18 Months...How Can It Be?

As I dropped Josh off in nusery for the first time, part of me cheered because I could actually listen again, and the other part of me was so sad that my "baby" is now 18 months old! How can it be?! I swear to you he was just barely a brand new baby in my arms. I know all of you mothers out there know EXACTLY what I'm talking about. It just passes way too fast. I can honestly say that I have loved every day and every minute. Maybe when I have more kids it will get more difficult, but so far it has been perfect. I wake up every day and wonder what I did to deserve something so wonderful in my life. I feel almost guilty getting to stay home with Josh everyday while Boyd has to go to work. It has been the greatest 18 months of my life. I haven't been too good about keeping up with Josh's journal lately so I want to go ahead and record some of the things he's been doing lately so I will remember. I know this probably will be boring to anyone but me and everyone who knows me knows how long-winded I can be...but I'm going to do it anyway... :)

* He loves playing hide and seek and running behind the couch and having you jump up and scare him and say "BOO!" He will laugh and laugh and can play it for hours.

* For a couple of months now he's really been repeating what I say and comes up with new words every day. The other day I did something and I said, "Shoot!" The next thing I knew I could hear Josh in the other room saying, "Shoot, shoot, shoot!" It's a good thing he's around me a lot more than his daddy or he might be saying something else... :) He's even starting to say a few small phrases occasionally("I want that", "What is it?", etc...) His favorite thing to say right now is "Uh Oh Mama" and "Oh No!". Every time I'm in the other room and he comes running in saying that I know I'm in trouble. He's even learning a few Spanish words... I always count in Spanish with him and the other day he was going down the slide and I called out, "Uno.." and he responded, "DOS... TRES!" while holding up his three little fingers. I guess even when you don't think they're listening, they are. :)

* Josh loves to read books. Sometimes I won't know where he is and I'll go in his room and he'll be sitting on the floor surrounded with several books turning each page and "reading" in his little gibberish. Every night he picks out several books for us to read, and sometimes he'll want me to read the same book over and over. What can I say? He's a boy after my own heart...

* Josh has such a sweet heart. I know some of you reading this will beg to differ if your kid is littler than him and have been blessed with one of Josh's "squeezes". He definitely can be a little too rough sometimes, especially when he gets excited. We often have to remind him to be soft. When I picked him up from nursery last week I asked how he did and they responded, "He did great, but we have a feeling he's going to be a linebacker someday..." However, Josh also has a very sweet side more often than not. Every time he hits he always gives a big hug right after because he knows he shouldn't have. He loves to give loves and to be hugged and kissed in return. He's very independent and not "cuddly", but will give a hug and kiss any time you ask. Sometimes he'll get frustrated and hit me and I'll say, "That wasn't nice Josh. We don't hit." He'll then start walking to his room and say, "Time out..". Even if I forget or don't say anything, he'll remind me that he is suppose to go to timeout. It's really funny because he cries and hates it while he's in timeout, but he reminds me just the same.

* He loves to say prayers and often is the one to remind us. The other night I was gone and Boyd was putting Josh to bed and he told him "Night, Night" and went to lay him down. Josh told Boyd, "No!" and he folded his arms to remind Boyd to say prayers. It is amazing the things a child can teach you...

* He absoluely LOVES music and dancing. The minute he hears music he begans to move. I have to admit, he's got some great dance moves... He will start moving his shoulders, bobbing his head, and swinging his hips. The funny thing is that he can do it right to the beat, and he'll do it in front of everyone. He's never shy. He loves to sing songs and hear Boyd play the guitar. Hopefully he got his Dad's musical talent...

* By far Josh's most favorite thing right now is balls. Right when he wakes up he heads straight in and picks up his balls and starts throwing them and putting them in his little hoop. I spend several hours a day playing hoop with Josh (too bad it hasn't improved MY game any... :) He goes around all day saying "Ball" and "Hoop". He never gets tired of it. Josh won't really watch tv or cartoons or anything, but if there's a game on then he'll stop what he's doing and check it out(even if only momentarily). He was cheering for the Cardinals right along with us during the Superbowl! :) Yesterday we were at the park and I turned around and Josh was gone. Next thing I knew I saw him over in the field right in the middle of some kids' flag football practice. He kept saying, "Football" and running toward the ball trying to make those big kids give it to him.

