Lots of Love

We have been so blessed. There is a lot of love in our home. Constance is a very loving little girl. she absolutely loves her little brothers and she loves to do stuff with them and for them. In the morning she loves to get Jordan up. At night, she loves to sing to him. He now starts to sing "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star" when he is tired ... that is what Sissy always sings to him and he has learned it and "ABC's" by her singing to him. It is the sweetest thing.

Jordan is so sweet and loving ... He loves to give kisses. Every time he sees his little brother, he is there trying to give him a kiss. Sometimes he loves a little too hard. I find him on top of Dominic trying to give him a kiss. He doesn't quite understand soft also means not laying no top of the baby.

Normally Jordan stops doing things as soon as I get the camera out ... this time I was actually able to get a picture of him. I thought it was so sweet.

A Little Too Quick

Every day brings new excitement into our lives ... I can honestly say there is never a dull moment.

Keeping up with Jordan is fun. I have learned to lock some doors first thing in the morning before we get him up which helps. Bathrooms are the first doors to get locked or else you would have Jordan in the tub fully clothed and probably trying to turn the water on or he would playing with the toilet. That is definitely something we want to avoid. We also have to make sure Sissy's door is locked ... he loves to play with her stuff ... she doesn't love that too much. Right now we are lucky ... he can open the main doors ... but he can't quite reach the storm doors and get them open. Heaven help us when he can ... We have had to buy some child locks for the fridge and our computer desk. Jordan has learned to open both of them.

Every day we are seeing Jordan's reach get a little higher.

So the other day I was in my room feeding baby Dominic. The next thing I know in walks Jordan with a white powder on him and his fingers in his mouth saying "mmmmm". I was trying to figure out what on earth he had gotten into. I have really good child locks on the cabinets and knew he couldn't have gotten into the flour. I came into the kitchen to find Dominic's formula sitting on the floor with the lid open. Guess I knew what he got into. I now make sure I put it farther back on the counter.

Of course I didn't grab the camera in time. I think I need to just start wearing it around my neck all the time.

School

Constance loves school. We have been very blessed ... she has had wonderful teachers. They have been perfect for her and her personality and helping her reach her full potential. Because of this ... she hates to miss ... to the point she is has been in tears when I have told her she can't go due to a fever.

She has developed a love for reading ... partially in part to her teacher this year. It has been wonderful to watch (especially since it is something that her mommy loves to do too). This year her hard work has paid off. She has made the Principals list 2 times ... all E's. and the Honor Roll 3 times. She loves to get the ribbons at the awards ceremonies each six weeks.

It is hard to believe that another school year is almost done ... time is going by so fast. Constance is counting down the time until Jordan will be in school with her. She really wishes he could go to school now ...

Jordan and Bugs

This is one of those times you really wished you had your camera with you and were ready ... but there is really no way of knowing that it was going to happen.

As I mentioned previously I really do try to clean the floors, if at all possible, at least once a day ... due to the simple fact that Jordan can and will put anything in his mouth he finds. In the past he has eaten a dead house fly ...

So tonight when we got home from running some errands, Jordan and Constance were on the front step and playing around ... next thing I know Constance yells that Jordan ate a bug. I looked at him and said "yuck, yuck." His normal response to this is just smiling and laughing. This time he proceeded to eat the bug and within a minute he was crying and trying to get the bug out and flicking his hands trying to get it off his fingers. He didn't seem to like the taste too much. His little face was priceless ... it was one that needed to be caught on film. Oh well ...

I guess we will see if he tries eating bugs again or if he has learned his lesson ... time will tell.

Cheerios

You would think that one day I would learn ... evidently not. Without fail when I go through and clean all the floors, as soon as I get it done there is a trail of dropped cheerios throughout the house again. Of course, you notice this when you just so happen to step on one or two. One of these days I will learn not to let Jordan walk around the house with cheerios in a snack cup ... especially when I have just cleaned the floors. But then again, he always seems to find then later when he wants something to eat. He has secret stashes around the house.

