Fresh Start

Okay! We're gonna try this thing again. I had a bad case of the lazy's and with each passing week, the task of catching up the blog grew larger and larger. So here's what I'm gonna do: I'm gonna fill all you faithful readers in with the major advancements and achievments since the last post. I'll do this mostly with pictures and brief explanations. After that, I'm just going to start posting again. I hope. This kid is starting to say some pretty funny things and that's why I started this whole thing in the first place. To record all the funny things Jackson would say and do. Deal? Good. Let's do this thing.

Let's start with that big fat puffy eye of Jackson's that you saw in the last post. He had a blocked nasolacrimal duct (tear duct). The purpose of said duct is to carry away used tears (and the crud associated with them) and make way for fresh tears. Jackson's left duct was blocked and allowed for bad things to grow.

Well, we got that fixed. We agonized over the whole thing and then the procedure took all of about three minutes and was an instant and total success. Here are some picture from the big day.


before the surgery. Note the purple dot over the "correct" eye.


After the surgery and still a little doped. Showing his red Gatorade tongue.

Here's just a bunch of pictures from summer. Hopefully I'll at least get them in chronological order


We got a vist from the Bordings. Second cousin Kate showed off her skills.


Fun with the hose at grandma's


Chowin' on some Cheerios.


Jackson likes to hijack the camera and take lots of photos of nothing. This is one of my faves.




A visit to the Zoo.


Mac n' cheese head.


More fun in the sun.


Chicken nugget love.


Earning his allowance.


Lots of things have happened since I last blogged. Jackson started daycare and Betsy went back to work full time. This was very difficult at first. Both for Jackson and for Betsy. More so for Jackson. He cried non-stop for the first week. As the weeks went on, he got better and better. He really enjoys "school" now. The major drawback is the back to back sicknesses. Every week he catches some new bug from the other little dirty booger faces in his class. We're just getting over a particularly nasty one today. Hopefully, his immunities will be all built up soon and he'll be able to fearlessly chew on slobber encrusted toys without peril.

We got a new kittie.

This is Jimmie. We thought she was a boy at first. The people that I got her from told me she was a boy. By the time we realized she was in fact a girl, she was already Jimmie. Or Jimbo, as Jackson likes to call him. ....errr her.

Jackson says tons of words. He'll try and say anything. He recently started putting a few words into little hilarious sentences. His first was "I threw it!". If he couldn't find his "ya ya" (that's the word he invented for his pacifier), we'd ask; "what did you do with it?" and he would respond with "I threw it!" complete with a pitching arm motion.

Another of his favorites is "hold you" which he says when he wants someone to hold him. He sticks his arms out and say "hold you". It looks something like this.


Just a week or so ago, Jackson came out into the TV room with the diaper rash cream in one hand and his other hand on his behind and says to me; "cream for your bum". Of course it wasn't as clear as that. the "for your" part had to be slightly interpreted, but there was no doubt about "cream" and "bum". Now he often demands cream during diaper changes.

Jackson had his second Halloween with the crazy family he was born into. Last year he was blissfully oblivious to anything potentially scary. This year he started out very scared of Halloween displays at stores and he would clamp onto whoever was nearest and start crying or wimpering. That gave way to the slightly braver pointing forcefully at scary things and saying "whoa". By the time Halloween rolled around he was a full fledged Birdsong. Not scared at all.


"I aint 'fraid of no ghosts"


He dressed as a very cute, I mean very scary, skeleton.

I'm sure I've forgotten to include more than I've actually included, but I'll get whatever I missed next time. Hopefully less than four months from now.

Here I'll leave you with a few more pictures. He's getting real big real fast.



Making funny faces with Dad.


sitting in the kitchen cabinet.


Showing off his power tools.

Bye Bye for now!

June Bugg!

I don't think I've mentioned it before on the blog, but back in January we started calling this kid "Bugg" (hence the title of the post). Betsy had been calling him bugaloo for a few days and then it got shortened to just Bugg. The extra "g" is just for fun. It just sort of stuck. It might come in handy in the future as we have met a lot of other Jacksons and Jacks.

Anyway, on with the update.

One Eyed Jack!
Wednesday morning we woke up to a face that looked something like this.



We instantly assumed it was some sort of insect or spider bite. So Betsy took him to see the doctor and she too thought it looked like a spider bite and prescribed Benedryl and and a watchful eye. The next day it still looked really bad. So back to the doc he went. This time she suspected an infection rather than a bite and sent us to the children's hospital to see an eye doctor. The eye doctor felt pretty certain that she was lookin at an extreme case of conjunctivitis (pink eye). She prescibed antibiotics and sent us on our way. It got a little better as the day wore on. It was half open and still all red. While on our way to dinner, Betsy looked at Jackson in the rearview and started laughing. She said "he looks like Nick Nolte's mugshot.".
You be the judge.


