Morning Coffee

A peek at our morning--

Following breakfast comes an attempt to get clothes on him. Four out of seven mornings he fights me while I'm just trying to get a shirt on. Then it must be the perfect shirt, which wasn't this shirt today (even though he wore one very similar in style yesterday without issue). Notice where his right hand is.

His Grandmother got him several shirts similar to this, but they have buttons on the back of the neck. He's done well wearing them a few times, until today. He tugged and tugged and fretted until I changed it. Distracting him didn't work today.

As you can see in the next picture, I had to change his shirt. Now he's happy in another shirt and is playing with the blinds in his room. His daddy won't let him do this, but it was making for some cute pictures, so I let him. For a minute.


And this is why Daddy won't let him touch the blinds . . .

he tears them up

so I made him quit;
which led to this

and this

and this

and finally this

until I distracted him with his phone and chair

until he spotted the camera and darted

Summer Fun

We are back home after spending a good bit of June on the road! We went to my parents' the weekend before the 4th of July, got home Sunday evening, and headed to Zach's parents' the following Tuesday. Jackson still does well traveling, but there's only so much a little boy can take while being strapped in a carseat hour upon hour (about 10 hours to be exact for this trip)! The following pictures are on our trip to Alabama. We were also able to spend almost the entire week with our niece, Emma. I'm glad she and Jackson were able to "play" together, although I wish they could be around each other more often.

The first two pictures are of a crop duster in Greenville, MS. We don't live in the Delta, but we drive through a good bit of it when going to see both sets of parents. Ever since we've lived here, I've been fascinated with the crop dusters and enjoy getting to see them in action this time of year! We caught this one flying really low. In fact, I think this is about the lowest I've ever seen one. Since Jackson was still awake, I made Zach pull over so I could take some pictures!

Coming in!

I don't know if this picture really shows how low this plane was. I bet it was only 50 feet off of the ground at some points, which I'm sure is against FAA standards!

Emma and Jackson eating breakfast one morning!

Say CHEESE! Emma, the photographer!

Jackson is figuring out how to play pool and has picked out his stick. I think he picked the same one out each time!

Setting up

"If you hit this ball, this ball will go in and help set up your next shot!"

All smiles except our child! We headed to the lake one day and had a really good time, even if this picture says otherwise! Jackson opted to sleep rather than getting in the water and threw a fit when we put his life jacket on! Once he woke up, he loved watching the water while we were moving.

Zach found a museum that has daily train rides, so he reserved tickets for all of us on the 4th. Of course, Jackson loved it (and we love watching him get sooo excited)!


Sweet babies waiting on the small train to take us around while waiting on the real train ride!



We were on the caboose of the real train. The ride lasted about an hour and it was hot! At the end of the ride, Jackson was able to get a ride in the engine. (I have pictures, but they're not posted.) I was standing there watching Jackson and Zach in the engine when they stuck their heads out the window to wave; one little boy saw him and asked his mom if the baby was driving the train!

I know it's blurry, but I love this picture!

Sweet picture of Emma swinging with "Gam-pa" and "Gam-ma"

Playing with his train while riding the train!

Taking a snooze with his favorite pup on the way back home!

I have hundreds of pictures from the past week that I've been going through and decided to just post these. There are so many cute ones, but I had to draw the line somewhere! Some of the other pictures may get posted later on! Until then, we're getting back into the normal swing of things!

Pockets

We've been on the road some more with a trip to my parents this past weekend and another trip upcoming to Zach's parents. In between seeing the countryside, here are a couple of pictures!

Recently I commented that there are some days Jackson doesn't care to wear a shirt, and other days he doesn't want to wear shorts. Well, he doesn't like pockets in his shorts, either. Or tags in his shirts (which, by the way, is just like his Daddy)!

When all else fails

Hopefully this will not become part of his nightly routine when going to bed. . .

After almost two hours of trying to get him to sleep, we decided to let him run around and this is where he ended up!

Hindsight

is 20/20, of course!

Zach and I wish now that we had bought that refrigerator that had a lock feature on the ice and water dispenser! I walked in the kitchen earlier today and Jackson was soaking wet with water all over the floor!

And, as you can see, we occasionally have issues with not wanting to wear clothes! Today he didn't want his shirt on; the other day he didn't want his shorts on!

Little Marathon

Jackson and I have been busy, busy, busy the past week. We headed to Zach's parents to visit and also to attend a family reunion. It's a long trip (about 10 hours with Jackson) to Zach's parents' house and not too easy for a hyper little boy, but Jackson does great (thankfully) and takes it all in stride! Warning--I didn't break each event up into a separate post, so there are a lot of pictures and different subjects crammed into one long post. So, to read all of this, it's a bit of a marathon!

This picture was taken about 2 weeks ago. I wish it was a bit clearer, but I love his expression!

Poor little fella had his first bee sting about two weeks ago. The bee popped him in the thumb he's squeezing.

And finally at the grandparents and the center of attention

A couple of months ago, Zach's mom took Jackson and Emma to ride a train at a mall near Atlanta. Since Jackson is nuts for trains, we took him back for some more fun. Emma is out-of-town, so she wasn't with us and I think that really made a difference in the end result! Of course he LOVED riding the train--so much so that he rode it not once, not twice, but three times around the mall. The ride was great; leaving the train and trying to walk out the door was AWFUL. I can't stress how horrible it really was . . . screaming bloody murder for at least 30 minutes, going limp on the floor so we couldn't pick him up, you name it, he did it. Awful.

All smiles for now and having the time of his life!

Still in heaven and all is wonderful with the world!
I think having Emma at the last train ride helped distract Jackson when they were leaving. How I (and everyone else in the mall for that matter) wish she had been there this time around also!

Worn out!

Several pictures of the family reunion (click on it to see it larger). Unfortunately, it started raining about 2 hours into the reunion and the place cleared out in a matter of minutes!

On Monday we headed to Wild Animal Safari, which is a drive-through park where all sorts of animals (zebras, elk, ostriches, deer, etc.) come up to, if not into, a bus so you can feed them! We weren't sure if Jackson would be old enough to really enjoy it, but he loved it! He was giggling and grinning the entire time!

I wasn't able to get a good picture of it, but here he is throwing food to the animals

Some of the deer that followed us begging for hand-outs!

And the elk that got

up

close

and personal!

Having fun!

Silly faces! Jackson makes this face a good bit!

Well, this was a bit of smorgasbord, but some highlights of our trip! And in keeping with the marathon theme, Jackson recently weighed in at 26.2 pounds!

Cooling Off

Waving at people passing by