Overserved

Someone was overserved during the Christmas festivities...

Jackson's First Christmas

Jackson had a wonderful first Christmas, filled with lots of family and fun. We traveled to San Antonio for just a couple days and then headed back home on Christmas day. Jackson wasn't really sure what to do with any of the gifts when they were still wrapped, but he's had tons of fun playing with them now that they are open and put together! Here's a few pics from the Christmas celebrations:

A family photo in front of the tree:
Auntie Mal Mal, Jackson and Me:
Jackson playing on his Retro Rocket:
Jackson & Diana:
Jackson hearing stories from Granddad:
Jackson excited about his toys:

6 Month Photo Session

Here are some of my favorites from our 6 month photo session with Chunky Monkey Photography. As you can see, I had a very difficult time picking out my favorites, so maybe I should say...here's a selection of photos from Jackson's photo session!

100% Boy

I just received the photos from Jackson's 6-month photo session. Heather from Chunky Monkey Photography did such an amazing job capturing a ton of beautiful photos of Jackson. I haven't had a chance to really look through all of them yet to pick out my favs; don't worry, I will be posting those on here soon!

But in the meantime I had to post this one photo...during one of our breaks we were sitting on the sidewalk talking and Jackson tumbled face first into the landscaping and dirt. We both expected he would be screaming at any second, but instead he was laughing and loving it. Here's the photo she snapped as I picked him up:

7 Months Old

Jackson turned 7 months old yesterday. We celebrated with a trip to the vet for Maggie and Tiger to get their annual check-up and shots! ;-) Here's a picture of Jackson as he tried to "play" with Tiger:

And here is Maggie as she tried to plan her escape route (she hates the vet!)

But back to Jackson and his 7 month update...I weighed him yesterday and he now weighs 22 pounds. Still a big boy, but it appears that his crazy growth rate has slowed a little. As mentioned in an earlier post, he is rolling around like crazy. In fact, just now he rolled across the living room so that he could examine his Exersaucer and the zillion toys that are being stored over there. The other big update is that he got his first tooth last Tuesday. It is one of the bottom ones, and it appears that the other bottom one will break through pretty quickly. We have moved on to 2nd foods in the baby food department and he absolutely loves just about everything we have fed him so far. Right now he is eating a jar of veggies at lunch and a jar of fruit at dinner. We have tried one of the meats, but I don't think he is quite ready for it. Granted, it looked and smelled like cat food, so I'm pretty sure I would spit it out too! He's still a great night-time sleeper (not such a great napper, at least at school when there is so much action going on all the time). And, just like me and Scott, he is NOT a morning person. He would prefer to sleep in a little later than we have to get him up each weekday and thankfully sleeps in a little for us on the weekends. Let's hope he continues these wonderful sleeping habits!!

Here's one final picture form the vet's office, if you look very close you can see his little tooth coming in!

On the Move

Over Thanksgiving weekend Jackson finally mastered the rollover. He had rolled a number of times before in both directions, but those rolls typically happened by accident. Then one evening over Thanksgiving weekend he finally figured out how to get everything going in the right direction at once. Since then he has been rolling non-stop. He uses it to get to a toy or something else in the room he wants to inspect (like the diaper pail...random!) Tonight he was rolling around like crazy so I went to grab the camera to try to capture it, well by the time I returned and had it ready he was less interested in showing off his skills. But I did capture a couple rolls.

At about the same time as he started rolling, he decided that it would be fun to start scooting backwards. So if he's not rolling, he's typically on his belly moving backwards! And the latest movement...in the last few days he has really expressed the desire to crawl. His legs aren't strong enough yet, which can cause him some frustration, but he keeps trying.

Our Little Bear

I snapped this photo last week after our tour of ICE! I couldn't resist taking a picture of him wearing his bear jacket:

And the term "bear" is pretty accurate right now! He has been a handful the last few days. I think it is a combo of trying to get him back on his normal schedule, possibly a little under the weather, and potentially teething (but these "teething" symptoms have been around for quite some time...) Either way, we are ready to have our easy-going little monkey back!

ICE!

After Jackson's photo session this afternoon we decided to take a walk through ICE! If you are in the area, you should check this out. It's a little pricey, but it is pretty cool to see. When you arrive they give you a parka to keep you warm, this is key as the temps inside are 7 degrees. The smallest parka they had was really big for Jackson, but I didn't want to risk him getting cold (in fact, with the parka and his jacket underneath, he was super toasty). He was NOT a fan of the parka, as you can see as I was trying to get it on him

You have to keep your camera secured inside your parka, otherwise your battery will freeze. Well, this makes things difficult if you want to snap a picture and you are carrying a baby. I tried to get a couple pics of Jackson next to the ice, but he was completely unwilling to sit with the parka on (I probably wouldn't want to either!), so I only snapped a couple. And this doesn't do the place justice. Everything was made of ice, everything. Pretty neat!

Seriously??

Snow. In Texas. In early December. I know, it is nothing compared to the amount of snow we would have seen already if we were still up north, but I am still surprised.
Jackson has his 6 months photos scheduled for today. The plan was to do some fabulous outdoor photos, obviously the snow (and chilly temps) makes that impossible. So we are headed indoors, hopefully they still turn out fabulous.

And for those friends who don't live here and don't know much about the wonderful Texas weather...this snow will be melted in an hour. :-)