crafty???

Jack's walls are pretty bare. So I have decided to slowly but surely add some decoration to his room. We are starting out with these letters- which he helped to paint- then we are getting a bulletin board that will be covered in fabric. After that who knows, but we will figure something out.



Once we painted the letters I felt sort of crafty. I am not crafty or in any way artsy, but thought hey why not try small things and see how it goes. We cut out felt bats, spiders, and ghosts, added pipe cleaner smiles, and googly eyes. We also printed out some Halloween pictures, added ribbon, and hung them from the ceiling fan.


Realizing, that through doing these activities we have had far fewer outbursts, I had to come up with more so we made roll-out sugar cookies. Jack helped pour the ingredients into the mixer, helped roll out the dough, cut out the shapes, icing them, and eat them!


We had fun painting our small pumpkins last week, I thought why not do a couple more to keep inside. Jack picked out his pumpkin- his is the one that started out with white on it. He painted his pumpkin almost all by himself. I only helped in a couple of spots. His ended up being the one with the pipe cleaner hair.

a compact fall break

We had big plans for fall break, I was so excited, but a week before we were set to go Pete remembered he had a math conference that weekend!!! The conference was here, so no big plans to travel to far away cities were made. Needing something to do and somewhere to go we headed off to KY for a quick two night stay. We arrived in time to celebrate Danny's b-day. Then the next morning it was off to the Newport Aquarium. We had a great time.




Jack's obsession with lawnmowers continues. He is pretty particular and requires all lawnmowers be cleaned before ridden.




We also went to visit some farm animals ( they were extra stinky!) and Jack helped Granny carve a pumpkin.




Once home we painted a few pumpkins. This was Jack's first time using paint and he did a great job!

babies, toddlers, and out of town/ out of my mind

My sister, Mary, had a baby girl on Sept. 30th. I thought it would be great to go and help out, plus the added bonus of seeing Jack around a newborn couldn't be bad. Well, I just want to say right now that if anyone wants to help out a new mother- LEAVE ALL TODDLERS AT HOME!!!!!!!!!!!!
Oh, I was so angry, mad, stressed, mean, tense, and unhelpful. SORRY! I had great intentions, but we all know the adage. It wasn't that Jack was malicious or in anyway hurtful or harmful toward the baby, but toddlers need routine, exercise, and sleep- Jack had none of these. He was actually very sweet toward Khloe; he kissed her all the time, hugged her, wanted to help when she was crying, but that part didn't out weigh the rest. He never listened to me-ever, he never slept-ever, he did the exact opposite of what I said, and took so much of my time that I really couldn't be of any real help. Of course the fact that this baby was extremely good and didn't require much of my help in the first place also made me feel useless. They were really on that 2-hr. schedule of nursing and sleeping accompanied by almost no crying. We left 2 days early because we were causing more noise and disruption in their house than the new baby.

Things weren't all bad- here is Jack reading to Khloe while Mary took a nap.


Jack laughing at something - who even knows.




Jack holding Khloe our first night there.



I did get to see a glimpse of how kind and sweet Jack will be toward a new baby, and I think being at home with his dad, dog, friends, routine, and bedroom door that locks from the outside will all help when it is our turn in March.

Other notes:
I am taking weekly progesterone shots to help prevent preterm labor. Now that I have had the first one I am actually pretty nervous about continuing them. I am looking for any information people may have. I think the fact I am having a boy is intensifying my fears- maybe that is silly but there you go.

Pete has a math conference this weekend which is great for him because it is here at Purdue and the two professors he works with are hosting it, but sad for us because that is our fall break. Who schedules a conference over fall break? boo.