Mad Gracie Photo Blog

Jakezilla has officially turned ONE year old !! He is fully mobile and has even conquered the steps. We held his birthday party a few days early since the 26th fell on a Tuesday. He had a great time chasing everyone around, eating his cake, tearing into his gifts, with a little help from his big sister of course, and playing with his new toys. One of his gifts was the battery operated 4-wheeler. After getting the battery charged up we took it outside for a test ride. I put his hands on the grips, showed him the button to push on the handlebars and stood back. I really didn’t expect him to get it that quick but he took off and didn’t look back. Take a peek at the #1 for #2 page for a few more photos.

We had a stretch of hooot weather a few weeks ago, easily into the high 90′s and of course humid as well. Kathleen got a cute little pool on one of many trips to Target and we set the kiddies up in the shady spot to splash around and cool off. Madeleine of course loved it, we weren’t to sure about Jake at first but he had a blast splashing around and chasing his big sister around. Luckily things have cooled of a bit and we’re back to more reasonable temps. for now. The only problem is we still have July & August to go, at least now we are prepared with the kiddie pool.

For mother’s day Madeleine & Jake got mom a very nice Cherokee Red Dogwood tree for the front yard. So in the morning Madeleine and I went to the nearby nursery and picked up the tree and brought it to its new home, a beautiful spot just out in the yard in front of the house. Madeleine helped with backfilling the dirt around the tree and watering it. As you can see she had just as much fun watering herself. Meanwhile Jake supervised from the porch with a snack with an occassional outburst of some sort of baby babble. Everyone had a goodtime and most important Mom really liked her tree and the few other flowers we picked out.

Jake has hit 10 months ! We can’t believe it either, he’s eating real food now has a bunch of teeth coming in and seems to be happy and according to the doctor, healthy. He is mobile 2, Madeleine is Mobile 1,  with the crawling these days and as you can see in the photos Jakezilla is standing up with a little help. He has started to walk along the sofa and chairs and will usually let go to work on the balance for a minute before its back to the crawl. He is into EVERYTHING. Splashing in the cats water bowl is a favorite. Another favorite these days is chasing his hysterically laughing big sister through the house. After she laps him a dozen or so times as he wiggles his little self across the floor desperately trying to catch her,  he will stop, sit on his bottom and wait for her to get close before taking off again. I’m sure it won’t be long at all before he’s running right behind her, then things get tricky ! There are a few more photos on the Jake 10th month page.

Easter was fun this year. Maddie & Jake joined Aydan Saturday at Grams’ house to dye Easter eggs and they had a blast. Madeleine was really excited to see what the Easter Bunny had left for her, let’s just say she wasn’t disappointed with the purple basket full of chocolate ! Jake didn’t really know what was going on but enjoyed throwing the plastic eggs across the floor and watching them roll. We all got dressed up and headed to Gram’s & Gramp’s house for Easter dinner and of course the egg hunt. Maddie and Aydan cleaned up while and Jake enjoyed just sitting there, looking good and chewing on the plastic eggs.

So this post is a little late but better late than never ! My grandmom or G-Mom/GG-Mom as she’s known in the family, came up for a visit to help celebrate my mom’s 60th birthday last month. During her visit she came by our new house and visited for a while with Jake & Madeleine. Around the eighth month Jake was crawling pretty well and getting a few more teeth in.

In her three years Madeleine had never had a haircut, not even a trim. So a few weeks ago Kathleen took her in to her stylist. We told her that if she was good we would take her for ice cream afterward, bribery always works. Madeleine was fine when we arrived but when it came time to get down to business, she was having none of it as you can see in the photos. With a little convincing and some minor relocation, we were underway. Stacy, the stylist, did a great job and was patient and played along. As promised ice cream was next on the list. Being late morning our options were a little limited. After a bit of head scratching we came up with Brooms Bloom and off we went. Though it was hardly recognizable she was telling everyone that she had gotten her haircut.

Madeleine has reached the ripe old age of three ! We had a fun filled monkey day, lots of friends, Aydan, Elise, Eli, Preston and both Jakes plus lots of family. Her cupcake cake looked and tasted great,  she had a blast running around the house with everyone and ripping open all sorts of cool presents. She was so excited all day but when everyone started singing “happy birthday” she got really shy and wanted Kathleen and everyone to stop. It didn’t last very long though and she was ready for a cupcake ! When we woke up the next day I asked her if she had a good birthday; she smiled and said ” I had a great birthday”

A few weeks ago Madeleine emerged from her playroom in this fantastic outfit and proceeded to dance around the house and ,as she often does, use the sofa as a drum. She will smack the drumsticks together and yell out “1.2.3.4″ ! then start playing drums and singing a song like her favorite character Marinna from the Fresh Beat band. She even struck the Rockstar pose as I couldn’t resist the urge to capture this moment.  It’s just one of those times that make me thankful I’ve kept up this blog and happy to be a dad.

Jake has officially hit seven months ! He is throwing out lots of baby babble, he even says “Da Da Da” . We’ve been trying to get him to say other words but “da da da” seems to be the favorite for now. He’s on the verge of crawling, he will get on his tummy and spin all around he just hasn’t put the crawling part together yet. His two teeth are doing great, no more visible now but like the crawling I’m sure they’re right there. Jake is an early riser, usually making some noise around 5am . He will occasionally sleep in till 6:30 or so. He went through the sick spell recently. The poor kid was so congested he sounded like Darth Vader when he was sleeping. He bounced out of it pretty good though and seems to feel muuuuch better. Over all I would say he’s a happy kid, pulling his sister’s hair, laughing that awesome baby laugh, just having a good time; and that’s what it’s all about.