Dead on if you ask me.

Here's Nick binging on refried beans.


So, come Friday, he was looking much better. Now he's almost back to normal. Thank goodness it wasn't a spider bite. I was envisioning necrosis of the eyelid and losing sleep.

Here he is on Friday morning. Happy as a clam. This whole ordeal hardly bothered him. It looked so painful and itchy to me, but he just kept on like nothing was wrong. He's a tough kid.




In other news, Jackson has picked up a new game. It's called "This?". He loves to point at anything and everything and say "this?" wanting you to say whatever it is. It's really quite comical. Here's what mine or Betsy's side of the conversation might sound like; "couch, eye, nose, eye, couch, couch, still the couch, knee, ear, other ear, coffee table, and so on".
Here's Jackson playing the this game in the car with a book.

He's concentrating on that bee before he goes to the next page.

Summer Time...
The warm weather is here and Jackson loves to be outside enjoying it. We've been taking lots of bike rides around the neighborhood and trips to the park and the beach. Even if it's raining, Jackson wants to be outside


Here are a few more pics and a video clip from Grandma and Grandpa B's house a couple of weeks ago.







That all for now. See you next month. *** I dont know what's up with the crazy font size. I cant get it back to normal***

Back By Popular Demand!

It's Jackson and his world famous blog.


Okay, so I'm not gonna make any excuses. I'm just lazy. I hit that one year mark and decided to take a little blog vacation.

So what's new in Jackson's life? Not a whole heck of a lot. In the time since the last post he's just been honing his skills. Walking, talking, eating, and sleeping (yeah right!). Actually, last night was the first time that Betsy and I woke up with the alarm clocks and Jackson was still in his crib. Total victory! I'd say it was probably seven hours in the crib all by his lonesome. Normally, come 6:30 am, we've formed a capital "H" in the bed. Betsy and I are the two sides and Jackson is that perpendicular line connecting us.

Walking has totally replaced crawling. He's pretty darn good at it too. And fast. Just the other day I laid him on the bed for a diaper change. I took off the dirty diaper and turned my head to get the wipes. Before I even had the wipes in my grasp, he was on his feet and sprinting across the bed. Fortunately he belly flopped before he reached the window sill.

I guess I better plug in a picture or two before I go on. He is still getting cuter by the day.





Jackson is still no pro when it comes to eating but he does a pretty good job. He'll try most anything we offer him and if he doesn't like it he'll just shake his head and the second offer. He's very fond of shaking his head "no" in response to most questions. We're working on "yes". He likes lots of different foods. We just have to cut or tear everything into little tiny pieces. Otherwise he will literally bite off more than he can chew. Shredded cheese is by far his favorite. He get's that from me. He also enjoys deli sliced ham, green beans, sweet potatoes, chicken, spaghetti, and he loves bananas. We pretty much let him go nuts with bananas. He'll take a big bite but it's so mushy that he can handle it.
Here's the little monkey with a banana.


Here's what happens when you mix babies and spaghetti.




The most important food shift is that from formula and breast milk to good old fashioned cow's milk. Jackson polishes off a gallon of whole milk every three days.

Other than that it's pretty much the same routine. Mommy during the day and Daddy in the evening.

Don't worry! Here come the rest of the pictures.

Jackson and I like to take the wagon out for a spin and hit the swings down at the boat ramp.




He totally thinks he's the coolest guy in town when he has his shades on.


And here he is on Mother's day. Note the awesome "mom" tattoo on his arm.


Okay, That's it for now. It's my plan to do a monthly update from here on out unless something especially noteworthy happens. Thanks for reading. See you next month.


Bye Bye!

The Party!

Jackson's first Birthday Party was a ton of fun. Thanks to all the friends and family that came for the big event. We had the party at Jarboe Park in Neptune Beach.

Here's the Momma setting up the spread.


Grandma M. got jackson two awesome cakes from Cinotti's Bakery.


They even provided an individual size cake just for Jackson.


He started out a little shy, but he eventually tore right into it.

Create Your Own

Jackson got a load of great gifts and made quick work of the wrapping paper.


As always, he loved hanging out with his aunts Stacey and Jackie.




Thanks again to everyone who came out to celebrate with us. It was truly a memorable day.