YES for summer weather!!!

Little Mister is now 15 months old!  He is growing up wayyy too fast, and this last month has brought some big changes in our little man's life!

First, he is a full blown walker these days.  No more crawling for him, he's pretty darn steady, and getting faster and faster daily.  Crazy how he went from taking 3 or 4 steps for weeks to just all of sudden walking everywhere!!  And he is definitely a SIGNIFICANTLY happier baby now that he is a walker, he loves being able to walk around everywhere and explore!

He has turned into a good sleeper these days (well, at last compared to the last year of his life!)  For the last week, he's been going to bed around 7:30, waking up at midnight for a bottle (yessssss he still gets a nighttime bottle), and then sleeping until 8:30 in the morning.  He takes a nap from about 12-3pm every day.  Goes down easily, no crying, same routine every day. :)  He sleeps with his paci and his blankie.  He is blankie obsessed and will not go to sleep without it!

He has turned into quite the big baby!  He eats and eats and eats, and I've been kind of slacking with his doctor appointments, so I have no idea how much he weighs, but it's a lot.  He's in 18-24 month clothes, no idea what size shoes since we just started putting him in them since he just started walking!  I get lots of comments about how big and "thick" he is....indeed. :)

He loves: sitting on Riley's white chair, climbing onto anything and everything (lately his fave thing to do is climb up into the double stroller), going down slides, going to the playground, and walking all around the kitchen.  That might sounds like a weird thing to say, but while he was a crawling baby we didn't allow him in the kitchen because of his allergies.  Now that he's walking and not on the floor so much, we let him come in the kitchen, and he is SO EXCITED about it!  He also loves pushing around this little shopping cart we have, and gets so mad when it gets stuck!.  Oh and I almost forgot, the kid LOVES the vacuum cleaner.  He loves to sit and watch me vacuum and follow me around, not scared in the least!

He loves playing with water, especially running water (faucets, hoses, sprinklers, etc).  He likes puzzles and playing with shape sorters and anything where he has to put small objects into something bigger.  He doesn't have a ton of words, but his receptive language is pretty darn good these days.  If we ask him where something is he will go to it or look at it, and he even follows some of the directions I give him!  He is seeming older and older every single day!   He loves all animals, especially dogs, birds, and cows.  He laughs and laughs and laughs at Bailey, and loves to look at all the cows on the hills by our house.

He loves playing with crayons and pens, but mostly just putting them in and out of things, and chewing on them.  He loves being chased by his daddy, and he's super ticklish.  If you say "I'm gonna get you..." he takes off running and laughing!  He loves climbing up the stairs, and can actually get down the whole flight of stairs by himself too. 

He loves to play with Riley, and loves chasing her around and getting in to all of her things. :)  He loves to have "tea parties" with her and do puzzles and knock down the towers she builds for him.  He loves going for walks/runs in the stroller, and he is getting much much better with new people, even approaching and smiling at new people he's never met before, but still is NOT happy to be left at the gym daycare. 

He is such a happy boy lately, and I'm sure I'm forgetting all kinds of things for this update.  But HAPPY 15 MONTHS baby boy!!

Slowly chipping away at Riley's 3rd year album.... I like to have them completed and ordered and in my hands by her 3rd birthday, which means I better keep working!  I'm actually not THAT far behind, surprisingly.  I also realized I never shared the family photos we had done in February, so this will kill 2 birds with one stone.  Although, since it's Riley's album, obviously these pictures are pretty heavily Riley-focused.

I'm at almost 100 pages... still over a month to go... it's gonna be a long book!!

I am almost 100% caught up on editing photos for clients.  Which means I will finally have some time to do some blogging, edit some of MY kids' photos, and work on Riley's 3rd year album!!  Can you believe it, she turns 3 next month!!  And Jackson turns 15 months tomorrow.  My sweetest little mama's boy.

Again, it's been a while.  Thought I would share a video of some of the latest happenings/antics around here.  I haven't shared a video in foreverrrrrrr!  Here's little Jacky Boy in action...

Little man is 14 months old!

