Trains at North Park Mall

We've been looking at a few options to participate in the holiday fun and after a miss at the lights in downtown Frisco due to Jackson's allergies, we decided to join Zoe and her mom to watch the trains at north park mall. The exibit was short but very intriguing, still think Jackson was a bit too young to be fully engaged but he did get a kick out of it. Of course he was not feeling the conductor hat:-) The exhibit had small replicas of the dallas skyline, New York City, neighborhoods and the white house of which the train circled around.

After we watched the trains we walked around the mall and found a puppet show that was near it's end, so we sat and watched what was left of the show. Next year we will definitely plan our holiday events earlier so we don't miss out.

Getting Ready for The Christmas Card

So we thought we would have a great picture to use for our Christmas Cards from a photographer we hired for Jackson's birthday party. Well there was a miscommunication and so she ended up not showing up and we were left to hire my mom as our photographer to try and capture a great shot. Those of you with children know that with little ones the adults have to be ready every shot because you never know when the shot of them smiling will occur. Well of course I had to get on Jarvis for not being ready every moment:-) Here are a few of the ones that didn't make the cut, but were cute nonetheless.

Dr. Seuss Ice Exhibit

We've been spending some time with some friends of ours we met through Gymboree who have a little girl named Zoe whose 3 months younger than Jackson. Turns out they are friends with a mutual friend of ours from Cincinnati. The Dorrah's told us about this exhibit that happens every year at the Texas Gaylord Hotel where for the month of December they create an elaborate ice display based on a theme. This year's ice display was based on Dr. Seuss. We were in awe, it was truly amazing, everything you'll see in the pictures was all ice! Apparently people come from China (I think that's the country) and work on building the sculptures for 30 days. They keep the temperature at 9 degrees in the exhibit so they give you huge parkas to keep you nice and warm as you cruise through the exhibit. This will definitely be an annual thing we will do!

All Bundled Up

I just had to take a picture of jackson in his jacket and hat. He looks just too cute in the hat! He's ready for winter.



I just had to take a picture of jackson in his jacket and hat. He looks just too cute in the hat.

Jackson's Birthday Parties

To celebrate Jackson's first birthday with family and friends we threw him 2 birthday parties.

Jarvis and I typically go to his family's house for Thanksgiving so I think 2 parties will be an annual tradition since Jackson's birthday falls near Thanksgiving. The first party in Montgomery was mostly family but also a few good friends. As you guys know from previous entries, Jackson's allergies prohibit him from enjoying the things we love...cake, icing...ice cream so being the good mommy I am I scoured Montgomery in search for gluten free ingredients to make him his own special cake. After staying up late the night before the big bash and making two cakes (in case one didn't turn out right), Jackson's cake was ready for him to dive in. Of course when it came time to dive in, he needed a little help from me but ultimately was OK not having cake! He had such a good time at his party and enjoyed playing with his cousins. With the party wrapping up around 3:30, the Boyd's were packed up and on the road for our 10 hour trek back to Dallas and Jackson slept 9 of the 10 hrs!

For birthday party #2, I went a little overboard. I handmade all of his invitations.(not sure I would ever do that again after 20+ hrs of work) and attempted to make another cake for him and the cake for the party. The theme was a Jungle so we had blow up jungle animals, jungle treat boxes, jungle theme music and animal tags for the kids. All of his frito lay friends came out to celebrate with him and a few friends that we've met since we had Jackson. I made little mini turkey sliders and animal cookies for the kids. A friend suggested having an older activity for the older kids so we bought some canvases and oil paints for the kids to paint pictures. Everyone enjoyed themselves so I know it was all worth it. Can't believe my baby is one!! This has truly been a blessed year..I will cherish this time forever...

Jackson's Now Walking!!

So as you may remember from my many previous posts, I have been wondering when this day was going to finally come. Well 12 1/2 months and it is here. Jackson took 26 steps today, the most yet and so I will say he is walking! It's soo interesting to watch. It's very robotic, as if they are really thinking "how do I do this walking thing." But we are very excited for this milestone for him. I know we might not be thinking that when we are chasing him all over the house like crazy but for now we are just as excited as he is.

Jackson Turns ONE!!!

