This Makes THREE, Kim!!
Dear Jack,
A lot has happened since I wrote you a letter last week. For one, you're more solid on your feet and walk when you don't realize it. You push off the floor and stand right up now. I also forgot to mention "special Evan and Jacky time" that Evan arranges with you. He puts a bunch of toys he thinks you will consider treasures (some of his and madalyn's and yours) by your door when you sleep and says when you wake up he'll have time with you. He probably gets this from me having little dates with him when mom's in town. Like today!! (We're going to Starbucks on a birthday gift card Stephanie got me months ago- thanks, Steph!! (No, he won't have coffee...there's chocolate-milk and dessert, too, people!) And I might try to teach him how to play Chess since there's a Chess Board in there... wait, do I know how to play Chess? Maybe it's a Checker board... let's hope it's a Checker board... I think it is... )
Anyway(!!), I also remembered what other things you like to put in your mouth! Chalk and rocks. You chew on pieces of chalk like you would Sweet Tarts. Crunch, crush, crunch. I hope there's nothing bad for you in chalk because you've eaten a lot of it... all different colors. And the rocks you suck on like Gobstoppers. I know I talked about how intelligent you are in the other letter, but yesterday I watched you, so caught up in watching your hands move and throwing your head playfully from side to side, crawl smack into a wall. You looked up, ready to take offense at whichever siblings slammed a wooden puzzle over your head this time... but alas, realized it was your own fault and just sort of sat there dumbfounded. I have to warn you that if you continue to crawl into walls and eat chalk, you're really going to dumb down those brains of yours.
Speaking of you throwing your head side to side, nothing characterizes your babyhood more than this antic. You look at us, smile, and throw your ears towards your shoulder, side to side, bobbing back and forth. Sometimes you just shake it. You used to do it when you were pretty small and would meet new people. It was your way of saying, "Hello! Nice to meet you! See what a happy baby I am?? I'm so happy to meet you!"
Two days ago, Evan carried you from the back porch out into the grass so you could "play in the sprinklers" with them. I found you leaning against the pool screen as though you were clinging to a ship in the middle of a hurricane and screaming. Yesterday, when I carried you in the yard on my hip to tell the kids it was dinner-time, you saw the sprinklers in the front yard and panicked. (I just thought I'd tell you this upfront so that if you have some phobia of water parks you would know where it came from and that you weren't to blame.) I keep telling him "Evan, if he's screaming, it means he's not having fun."
Lastly, the other thing I forgot to mention, is how you lie flat on your face on the ground when you get frustrated about something... really, really frustrated and flat you go. You spread your arms on the floor above your head and just give up and cry in anger, limp. Usually it's when you're too tired to crawl and catch up with someone, or when a kid snatches a toy from you. Another thing that makes you mad is when I get you out of your beloved dishwasher. You try to crawl in, I pull you out, you scream and cry. That's the cycle. Madalyn loved the dishwasher equally as much, which gives me hope that this will pass, because now it's no longer an amazing gadget-storing toy warehouse but just a dishwasher.
Ok, so that should do it. NOW I've recorded most things in complete. I hear you playing with a toy in the other room and it's stuck on squaresquaresquaresquare, so I better run help you.
Mommy
Labels: Jack, parenthood, siblings