Okay, what he has been up to...  He is dappling in the idea of walking, taking 6 or 7 steps here and there, but prefers to crawl.  I am just waaaaaaiting not so patiently for him to be a full time walker.  He's just not that interested in walking around!  If you say "Jackson, stand up and walk!" he might humor you and stand up and take a few steps, and then he gets down and crawls.  He is the fastest crawler though, and he can regular crawl and bear crawl equally fast.  At this age Riley had been walking for 4 months, sooooo needless to say, he's a very different baby!

Talking... he says mama, dada, hi, dog, duck, bay (for bailey) and he can "bark" like a dog, although it sounds more like rorororo, which Riley is sure to tell him NOOOO a dog says woof, not rorororo!  He is starting to wave, and he claps like a madman, especially when I sing If you're happy and you know it.... He is a super loud babbling  baby, so he has lots to say, just not the words to say it!

The boy loves to be outside.  He loves playing in the sand and in the water.  He loves to swim!  He especially loves any sort of running water, so hoses, faucets, water being poured from a bucket, etc...  He LOVES animals.  He gets all giggly and will crawl over to them as fast he can!!

He's still super attached to me.... he will smile and flirt with strangers as long as I am RIGHT there... but if they get too close, or try and pick him up, he starts to WAIL.  I tried to leave him at the daycare at the gym one time, and he completely freaked out, and could not be calmed.  Poor guy.  Needless to say I didn't get a workout in. :)

He's really into grabbing people's faces (and eyes) and giving big slobbery kisses.  He likes to be thrown up in the air, and he loooooves dancing to music.  He loves it when his daddy tosses him on the couch and tickles him... He is super ticklish!!

He loves to play with phones and remotes and things with buttons.  He likes knocking down towers and taking things in and out of other things.  He likes to idea of TV (as in, turning it on and off) but is not really super into the shows.  He will watch bits of Mickey Mouse if Riley is watching (he especially loves the songs), and he loves this Vinko DVD (think tons of songs/nursery rhymes), but other than that.... not super interested.  He's just starting to take a liking to books.  And we have tried and tried and tried and he just would NOT sit to read with us.  And now we've got about 5 or 6 books he likes, so we're getting somewhere!

He has 4 teeth now (2 top, 2 bottom), and is in mostly 18 month clothes, I think he's around 23 pounds these days.  He does this super cute thing when he's throwing a tantrum, he will put his head down and stick either a leg or arm up in the air, like he's doing some yoga headstand pose.  He is a very tempermental baby, and will holler and cry and either arch is back or go all floppy fish on me when he doesn't get his way.  He can be a bit tough to take on errands, but we try our best and move as quickly as possible!  I can go through target in record time if need be!

His favorite foods are: sausages, bananas, waffles, rice cakes, and sliced apples and oranges.  He loooooooves his rice milk!  I don't see us eliminating a bottle anytime soon... Riley was never really a bottle baby, but this little boy LOVES his bottle.  He's alright with a sippy cup, but he prefers to take huge sips and then spit it out everywhere.  Cute, huh?

We've reached a pretty good place with his allergies... it's no longer this new thing we have to deal with, and we've found lots of stuff to feed him, and avoiding all of his allergy foods is not as challenging anymore.  Still sad that we can't ever ever feed him anything from a restaurant, but we're adapting!  As long as we bring special "treats" for him, and sort of isolate him from all other people and food, he's good to go.

He loves going for walks/runs in the jogging stroller, riding in the car (as long as Vinko is on), and climbing up the stairs.  He loves to play with Riley (as long as she's not hitting/kicking him!)  He loves shoes, and will crawl over to anyone who happens to be putting shoes on.  He loves crawling races and trying to climb up his mama's legs.  He is (hopefully) starting to grow out of his super high maintenance needy phase, so let's keep our fingers crossed that it continues!!

Oh one more thing... he LOVES his grandpa... grandma too, but he has a special place in his heart from grandpa.  Like, he gets so so so excited every time he sees grandpa and lunges for him and smiles and laughs.  They are best buds!  Happy 14 months baby boy!!

I get overwhelmed when I don't post for a while, and then I have so many photos to share, and I end up not sharing any of them.  So I'm going to do a quick photo share from the last month, and then move on.  Pretend I'm all caught up. :)

We started off the month with a little trip to Tahoe!!  Kids loved it, although Jackson was a little bit too cold, but he sure looked cute!