Today is Jackson's official birthday. We started the day at the allergist getting round two of his flu shot. Then we went to the doctor for his 12 month check up. Jackson is growing is definitely growing and as the doctor said is very advanced. He weighed in as a lightweight of 18 lbs, in the 10th percentile. He's so active now that the doctor said we probably need to just feed him more to keep up with his metabolism. His height came in at the 30th percentile at 29 in.

Jackson's development continues to amaze us. He's taking steps but not full on walking, but we imagine it will really be any day now. He's becoming more independent and loves to walk around holding his bottle, multitaksing:-) He is doing well with his vocabulary and loves to try and repeat every word you say. His favorite thing to do still is to read. He will sit quietly on the floor and flip through books as if he's reading to himself. He almost likes this more than us reading to him. We believe he is destined to be a scholar:-)

To celebrate pre-birthday parties, we took him to cheesecake factory. He had a good time eating french fries - which he loves and was pleasantly entertained by the cheesecake factory staff when they sang happy birthday. Initially we started out going to this new restaurant, Cozy Kitchen, because they advertised that they had gluten free desserts and breads, but they were closed so unfortunately Jackson didn't get any cake on his official birthday. All Jackson could do was look at his ice-cream sundae that the staff brought out.:-(

Halloween...Tricks & Treats

Halloween was a busy three days for Jackson. Thursday my marketing department invited all the babies born between January 2007-present to a fun celebration where they all dressed up in their costumes. You ask why did they restrict the age, well we've had a bit of a phenomenon in the department where about 35+ babies have been born since 2007. Since I've given birth to Jackson 17 other women have also given birth to babies!!

Friday we went over to one of Jackson's friend's house's, Charlotte for some pumpkin carving. Charlotte's mom also works with me and she had Charlotte 2 months after Jackson. Jackson enjoyed playing with all the children. He's such a social baby he just bounced around from playing with one baby to the next as if he was working the room.:-)

Then Saturday we started out the afternoon going to the Dallas Arboretum. Every year they have a fall festival with a pumpkin patch and fun activities for the kids. We spent some time exploring the arboretum and ended up in a very organized and creative pumpkin patch. Jackson loved the arboretum he was facinated with all the flowers, fun props and the pumpkins.

After the arboretum we raced home to get ready for trick or treating. One of our neighbors invited us and a few other neighbors to her house for some pizza and treats before we all headed out for some trick or treating. We ended up just going trick or treating on our street and then came back to the house to give out candy. Jackson was pooped by 8pm and our little lion was fast asleep by 8:15.

Swim Class With Daddy

Normally I am the one in the pool with Jackson for his swim class but today I was running late from work so I ended up meeting Jarvis and Jackson at the pool. I was able to get a really good video of Jackson swimming with Daddy.

Jackson Feeding Himself

Jackson is getting the hang of feeding himself. He either enjoys it too much or he's just plain greedy. We often have to stop him or limit the amount of food we put on his tray because otherwise his mouth will be stuffed. It's amazing that he only has two little teeth at the bottom but he can stuff his mouth and work the food with his gums and two teeth until it's small enough to swallow...crazy!

Jackson's 11 Months!!

Jackson turned 11 months today, can hardly believe he'll be a year next month. He's taking a few steps...and then of course resorts to his crawling. We made a major milestone this month, he no longer needs us to rock him to sleep!!! We put him down in his bed and he talks to himself until he dozes off or just plain dozes off.

Swimming at Home

Occasionally we think Jackson is taking the skills he’s learning from swim class and applying them in other settings. Here he is sliding across the floor with both hands otherwise occupied. At first we thought, maybe he’s trying to swim but then we thought, maybe he’s just multitasking…his hands are occupied and he still wants to get around so he is going to glide across the floor:-)

We're Almost Walking

Jackson made huge progress on his way to being able to walk. We bought him this push toy several weeks ago to try and get him interested in pushing something around, ya know so that he would walk soon and to our surprise he had NO interest in pushing the toy, all he wanted to do was turn it over on it's side and play with it. Well Jarvis started working with him the past day and voila he is cruising with his toy. I believe he will be walking by his first birthday!

