Jack & His Great Grandpa

A priceless photo of Jack and his Great Grandpa Ken.

Birthdays

In our family, we now have 4 birthdays on the same day - Jack, myself, my twin brother Mark, and Jack's cousin, Claire. Because Claire and her family were in town from Texas we were able to spend our birthdays together in Turlock. It was a lot of fun to see everyone and was almost like a mini-Christmas.
Jack woke up on his actual birthday saying, "fire", "cake". He's been asking for cake for his snack ever since.

Wedding Weekend

Last weekend, we flew to San Diego for Scott's sister, Renae's wedding. She looked absolutely gorgeous, her husband Todd is a lucky man. Another great thing about this trip was Jack stayed home under his grandparent's care, so we were able to relax and hang out with family. Side note: You learn things about what you have taught your child when he is under the care of others. For example, Jack was crying so his grandpa pretended like he was crying too to distract him. Jack immediately ran up to him and said "tylenol" and ran to the cupboard where we keep this miracle elixir.

Choo-choo...

This morning we took Jack on the ride of his life...the Caltrain. We rode it from Redwood City to San Mateo, had lunch and came back home. He couldn't contain his excitement as he continuously yelled, "people", "train", and "choo-choo". As soon as we got off the train he wanted to go to the airport....hmmm.

Christmas Trek to San Diego

We decided to make the trek to San Diego for Christmas in the Minivan. Here's the recap of this adventure...
Leg #1 - Cayucos Pit Stop
We stayed the first night in Cayucos at our friends Amy, Garett & Ruby(their dog). Jack loved chasing Ruby & we loved getting ou of our car;)

Leg #2 - Down to SD
The trip the rest of the way was great, no traffic, and just a few stops for Jack. We stopped in Ventura and he ran in the opposite direction when we tried to get back in the car. But, he settled in after a bit and very intently read his books.

The arrival in SD was a rocky start for Jack. Just as we began to tuck him in for bed - after the 6+ hour trip from Cayucos - he bolted to the front door proclaiming, "car, car, car!" Scott took him to the car, he climbed into his car seat got out and climbed right back in and pointed to the steering wheel loudly demanding, DRIVE!".

One of our first priorities was to see the train set Jack's grandpa John & Uncle Chris set up their (one that John had received when he was a boy). We huddled around the track while Jack derailed some of the trains, switched the tracks and loaded and unloaded the milk car.

The rest of the week was filled with activity, Jack was a bit overwhelmed but on Christmas Eve he did feel comfortable enought to run streaking through the living room several times before bed.


We made gingerbread houses, went bodyboarding, and Jack planted himself in a large puddle on the beach.



Our final event was visiting the San Diego Zoo. Jack enjoyed the monkeys and turtles. I personally liked the camels. All in all it was fun to spend time with family and the 10.5 hour trek back home was long but in the minivan extremely comfortable.

My Chrome Airplane

We were a bit overwhelmed bringing this large chrome airplane home after winning it at a raffle for Scott's work Christmas party. I guess it's a good thing we bought the minivan. But, Jack loves it. His jaw dropped the minute he saw it and although he can't move the pedals yet, he loves to sit in it, turn the propeller, and can often be found laying under it checking the "engine".

Jack's Tree

I've received many complaints about my lackluster blogging activity. So, I'm playing catch up here and posting much of what I've failed to over the past 2 months.
We had a Jack-sized Christmas tree this year because we were traveling down to San Diego for most of the holidays and we also feared having to keep Jack from attacking the tree. Here's our attempts of taking photos of Jack running around at Half Moon Bay with the tree. I'm not sure what he's trying to communicate to the tree in the second photo.