end of lunch Jack looked at me and said "Can Jax go play in a kennel?" I had no idea what he was talking about. "Can Jax play in a kennel, mommy?" I turned around and there was an indoor play area. There was a multi level play unit that led up to a slide. In the middle there was a landing of sorts with mesh rope walls to keep kids from tumping over the sides. The only thing that made sense to me was that Jack thought the mesh looked very similar to Marley's kennel. (Marley is Aunt Beth & Uncle Doug's dog.) On a side note, Beth used to have a terrible time keeping Jack OUT of Marley's kennel. Jack loved to crawl in there and play.

Parents: Do you remember the days of potty training? Do you remember the days of poopy underwear? Do you remember trying to get those underwear off of a litle one and then dunking and swirling said panties in the toilet to get as much poo off of them before you had to wash them out in the sink? Well...

Jack pooped his pants one afternoon this week. He came to me walking like he had just gotten out of the saddle. He said "Mommy needs to change Jax' pants." I told him HE needed to change his pants. He dillied. He dallied. He dilly-dallied. After numerous attempts, I finally got him into the bathroom and told him he could change his pants on his own. When I returned to check on him a few minutes later he was standing at the stool with a very wide stance. He had poo on his pants, which were in a puddle on the floor. There was poo on the floor, poo on his sox, poo on his legs, poo on the toilet... And there he was, dunking his underwear in the toilet. I asked him what he was doing. He said "I'm cweaning my pants." I took pity on him and helped him out. I knew from the get go that there was going to be poo everywhere. I just wondered if making him deal with his pants himself might encourage him to use the toilet BEFORE he used his pants.

Jack LOVES Harry Connick's The Happy Elf. He asks to listen to the CD in the car. He asks to watch the DVD at home. He runs around singing the songs anywhere and everywhere. The title songs goes like so "Seven days a week, every week of the month and every month of the year, he's got us making presents and I'm happy. Every girl and boy gets their own kind of toy. We like to fill 'em with joy. We're working over time to make 'em happy. Then on Christmas Eve we jump on Big Red's sleigh. We don't miss a chimney on our jolley way!" Well, Jack sings everything word perfect until..."When on Christmas Eve we get a big red snake..." My boss suggested I get a video of Jack doing his own Happy Elf lyrics and send it to Harry Connick jr.

Jack makes up songs all the time. Here is one John overheard this week:
One is for Mommy, who just jumped a cow.
Two is for Daddy, who just jumped a cow.
Three is for Gammy, who just jumped a cow.
Four is for Poppy, who just jumped a cow.

Jack told John that he wants a Thomas birthday party. He also told John tht he wants "a tape measure and a level" for his birthday presents. He has good timing in regards to being aware of getting presents. His 4th birthday is at the end of March. Then Connie will be 6 in April. Jess will turn 14, I will be 36 and Wy will be 2 at the end of May. Daddy & John share a birthday in July and then we get a break.

Wy decided he wanted to wrestle with Jack so he crept up on him nice and slow and JUMPED him! Connie tried to join in on the fun, but the boys seemed to agree that this was boy business and tried to keep wrestling and keep her out of it at the same time...

The kids were sitting around the table eating breakfast this morning and making a lot of noise. Mom finally said "OK! We are playing the quiet game." Abbie sat straight up and said "Hushpuppy, one, two, three, four!" Wyatt looked at mom for a second and then started humming and dancing in his seat. Here is Wy reading to himself.

Wy doesn't like me to love on the cats. You know how kids will try to seperate the parents when they hug or kiss? Or when mom points to dad and says "mine" then the little one will run to dad, grab him and declare "MINE!" Well, that is about how Wy acts when I try to love on the cats. It isn't that he thinks the cats are his, he just doesn't want me to love on them. When I pet Gracie, he will push my hand away and say "NO". If I hug her or Libby he will actualy start to cry.

Here I am doing homework with Connie. She is learning to read and one of her daily projects is to take a highlighter and find words she knows in magazine or newspaper articles. I pick one of her words and sether at it.

Before I go, I should tell you all that my mama has been working on her Master's degree for the last 18 months and she is DONE! As worried as she was she wrapped up her graduate work with a 4.0 grade point average. Way to go mama!!!

My last comment before I go: John was sorting through our taxes and Jack said "Daddy, what are you doing?" John said "Taxes." Jack said "Daddy? Can I do taxes?" John said "Buddy, you will have plenty of your own one day." Jack said "Oh, OK" and walked off.

OK - so it is mostly about Jack, but all I can say is - he was funny this week. I promise to write more about everyone else next time. In the meantime, much love and many blessings from Owenland Park!