Life Lessons

Life is full of lessons big and small. For a 4 year old, those everyday lessons feel much bigger. Jaxon learned a valuable lesson this week about taking care of one's most valuable possessions!

Santa brought Jaxon lots of goodies this year but by far his most cherished was a simple stocking stuffer that Santa happened to see lying, misplaced in the wrong toy aisle at Target! That simple stocking stuffer is a rubbery, red-eyed tree frog, Jaxon affectionately calls Froggie! Froggie goes everywhere w/ Jaxon! He sleeps with him, bathes w/ him, takes him to communion at church w/ him! Every morning Froggie eats breakfast w/ us, brushes his teeth w/ us and rides to school w/ us! I am given strict directions daily as to what I need to do for Froggie while Jaxon is at school... Max and I are to play w/ him and make sure that we give him his imaginary fly food!

Daddy & I have never seen this child so attached to any other inanimate object thus far and have been dreading the day Froggie turns up missing... that day came this week!

I can't even begin to tell you how many times we have told Jaxon to leave Froggie at home when we go somewhere or to leave him in the car. If he is allowed to bring Froggie in, he is responsible for him and up until the other day has always done really well w/ keeping track of his rubbery friend.

My niece Alivia, turned one on Tuesday! We wanted to do something special for her so I suggested to Jaxon that we go to town and pick her out a Birthday balloon at the grocery store... we've got slim pickens in our small town! When we arrived at the store, Jaxon, like always, drug Froggie in w/ us. I wasn't paying any attention to what he was bringing in because Mr. Max was busy letting me know he'd like to get out of his car seat!

Jaxon LOVES going to the Linn store because they have shopping carts for kids! He immediately grabbed his cart and headed for the balloon display which is conveniently parked next to the toy section! We picked out our balloon, argued about a recorder he thought he must have from the toy aisle and headed for the checkout.

Later that day, as we were getting ready to leave for Alivia's pizza party, Jaxon began searching for Froggie. We hunt for that dang frog several times a day so I thought nothing of it at first! He wasn't having much luck inside so he asked if he could go out to the car and look. When he came back in w/ no Froggie, we began retracing our steps.

I remembered that when we went into the gas station to drop off a movie we had rented the day before, that Froggie was w/ him; Jaxon had introduced the owner to Froggie! That's when I realised where Froggie must be... the grocery store! Panic swept over me at that point knowing that the store had closed 30 minutes before our discovery! Luckily Jaxon was relatively cool about it and thankfully we had plans to go do something fun so it kept his mind off the matter.

At bedtime Jaxon was lost. More than feeling sorry for himself, he felt tremendous guilt that his friend was sleeping in a dark, scary, unknown place! I promised to stop after dropping him off at school to rescue Froggie and then promised to take extra special care of him while Jaxon was away!

Sure enough, Froggie had spent the night at the store and luckily was found by an employee, not another amphibian-loving little boy! Relief swept over me and at the same time panic... Froggie's arm was missing!!! A few weeks earlier, Froggie had lost his arm in a swinging accident. Jaxon was crushed and begged us to repair him. After several failed attempts at reattaching his severed arm, I managed to fix it and things were back to normal. The only difference was that at bath time, Froggie had to watch from the side of the tub because he couldn't get his Curious George "cast" wet!

I dreaded picking Jaxon up that day from school. I knew he'd be asking about Froggie and wanting to see him the second he got in the car. Daddy and I had discussed that this was a valuable life lesson and that he'd just have to deal w/ the consequences. Surprisingly, he dealt with the missing arm relatively well. He realised that there wasn't much any of us could do to change things and was relieved more than anything to be reacquainted w/ his best friend!

Hopefully he has learned his lesson and will think very clearly before bringing Froggie anywhere else for awhile!

Grandma 911

I remember as a girl my Mom getting really upset w/ us kids when we'd pick up the phone while she was talking to someone. I NOW KNOW WHY!!! Jaxon has had a recent obsession w/ the phone! We recently had Parent Teacher Conferences w/ Jaxon's teacher at his school. One of the things his teacher suggested that we begin working on him with was learning our phone number.

He has always done very well with word/number recognition so I decided to incorporate a little of both in our at home phone lesson. I wrote our phone number down on a note card and under the number I wrote his name. We began discussing what phone numbers are used for, who has them and when it's necessary to use them.

