Farmer Jack's 1st Birthday

Birthday boy breakfast

Birthday lunch date with Mom. How lucky am I that I got to spend his birthday with him?

Josh insisted that we get a petting zoo for Jack's birthday party. I loved it. It was definitely a memorable first birthday party. Here is the birthday boy enjoying his special day with his farmer parents.

Jack's guest of honor was this amazing llama. 

We had lots of fun human guests too.

I love seeing pictures of kids getting violent and aggressive trying to get the candy from a piñata. 

I'm very happy that my little Jack stuck around for a whole year. It has been a great year and I hope I have many, many more. 

My little Jack buddy, there are a lot of people who love you. I hope you can always feel that. 

My darling Madeline

The greatest surprise of parenting is liking your kids more and more as they get older. (Ask me if I still feel that way when she is 13.) I really, actually, positively enjoy my time with Maddie. She is fun and nice and we have a lot in common. 

She took a sewing class this summer and enjoyed it so much. We set her up a little sewing corner in the playroom and she made all kinds of cool stuff.

I realized that she is now old enough to go to (certain!) shows downtown with me. We went to see David Copperfield since Maddie sits next to David's son at school. We also watched The Wizard of Oz at the Smith Center. Does anyone else feel that the Smith Center has made their life so much better? I feel like it raised the quality of this city so much. I'm so grateful it is here.

 

Maddie explored the new kid's museum downtown and gave it a thumbs up.

Are we already to this stage?! No more coloring and barbies during playdates?! They just play in my closet and do their nails.

 

She laid out her outfit for the first day of school. Moments like this remind me of how similar we are. 

First day of third grade.

Puppet show for me and Jack to watch.

One day a week, Maddie gets to go to Dad's office and "help" after school. Josh complained to me that he runs out of ways that she can "help" him at the office. He gets no sympathy from me. I have been pretending to be fun and racking my brain for ways to keep her entertained for almost nine years. A few hours a week is nothing.

 She gets SO into books she is reading. "Just let me finish this chapter mom."

I looked over during a pedicure and saw her reading a trashy magazine and just laughed my head off. She is SO OLD.

One of her best friends this year is the daughter of Penn (of Penn and Teller). She got to go to his "office" at the Rio and have dinner with him. The funny thing is that she probably has no idea who he is and probably doesn't care. She just talked about how much she loves buffets because you can get whatever you want.  :o)

What's happening in little Jack Buddy's life.

Jack learned how to pull himself up in the crib a while ago. I watched him for half an hour on his crib camera while he pulled himself up and didn't know how to get back down. I snuck in there three times and helped lay him back down, but he just pulled himself back up again. Eventually he got so sleepy he just kind of crumpled up into a ball and fell asleep in the corner.

Now he is a tough guy and can get around a lot better. He especially thinks he is cool when he crawls up the stairs all by himself. When he gets to the top, he turns around with a big grin. So proud of himself.

Why do babies love to chew on lemon slices when it is obvious by their facial expressions that they aren't necessarily enjoying it?

This big boy got his first rocking horse. (I just want to SQUEEZE him!)

He hated the rainy season. This boy likes to crawl around his backyard and play in the dirt and chew on the grass and get into trouble.

He is such a big boy now! It hit me when I watched him crawling around and playing at a park. A park?! Really?! He is getting so old!

Even though I am trying to finish my last year of law school and Jack is supposed to be in school, we play hookie a lot and just hang out. He is my little buddy. Just call him Ferris Harris.

Our kids absolutely love to visit their dad at his office. I honestly think they would choose a day at dad's office over a day at Disneyland. 

Jack's hair is losing the redness and turning this absolutely gorgeous color of gold. I couldn't figure out where his hair color was from until I saw him sitting on his Grandpa Stucki's lap. Duh. Here are the two golden haired boys. 

As much as Jack loves his mama, he is definitely a dada's boy. Holy crap, he is obsessed with his dada. He will shove me out of the way to get to Josh. It makes me very happy that they have each other. 

Jack got to hang out with Grandma Linda while Josh and I were in Seattle. He was very "helpful" at her office.

I love having a crib camera so I can text my mom from Seattle and harass her when she wasn't doing something perfect. Haha. She knew I would watch Jack on the video and so she was making me laugh while I was stalking them. 

Jack loved his new big boy tricycle. "Look ma! No hands!"

He took his first steps!! I barely caught it on camera. He loves his new walker toy from Uncle Kyle and Aunt Kristina.

Jack is my little buddy. We spend a ridiculous amount of time in the car together shuttling Maddie around to her very busy social life. I love when he gets grumpy.

My greatest fantasy was that I would give a son to Josh. And this son would love baseball. So far...so good.

It's very tiring being the cute little baby of our family.