We had to stop at this ice cream shop where we took pictures of Riley almost 2 years ago!

We have spent a LOT of time outside these days.  It is where Jackson is happiest.  Both kids are happiest outside, but Jackson especially.

And when he's not outside?  He staring longingly...

Jackson has had a bit of a rough month... sickness, itchy skin, just overall irritable... he's not one to sit and play for more than a few minutes, and he's been super clingy and whiny.  But I did have one day where he played in this huge cardboard box full of balls for a solid 20 minutes.  It was awesome.

But if all else fails, and cranky baby is super cranky, we go outside...

Riley and Jackson sometimes play really well together.  They play with the same toys, share, make each other laugh... it's super cute... Other times... well, there are tears, we'll put it that way.

Little Mister has been practicing his walking... he's getting there!  He's taken about 6 or 7 steps, but still prefers crawling to get places FAST. 

We did the whole Easter egg thing late at night after Jack was in bed.  Riley loved it, of course.  She loves any sort of art project, so dying eggs was no different.  She made some FAB eggs!!

And then there was Easter!  It was pretty lame since our whole house was bogged down with the flu, but Ri still wore her "princess dress" and loved every minute of the Easter egg hunt, so it was a success as far as she's concerned!

Riley picked out the pink bunny basket for Jack, and he froggy basket for herself.  Love it.  And no, Jackson never ever has matching socks on.  We are lucky if he even has two socks on at all!!

How is she almost 3 years old already???

I didn't do an update last month (did I?) so I thought I ought to do one now for little miss Riley Bug.  Where should I even begin?  This little monkey is FUN FUN FUN.  And super cute, yes?

Current favorite things: playgrounds, playgrounds, and playgrounds!  Girl loves her slides and swings and climbing structures, that's for sure.  We could just playground hop all day long and she would be he happiest girl in the whole wide world.  And she can do some pretty impressive things on the playgrounds these days, climbing up all kinds of things with no help at all!  Gives me a mini heart attack every single time, but the look on her face when she gets to the top is totally priceless.  So so proud of herself!

90% of the time she absolutely adores her little brother.  She loves to play with him and give him kisses.  She lets him snuggle her and grab her hair and face.  She chases him around and tickles him and shares her toys.  She also has her moments where she just wants him AWAY from her stuff and she will snap if he gets too close or messes with her things.  But overall, she an awesome big sister, and he's pretty lucky to have her.

She loves to be outside... jumping on the trampoline, playing in her sand pit, drawing with chalk, playing hopscotch, riding her scooter or her bike, anything outside!  We planted her very own veggie garden and she loves watering it and watching her veggies grow!

While she loves to be outside, there are plenty of things that she loves to do indoors as well.  She's really starting to get into real little kid games, things like memory and bingo and connect 4 (all things impossible to do with a 13 month old around, of course).  She loves doing "magnet shapes," which is basically a magnetic board where she makes all kinds of cool pictures using different colored shapes... things like flowers and "red moons" and anything else her little mind can create.  She loves playing with marbles and doing all sorts of puzzles... she is really really good at puzzles!!

She is constantly asking questions... why this?  why that? who is that? what are you doing? why why why why?  i try and answer with as much details as possible, but to be honest, sometimes I don't even know the answers.  Then google is our friend. :)  I like the inquisitive mind of a 2 year old!

She loooooooves to draw.  She will color and draw for a very very long time.  She also likes to paint and do art projects of any kind.  She can draw straight lines and circles, and can do a "follow the dots" kind of drawing.  She is really into words and seeing what letters on the pages mean what words... she will point to words and say "does this spell _________?" She loves reading the same stories over and over, but is open to new stories too if I ask her to read something different with me!

Riley gets dressed every day by herself.. picks her outfit, takes off her PJS, and puts on all her clothes all by herself.  She loves to dress up like a princess with her princess shirt and dress, princess shoes, etc..