I gave him permission to practice dialing our number on our base phone but instructed him to leave the receiver alone. I explained that if he were to pick it up, we wouldn't be able to get calls from other people. That's when he asked if Grandma had a phone number. I told him she did and at that point explained how every one's numbers are different. I wrote my parents home number on another note card and wrote "Grandma" on the bottom. I then explained to him that Grandma's phone number is similar to ours because the first 3 numbers are the same since we both live in the same area.

A week went by and the excitement of dialing grew old. But one morning while I was brushing my teeth, Jaxon decided to begin practicing again! It was the first day of Spring Break and it was gorgeous outside. We were just on our way out the door to play when the phone rang. It was my Mom calling to tell me that she wasn't going to be home that afternoon. My first thought was, "Ok... why does that affect me?" She then told me that Jaxon had called and said he was coming over after dinner! "Jaxon called your house?!"

While I was brushing my teeth he had come in and said that he was going to Grandma's after dinner to play... she apparently had said it was OK. I thought nothing of it because he says this pretty much daily and he had just been to her house the day before so I assumed they discussed it then. But after talking to her & explaining the whole lesson on learning our phone number I realized what had happened!

Grandma's number is a dangerous thing! And now I'm terrified to even tell him about calling 911!!!

5 Months

5 months ago feels like an eternity and at the same time like it was just yesterday! Caring for two young boys has had it's ups and downs along the way. Any parent can relate to the feeling of constant worry when you have kids. You worry about whether or not they are gaining enough weight in the begining, about why they haven't pooped in 3 days, why they lay awake at night screaming and when they finally do sleep, why they aren't waking up! When you reach the 3 month mark things fianlly start to settle down a bit, you are able to start getting into some kind of a routine. But just when you thought things were getting easier, they reach the 4-6 month milestone of rolling over and eating baby foods... instead of worrying about their weight, now you're worrying about them falling off the bed or choking on their cereal!

Some of Max's favorite things this month are strolling in the buggy on nice days, rolling around on the floor with his toys, bouncing in his bouncer and playing peek-a-boo!

Check out our family movies to see Max playing peek-a-boo! http://www.youtube.com/user/welchfamilymovies#p/a/u/1/Hi7RD4bPLXA

Rock'n & Roll'n

2 days shy of his 5 month mark, Maddox rolled over for the first time! It's such an exciting milestone, sort of the first, "Look at me Mommy, I'm doing big boy stuff!" I have to admit, I'm a little annoyed at his choice of timing however. While I am a big fan of my kids showing off all the cute things they do and learn to others, I felt a bit jealous that he decided to perform this adorable act for the first time in front of our Parents As Teachers lady instead of someone like Daddy or Grandma! Oh well, I guess he was just doing what kids do best... showing off!

After lunch Mommy was busy helping Brother w/ his regular bathroom duties. Max enjoys spending that time under the mobile in his crib. His crib is more of a giant changing table than anything else, a place he enjoys playing in more than napping or spending the night. It's Daddy & Mommy's fault, we haven't taken the time to get it repaired and since he still sleeps in his travel bed in our room, we haven't been too worried about it!

Jaxon & I were just finishing up when I hear Max start screaming from their room. Brother & I both ran in and found Max lying on the floor! Guess now's a good time to get that crib front repaired! Big Brother was sure impressed w/ Max's showing off... after he made sure he was alright that is!

Real American Super Heroes

Jaxon's friend Cody, is from a military family. Both of his parents are what Jaxon likes to call, Real American Super Heroes! As a special treat, Cody's Mom took the boys to see the tanks at Ft. Riley yesterday. Jaxon had the best time! Here are a few pictures from their outing!

Thank you to Cody's Mommy for including Jaxon on such a special playdate!

PreSchool Jam Session

There's really nothing cuter than a bunch of 4 year olds putt'in on a show! Jaxon & his buddies participated in their first school musical this month. Here he is rock'in out to "Baa Baa Black Sheep"! To see the kids in action, check out our home movies... it's worth a watch!
http://www.youtube.com/user/welchfamilymovies#p/u

Little Toy Trains

My living room floor has been converted into a rail yard! Daddy & Jaxon were busy little engineers making it a goal last weekend to use every piece of track that Jaxon owns, to create a mega train station. It looks a bit more like the entire Island of Sodor has up and relocated to our living room!


With the crazy weather and weeks of illnesses that we've been experiencing lately, I couldn't tell them no, take your trains elsewhere! And now, I have let the train remain set up for almost a week! Ask me how ready I am for Spring!!!

Check out our home movies for a even better look at Jaxon's train!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CTfGMivanaE