Day Out With Daddy

As you've seen in earlier pictures, Jarvis gets a kick out of dressing Jackson up like him and taking pictures of themselves. Here they are with hats and zip up sweaters ready to go out as "twinkies":-)

Our series of words

One of the exercises we like to do with Jackson (I know he already has exercises and he's not even 1) is we like to run through all the things he knows and then we say "yeah" at the end to praise him. He loves to praise himself so often that sometimes he stops our exercise and starts to clap to say "yeah" after one command.

7-11 Playdate

Jackson invited all of his frito lay baby friends over for some good food, football and fun! There are six babies that were born within 2-3 months of each other at work, two actually born within a few weeks of Jackson. So we'd thought it would be fun to have them over for a playdate...hence the 7-11, they were all between 7 and ll months. As you can see from the pictures, it was like herding cats. We had 3 different cameras and probably 8 or so pictures and NONE of them came out clear or with all five babies looking straight ahead:-)

Jackson's 10 Months!!!

Today Jackson celebrates another monthly birthday Jackson is now 10 month’s old!!! We are making a lot of progress, he’s finally signing back to me!!! He know how to sign, “milk”, “all done”, and blow kisses. He’s still not walking but he will take a few steps when you hold his hand in front. He is a self praiser and likes to praise himself when HE feels like he’s done a good job. And while we probably won’t have to worry about self-esteem issues, we may have someone who may be too assure of himself – but hey confidence isn’t a bad thing. Our method of praise is “yay” with a hand clap and boy does he love this!

He has added “stop”, “pup pup” to his vocabulary. He loves to tell us “stop” and with attitude when we tell him “stop” as he’s doing something he’s not supposed to do. I’ve got him pretty well trained when I yell his name or say it with force I sometimes don’t even have to say stop, he’ll just automatically say it for me. Now, most of the time he stops what he’s doing but then goes right back and does it again but we are making progress:-)

Dirty Looks...Just for Play?

All those that have been around Jackson over the past several months has seen his famous dirty look. At first he was just doing it for fun, now he knows how to use it in context. It's funny because he'll even play with you, if you give him a dirty look he'll give you one right back. He'll go back and forth dirty look, release to a smile, dirty look, smile.

Trip to San Antonio

Jackson and I drove down to San Antonio for my nephew's birthday. This was my first time driving a long distance (4.5 hrs) with Jackson by myself. Jarvis stayed behind because he had tickets to see a UFC fight and the Cowboy game in the new statium.

As you folks with children know, we become a slave to our children's schedule so it was important that we leave during jackson's nap time so I could get as much driving done while he was sound asleep. The plan was successful and he slept for the firs 2.5 hours. By the time he woke up we stopped so I could change him and feed him. Then back on the road for another 2 hrs. Well he wasn't so excited about that. He fussed for about 15 min then miraculously fell asleep again!! I guess the ride was too relaxing for him in the end or was tired of fussing and realized he couldn't get out.

We had a great time in San Antonio at Chuck E Cheese. I guess that will be us someday...parties for Jackson at Chuck E Cheese. At least jarvis and I love the pizza there! After the party we went to meet one of my best friends from high school and her mom. Jackson was excited to see them and it was great catching up with auntie april and her mom. The drive back was much of the same but we stopped off for a nice treat at the Kolache Bakery!

Jackson is Dedicated to the Lord

Soo sad about this one as we do not have one single picture!!! We were too busy rushing out the door to make it to church and then when we got there everyone, including our friends and family, were in the pulpit for the dedication. Jackson had a very cute outfit from his Ne Ne (Jarvis' mom) that he wore. He was also on his best behavior, but no surprise with that. Our Pastor wrote a nice poem that we will treasure as Jackson gets older. We felt so blessed to share this momement with our friends and family that were able to join. Here are a few pics with his cousin Karys...

Jackson's Play Dates!

So for all our blog readers, we are of course behind in the blog, but catching up quickly...

Jackson had more play dates this weekend. First we went over to Noah's house for some Friday afternoon fun. Noah and Jackson played very well together, no fighting just sharing and pushing up on each other... well Jackson did most of the pushing:-)

Then Monday for labor day we invited Miss Zoe and her parents over for lunch. We met Zoe at Gymboree and come to find out her parents are good friends with some friends of ours from cincinnati, small world!! Jackson is such a loving person, he greeted Zoe with kisses and many times tried to yell and scream in excitment at her... to which Zoe showed no interest:-) All I have to say is You go Zoe...Let the boys chase you...