It is funny ... things that you would never think you would tolerate ... I have learned that sometimes no matter how hard you try to avoid them it just isn't always possible. I try to keep my floors cleaned on a regular basis ... yet Jordan still manages to find things to put in his mouth that I have managed to miss. He has managed to find a dead fly and before I could get to it ... yep, you guessed it ... it was in his mouth and he was saying "mmmmm". One time when Constance was feeding the dog ... she had accidentally dropped some dog food and Jordan found it ... yep, in the mouth and "mmmmm".

Thankfully these have only been one time occurrences ... at least to my knowledge. After all is said and done ... there is nothing that beats the smile Jordan gives you when he is so pleased with himself and what he has done. You just have to forget a few things here and there.

Constance's Birthday

Constance was excited for her birthday as well. She got to take cupcakes to school to share with her class ... which is always a bonus. She has talked about her birthday for months now ... she has been counting down since her last birthday. She has been talking about what she was going to do for her birthday since last year.

We started a new thing this year ... every other year we are going to have a party with friends and on the opposite years we have a party as a family. This year was the party as a family. Her gift was her bedroom. With the completion of the 3rd bedroom she gets her own room ... so we have been decorating and having a little fun with it. She is loving having her own room and being able to shut her door and not having to worry about little brother coming into her room. She has her own personal space when she wants it.

We had her cake and celebration on Monday. She wanted a cake with a toy on it so she had to wait until Mommy had a chance to go to the store to get one. She didn't mind waiting too much ... it meant she got to have cake 3 nights in a row. We took some of Jordan's cupcakes to share with Daddy and the guys one night and then we had some cupcakes and sang to Jordan the next night and then we had Constance's cake. I don't know who enjoyed the birthday cake more ... her or Jordan

Fire Trucks

Constance has grown up loving fire trucks ... for obvious reasons. Jordan has carried it to a whole new level. He knows which way we have to go from our driveway to get to the Firestation. So when we leave if we turn (what he deems as the wrong way) the wrong way, Jordan screams and cries "firetruck... firetruck..." When we do drive by the station he says "sit...sit...sit". This is pretty much standard. Now when we leave the house, we make sure and tell Jordan if we are not going to the station, in an attempt to avoid him getting upset which doesn't always work.

Well, Sunday when we were in sacrament meeting a friend had let us borrow a book they had on trucks. Initially this was wonderful because he doesn't like to sit still ... but now we have a book on trucks this should help. Next thing we know he is pointing at all the trucks and saying -- in a not quiet voice --- "Firetruck ... firetruck... sit...sit...sit." He hasn't learned quiet ... no matter how many times we have tried to get him to talk softly, or said "shhhh" he just doesn't quite understand. But it doesn't stop there. He loves to make the sound of the firetruck and in the middle of the meeting he proceeded to make the siren sound.

All you can do is sit there ... that's our boy!

Birthday Celebrations

Constance was so excited Friday. She woke up at 3 am asking if she could wake Jordan up. It was his birthday after all. She was told to go back to bed. She came back again at 5 am wanting to know if she could wake Jordan up. Again she was told to go back to bed. Finally between 6 and 6:30 ... when we heard Jordan making noise ... Constance asked if she could go and get him up. We told her to go ahead. She was so excited. She went in the room telling Jordan that it was his birthday ... which at the age of 2 he really has no idea what that means. ... it was great to watch. All day whenever anyone sang "Happy Birthday" to Jordan he would get the biggest grin on his face and start dancing.

When we went to the store to get ... Constance had to help pick out the kind of cake (Devils Food), frosting (Chocolate), etc. She was so worried that Jordan would see the gift she picked out. We explained that he didn't really understand what was going on ... now next year that will probably be different but this year he was in his own little world. I don't know who had more fun, Constance or Jordan.

We have had a weekend of birthday celebrations ... doing things around Mike's schedule. I don't think the kids were complaining. Two birthday cakes, presents and plenty of playing ... what more could a kid want.