paint prep

We've been busy getting prepping and painting the outside trim of our house. The siding is still fine, but the wood trim was peeling badly. Jackson had fun helping too. Here he is helping Daddy.

And here helping Uncle Jeff.

Taking a break with everyone too.

summersault

Jackson was playing on the floor and was doing summersaults on his own.

chalk

I wasn't paying attention to where Jackson was writing... oops

stop at the park

I went running this morning and Jackson just wasn't in the mood for it. He looks happy in the picture below, but that wasn't the case in the jogger. So we stopped at the park to play a little. He was sad when we left, but half way home he fell asleep. I think that was just what he needed.

It was pretty cold this morning, so he's wearing his new winter coat.

lots of fun

Wyatt came over and the two of them had a good time on the new play structure.

18 months

Jackson turned 18 months (1 1/2 years) last week. I need to get some actual 18 month pictures of him, but in the mean time, I wanted to write these down.

Here are some things I thought of that Jackson is doing now:

• Still loves playing outside, but now calls for "doggy" to come in and out with him.
• Saying new words still all the time and still occasionally will sign a new word. Just signed play for the first time the other day when he was asking if he could go play with some other boys at a wedding.
• Used to always say "gaga" for banana. And now he learned to say "nana" from watching Elmo. Funny that Elmo got him to say it closer to the actual word.
• Says "leche", but won't say milk. He still signs milk most of the time though, and he'll sign it in the middle of the night and I can't see, but I can hear his hand moving so I know.
• Also just started saying thank you instead of always signing it.
• Pretends to talk on the phone. He must have some funny friends, because he laughs hard on the phone.
• Loves Elmo's World and sings the theme song, "lala lala Elmo" is what he says.
• Wants to do things on his own, like stairs, eating with a fork.

3 pics from my (new) phone

Last week I got a new phone! It's pretty fancy compared to what I've had. The back slides out and is a keyboard, it's good for texting. Before I've always just had the regular, cheapest to get, cell phones. This still isn't considered a 'smart phone', but I still like it. Anyways, here are some pictures I took from it.

I got my haircut today, probably like 5 or so inches cut off.

Jackson watching cartoons the other morning. I thought he was pretty cute, just hanging out watching tv on the couch like that, turning into a little boy.

I got him a magnadoodle for our last car trip and he loves it. He was playing with it the other day and went over to his high chair (that we don't really ever use) and wanted up in it to write on his magnadoodle. I also thought this was pretty cute and also shows how he's growing up.