She likes to balance on one foot, and can walk on a balance beam like a pro (thank you dance class and gymboree).  She has an AWESOME imagination... Things on the floor become "mud puddles" or holes... she will play for a long time making "decorations" or solving "emergencies."  We think she may have made up two friends, one she calls "Mary" and one she calls "Singa."  I seriously love listening to the things she comes up with every day!

She sings all the time, and her newest fave thing to say is "awww shucks!"  Pretty darn cute, if you ask me!  She loves to "paint" her nails by coloring all over them... that, I do not love. :/  She has learned the days of the week and can count to 30, she loves to say "hola como estas? muy bien!" and count in spanish. 

I'm sure there's so much more but that's all I've got for tonight.  She is growing way too fast!!

While I do like sharing cute stories and pictures on this blog, one of the main reasons for this blog is to document my kids' lives, and to record things I probably won't remember 10 years down the road.  Things my kids might wonder, things I might want to look back and read about, and lately I have not done a very good job of that!

Life lately has been... interesting.  Riley is 2 years and 9 months, Jack is 13 months (approximately).  Jackson has sort of turned into a crazy obsessed mama's boy... if I am anywhere in the vicinity, he wants to be with me... Or he wants me down on the floor sitting right next to him and playing with him.  I can't even go get a drink or snack or use the bathroom without him crying and chasing after me.  He gets in to EVERYTHING.  He hates sitting in his high chair (unless being fed sausages).  He throws big tantrums when he doesn't get what he wants.  But the hardest thing is that when I'm home with him, he just does not want me out of his sight.  I love that he loves me so much, but it makes the day pretty challenging!

And Riley?  Well, I'm not sure what's happening with her, but she has been OFF the past week or so.  She has had more meltdowns than ever before.  She has started being MEAN to her brother.  Hitting him, pushing him, kicking him, throwing toys at him.  It's like all of a sudden she snapped and her patience with him ran out.  I'm pretty sure this new aggression of hers and Jackson's super needy behavior are directly related.  Jackson wants me with him constantly, and Riley has definitely noticed.  Is this an excuse for her to hurt him?  No. Of course not.  But it's clear to me she's pretty unsettled lately.  The crazy thing is, she will be so nice to him and give him hugs and kisses and share her toys and play right with him, and then all of sudden she will snap and lash out at him.  At the moment I feel like I can't leave the two of them unattended even for a minute because she may really hurt him!  This has NEVER been a problem up until now, so something funny is going on in that little mind of hers.

Take this toy computer, for example.... most of the time Riley lets Jackson pay along with her... smash they keys, crawl on top of it, do whatever he wants.  And then all of sudden she will just snap and shove him over and keep shoving him until I rescue him.  No forms of discipline have really been working, there have only been two things that I've found to work... it seems that Riley needs to just let off some aggression sometimes, and her outlet happens to be her brother.  One day I told her that if she felt mad, that she should take some of her foam blocks and smash them into the ground and yell "I'm soo mad!" instead of hitting or pushing.  And she did it all day long!  And then she was calm after she did it!  I don't know if it's going to be a good long term solution, but we shall see!

Jackson is a crazy little monkey lately.  With a temper!  He LOVES to be outside.  And he loves to climb up the stairs.  If he can't do those things, he will throw a big old tantrum. He also loves putting things in and out of containers, and will do this for quite some time!  And he ADORES swimming.  He would live in the swimming pool if he could!  But boy should you hear him scream when he has to get out!

We've started doing a few things with Riley lately that I'm really liking!  I rearranged her drawers in her room so that her bottom drawer is full of options for her clothes for the day.  She picks out her own undies, pants, skirts, tops, everything, and gets dressed by herself.  She needs help getting her t-shirt on, but everything else she does by herself (including taking PJs off).  She LOVES being able to go upstairs and get dressed all by herself!  She has also decided she needs privacy when she's using the toilet.  If I linger, she promptly tells me to leave her alone. :)

One downside of her getting easily undressed by herself... she is frequently naked...

I am so so excited for this fabulous spring/summer weather that we've been getting.  We could spend hours and hours outside.  We're in the process of getting the backyard perfectly baby friendly... we've got a trampoline, slide, sandpit, Riley's veggie garden, a little kiddie table/bench, water table, outdoor rug for kids to play on, and pretty soon we're going to get a big shade.  And Aunt Jennie may have bought Riley something huge and ridiculous (of the water toy/pool variety) so that will be making an appearance out there shortly!

