Oh, Jack!

Well, time for another update on our boisterous two-year old boy! Jack remains a great joy and a great challenge, and we are grateful for the opportunity to be grown and shaped as parents in this process. Jack does everything with gusto! Gusto in how he cries, how he says his new favorite word (which the montage will leave no doubt of), gusto in how he enjoys the rain or bubbles, gusto in how he expresses his moodiness in the morning, gusto in how he loves and plays with his baby brother. A day with Jack is never boring.

New developments are that we are at the beginning of the major potty training journey (equal amounts of success and accidents), we've finally gotten rid of the dreaded pacifier, (I know, you probably wonder why not sooner...but after his second birthday and our first trial run without it, he went after it with such force that we had to gain courage to try again!) we are working on lots of new words and pointing out the letter "J" for Jack and are encouraging him in whatever interests he demonstrates.

And those interests include many things. He LOVES the new ability to blow bubbles by himself. He loves to look at lizards on the porch (you'll see a picture of him laying down) and even tries to take pictures of them. He loves that we now put a little gel in his hair and comb it in a proper way (leaving the curls in tact at the back). He loves playing with his buddy Nate, who recently spent a lot of time with us after his own baby brother was born. He loves getting the newspaper on Wednesday mornings, opening and spreading it out on the couch, finding the grocery store ads and showing me what he'd like (usually Oreos). And, he loves to dance along with the musical "Oklahoma" and tap dance. So...to encourage that particular interest, I bought a pair of toddler tap shoes on eBay and waited enthusiastically to present them to him on Valentine's Day. I'm not sure what I was expecting...profound joy, I suppose. But...to no avail. He showed no interest in the shoes whatsoever and only finally just put them on this afternoon, but with not much enthusiasm beyond a few toe taps. Oh well...on to the next pursuit!

Some humorous things he's done recently: while Josh, George and I were sitting on the porch, Jack went inside and locked us out. I stood at the windowed-door trying to calmly give directions to Jack to turn the lock while Josh looked for a way in. Jack looked at me, held up a finger as if to say "wait a minute", ran to his toy drawer and pulled out his plastic set of CARS keys, thinking those would surely open the door! So cute! (Josh got in by going through the kitchen window, thankfully.) Funny story #2: I sometimes use Breathe Right nose strips at night, which Jack already thinks are funny. But after getting George ready for bed one night, I came out to find Jack pulling Scotch tape off the roll and putting it across his nose! (Picture included!) Funny story #3: He has small figurines from the Toy Story movies and loves Bullseye the horse and Woody in particular. Bullseye's leg broke off, so he immediately went to Josh's tool box, took out a screw driver and tried to repair him! I love his ingenuity!

His greatest joy is his baby brother. Now that George spends more time on his tummy and rolling, Jack spends just as much time giggling. We are still working on continuing to be gentle with George and using a kind voice with Mommy and Daddy. Jack is a joy and we love every day with him, even the particularly challenging ones. We know God has something great in store for our intense little guy!

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