And Low and Behold, We Have Teeth!

At 9 mo, 3 wks, Jackson's teeth have finally started to emerge. I know you are not supposed to get caught up in those developmental milestones, but I have to admit it's hard not to. So since 7 months, I've been looking, asking the doctor is there any sign and now they are here. I probably would not have known for a while because he has been his normal self, still sleeping through the night, not iritable, no excessive drooling but when I went to put him to last night he put my finger in his mouth and I was like "whoah, what's this scratching me?" In my excitement, bedtime quickly ended so we could go show daddy. Then in normal fashion the Boyds made a song out of the milestone, well Momma Boyd did..."you gotta teethusus, you gotta gotta gotta teethusus." Then the next day I noticed his second one was cutting! So I am hoping this is how he will be, calm, cool and collected. Now on to walking:-)

P.S. No pictures yet, it's been difficult to get them with his mouth open.

Jackson Learns to Swim

We have enrolled Jackson in a baby swim class through Emler Swim, which teaches babies through the age of 5 how to swim. He has the cutest little trunks, babies still in diapers are required to wear two pairs of swim trunks so if the first pair doesn't catch his business, they second one will... don't think he'll be excited to wear these speedo type briefs when he's 20 but they are cute now:-) At his age, he's in the waterbabies class so there is not a ton of backstroke or freestyle practice but they are learning to hold their breath under water, become acustomed to the water and how to get out quickly if they ever fell in. Jackson absolutely loves the water! He's not afraid, he kicks and plays and when I'm busy trying to get him to follow our instructor he drinks the water...I know, not so appetizing but I am constantly trying to keep him above water to prevent the swallowing. Now if I could just get him to drink plain water from a bottle!


Slide action...

Visit to New Jersey

Jarvis started a new job a few weeks ago and had to go to NJ for two weeks for training. This was the first time he was away from Jackson for more than a couple of nights so to break up the time, we decided to fly to NJ for a long weekend to visit him. My entire family is from NJ so we got a chance to drive down and visit with them while Jarvis was in trainig. We also have some very good friends from business school in the area who both had babies the same year Jackson was born so we were anxious to get the babies together, MBA class of 2033. We had so much fun watching Simone, Evan and Jackson play, they were really cute together. Simone was definitely running things and had Jackson and Evan bowing down to her:-) Jackson was on some sort of high, he was doing his butt dance... which is where he bounces up and down on his butt and waves his hands in the air. I'm going to try and post a video of it because it is really funny. Then we went to visit Uncle Michael and Aunt Alecia, who are expecting a boy in September. What a busy 4 day weekend but it was great catching up with friends and family and Jackson enjoyed meeting everyone.

Jackson & Simone doing a little dance...

Jackson's Fun With Cousins

My three nephews were in town for the week before the oldest goes back to school. My mom took on the brave task of keeping them entertained for the entire week! No problems this time but they sure are a handful. They came over to visit one night and I quickly realized, four boys or even three would be too much for me to handle. That night I felt like I needed some aspirin and I NEVER get headaches. Or maybe three kids would just be too much to handle.:-) But they were a lot of fun with Jackson. Jackson was chasing the little ones all over the house and trying to participate in the roughhousing that boys do. I'm sure it will be even more crazy when Jackson gets a little bit older.

Soon to be Lover of Chick Fil A!

Now that Jackson has passed the stage that we have to introduce foods one at a time, I figured I'll start giving him opportunities to eat what we eat. In this video I gave him a chick fil a waffle fry and after a few licks he was too excited and started flappin his hands like crazy. After I stopped the video he actually stuffed the entire thing in his mouth and pitched a fit when i tried to get it out. I guess I'll take that as Chick fil A will soon be one of his favorites just like mom and dad.

Jackson's 9 Months!!

Jackson turned 9 months today!!! He had is well visit check up with the Dr. and he is 18 lbs and 27 in. Since he has been cruising, crawling and pulling up on most everything (my pants legs are his favorite to pull up on) his weight is starting to slowdown.