Not sure if this moments before Jacky Boy got the big shove... I'm hoping not...

Gosh I look at this picture and her cute little fake cheesy smiley angel face and I just want to go and snuggle with her in bed.  And I think how can she go from the most fun, silly, smart and happy little monkey to the screaming crying mess of tears that won't listen to me?  The DRAMA of an almost 3 year old, I tell you.

We've got a lot on our plates at the moment in the Bartlett house, trying to balance new jobs, sick babies, crazy babies, and lack of sleep.  But man there are some fun times!!!  Can't wait until Aunt Jennie gets into town next weekend, and then.... DISNEYLAND soon after that!!!  Riley's mind is going to be blown when we get to Disneyland.  This guy will like it too, I'm sure. :)

The end of long jumbled post!

A little late, but better late than never!  I swear he JUST turned one, right??

This little guy has changed a lot over the past month!  He is still not walking, but he is cruising all over the furniture, standing independently, and getting really good balance so I'm sure it won't be long!  I try really hard not to compare him to Riley but it is so weird to me that at this point she had been walking for 3 months!  I know my little Jacky Boy will walk when he's good and ready, and really, we have not even really tried to encourage him to walk.  He much prefers to speed crawl all over the place, which is fine by me!

This month my little boy has developed his very first curl... ooooooh boy looks like he will be taking after Riley afterall!

Jackson has become an extremely opinionated little boy.  Things he LOVES (and will throw a big huge tantrum if he doesn't get to have): going outside, crawling up the stairs, sausages, smashing computer keyboards, and his water table, and his bottle the boy loooooooves his bottles..  LOVES all those things. Things he doesn't like?  Being confined by baby gates, sitting in his high chair (unless eating sausages), being pushed/squished by Riley. 

It's fun to watch him play and watch his mind work and how he explores the world.  He loves putting things down his car ramp and watching them go all the way down to the bottom.  He likes to climb all the way up his slide, and then slide backwards back down on his tummy, and the repeat.... He loves putting things in containers and taking them out one by one.  He loves destroying towers and throwing balls.  He loves to be tickled. He dances every time music comes on, especially if Riley is singing!

He tolerates the car most of the time, especially now that we have a DVD player in there.  He likes Mickey Mouse the best.  He is learning all kinds of new words and we are learning that he understands more than we give him credit for.  With Riley, I remember quizzing her at this age to see all the words she knew... well, sorry to say, it just totally never crossed my mind to do some of these things... like teach him all the funny/cutesy gestures we taught Riley, or all the animal sounds she knew and did at this age... he seems like such a baby to me, which I guess makes sense because compared to Riley he IS a baby... but he knows lots of words, and he says "mama" and "dada" and I swear he says "up up" and "no no."  We are working on teaching him more but he just mostly just gets mad. :)

He was down to one nap a day, then he had a few days where he was just super tired and cranky, so went back to two naps, now we're at one again, so who knows.  Probably in some weird transition phase for naps.  He is FINALLY down to waking up ONCE at night.  Never thought I would be so happy to have my 13 month old waking up once at night, but I am!  So much better than 5+ times per night.  I attribute this to (1) his allergen free diet (2) his strict skin lotion/creme hydrocortizone regimen and (3) his regular doses of benadryl/zyrtec to combat his itchiness.  I was reluctant to give him all of that stuff on a regualr basis, BUT his allergies are no joke, and he was a crazy itchy baby and just not happy, and sleep is so important, that I think we are doing the right thing.

He is a bit of a needy baby, and constantly wants me to be holding him and playing with him, and he will crawl over to me to be picked up, and lay his head down on my shoulder and snuggle.  He makes this cute little squeaky noise when he's happy or when he sees something he really wants (i.e. a bottle).  He loves to grab Riley's face, and he loves to climb on everything.  He loves anything with buttons.  He loves to hold two things and bang them together.  He loves destroying everything Riley is trying to play with (puzzles, towers, buildings, etc)  He loves to eat sand (yuck).

He is my little cutie patootie and I love him to pieces!!