* Josh loves to be around people and generally even if he's missed a nap he can go and go without getting grouchy at all as long as there's something going on and people to play with. He loves his cousins, being outdoors, slides, balloons, shoes especially boots (yes, my son has a shoe fettish :), playing in the bathtub or any type of water, being a helper (he loves to "help" with EVERYTHING), and many many more things. He is so happy and just loves life and everything in it.

Well, those are some of the things happening with Josh. As I said before, he is the light of our lives. We love him and can't imagine life without him. Nothing has ever been better. We love you so much Josh!!





One of Josh's many head injuries




Josh's second hair cut by Aunt Sherri (we forgot the camera the first time)

Visit from Harvey

This past week we had Harvey come stay with us for a few days while Kimberly and Jay got to have a much deserved getaway. We LOVE having Harvey! We always have so much fun because Harvey loves everything. We went to Xtreme Play bounce house with Aunt Holly, Jordo, and Sam, had a fire and roasted marshmallows, went to the library, the zoo, on a Ranger ride, and hung out at Jordan's house. We still didn't get to do everything we wanted so we hope he gets to come back soon!



After pushing those two heavy boys around the zoo for a few hours, I had definitly gotten my workout and was ready to go. Harvey,who absolutely ADORES animals, kept looking at the map and saying, "No Aunt Jen, we still haven't seen this animal or this animal." Now, for those of you who haven't been to the Phoenix Zoo, it is BIG, and we saw EVERY animal in it... :) Harvey carried around Josh's stuffed animal zebra and monkey and they got to see all the animals too... :) Really though, it was a gorgeous day and we had a great time!


Here we are on the Ranger out at Peralta

Cousin Love

I have to put in here the cutest little thing my 4 year old nephew Jordan did. All the kids drew names for Christmas and Jordan drew Josh. When Holly took him to buy a present he insisted that he wanted to get Josh a little backpack just like his because everytime he comes over to play he brings his little backpack and Josh always likes to play with it. It has a little pully thing that you can pull out and roll it like a suitcase, or you can wear it as a backpack. Well, the backpack was out of the Christmas present price range and Jordan didn't have enough money to buy it at the time (he earned his own money for his Christmas presents). So... Holly told him that they would just buy something else for Christmas and if he wanted to get the backpack still for Josh then he'd have to do lots of extra jobs so he could buy it (what a smart mom, huh?). After Christmas Jordan did little jobs around the house for two weeks until he had finally earned enough money to go to the store and get it. He picked out a little batman backpack and Holly said he rehearsed in the car all the way over how he was going to give it to Josh. He was so excited that he could hardly stand it. He brought it in and Josh loved it. I told him, "Jordan, that's Josh's favorite present he's EVER gotten. How did you know he would love it so much?" To which Jordan replied with a beaming smile, "I just knowed Aunt Jen."
NOW TELL ME IF KIDS AREN'T THE GREATEST!!

SJ Visit

A couple of weeks ago Holly and I took the boys and went home to visit Nana. It was such a great trip because no one else was home, not even my parents or Boyd's parents, so we literally got to spend the whole time over at Nana's house! The kids loved it. We played with Nana's toys, visited, went outside and had snowball fights (Nana's backyard still had a litte snow), made snow icecream, and even went on a ride around town with Mikayla, Holly, and the boys in the back, Nana in the front, and me driving. I think I got the best end of that deal not having to deal with keeping the boys contained... :) Needless to say they ate A LOT of candy while trying to keep them subdued... :) Nana showed us different places in town she had lived and then we went to Grovers and watched the sunset. It really was a great weekend and we were all sad we had to leave.

First Time Blogger

Kimberly has been trying to get me to do a blog for a long time now so I finally decided to try it. I'm going to use it as sort of a journal so I'm sorry in advance if my posts are too long or if it's boring. I really don't know what I'm doing so we'll see how this goes...