We started the day by going to Gymboree and then celebrated his birthday with our first trip to the Ft. Worth Zoo. We enjoyed the day seeing all the animals and reptiles. Jackson was a little intrigued by the animals but not as engaged as I hoped. There was a lot of “Jackson look over here, look over here, see the Zebra?,” to which he glanced and then kept chewing on his sunglasses. I guess we’ll wait a few more months before going back.

Although we miss every stage that we leave, the new stages are getting more exciting. Jackson is so mobile now it is truly entertaining. He will follow you around the house crawling like a mad man. He has two different crawling styles… the one-legged crawl- when he needs to get somewhere fast he uses one leg to push off of while he’s crawling on the other leg and the traditional crawl, when he gets close to something or first begins his journey this is his preferred crawling style.

As for teeth, well those are still non-existant. We keep thinking they’re coming and then we look and there is no sign of them in sight. The Dr. assured us this is perfectly normal, and some babies don’t get their first teeth until around 12-15 months. I guess the good thing is we haven’t had any fussy nights

The vocabulary is still a lot of constant sounds with the occasional, ba ba, ma ma, da da and uh oh. We are still signing to him but he has yet to return the sign, hopefully he’ll make some progress by next month.

Baby Let's Cruise...Away From Here...

8 1/2 months and Jackson is well on his way mastering cruising. He has been pulling up and walking around anything that's under 3 ft. We are of course more nervous than him. I don't know why babies are oblivious to dangerous hazards such as walls, furniture etc, meanwhile Jarvis and I are flinching at every stumble or loss of grip. I guess soon we'll get over it and when we see him attempt to fall realize that he will be just fine.

Jackson's 8 Months!!

Jackson has hit another milestone, 8 months! We didn't do a big celebration this month as today was not a good day for Jackson. He celebrated his birthday by visiting the allergist. We had a really severe reaction to milk based formula a couple of months ago so we decided to visit an allergist to find out if he has any other food allergies. After a series of prick tests on his back and Jarvis, the nurse and myself holding jackson down for 15 min while he wailed uncontrollably, we found out that he is allergic to:

Milk
Beef
Rice
Oat
Strawberries
Apples
Egg Whites
Chocolate

This was heartbreaking for me, as everyone who knows me knows I love to bake...Egg whites???... chocolate??? Just what on earth will I be able to bake him? Well the good news is that he might outgrow most of these and in a baked form he might be less allergic to some of these items.

At 8 months, Jackson is full on crawling, unless he needs to get somewhere fast then he resorts to his "army crawl." He's saying many constant sounds and is very good at immitating. He has become very good at pulling himself up on anything and everything. And, while I've been told he is progressing very fast for a boy, I still am determined to have him hit the next milestone as fast as he can. I guess that's the A type personality in overdrive:-) He is now the most crazy sleeper ever! He is all over the bed, on his stomach, his back, his side, butt in the air, tucked in the corner of his crib, on the left side, the right... all I know is I do not look forward to him getting in our bed when we go out of town, the only one who will be sleeping will be him!

Peek a Boo

I just love this video!!!! Jarvis is talking to Jackson as Jackson is crawling under the coffee table. Everytime Jarvis calls his name he peeks around the corner like, "yeeeeesssss, are you calling me daddy?" After he looks at Jarvis, he goes back to what he's doing...exploring his world.

Jackson & Mason at Gymboree

A week after we worked with Jackson on his gross motor skill of crawling (special thanks to Wendy & Jonae for kicking off the creeping aka “crawling”), Jackson was able to show the other babies at Gymboree that he too can get around. As you can see in the video Jackson was moving all over the mat. He saw his friend Mason and quickly moved over to him. We think Jackson is going to be the party type as he loves to socialize and play. He might of overwhelmed Mason a bit by getting in his face and screaming. We are trying to teach Jackson to be nice and not grab other peoples faces or shirts but this seems to be his mode of interacting with others. I think this video is so cute, Jackson was trying to give Mason kisses when he started crying. But as you can see he’s definitely not the shy type!

Fun in the New Tub

Jackson has now outgrown his baby bathtub but is too big for his tub in his bathroom so I found this blow up ducky tub that fits inside his tub. Jackson loves to splash and chase his little toys around in the tub. He also loves to lay back to let me wash his hair. I see now he’s going to like getting pampered… his future wife better be prepared.