Easter Fun

Justin, the kids, and I actually took part in a fair share of Easter activities this year. Usually Justin and I are a little bit scrooge-ish, but this year we actually got into the spirit a little. We dyed Easter eggs with Jackson. We actually kind of enjoyed it.

On Saturday, the 4th we went to the Waisath's for the year's first Easter egg hunt. Jackson actually found eggs on his own this year. Drake was content with one. While at the Waisath's Jackson and Justin participated in an egg toss, and an egg cracking contest, and we had an awesome lunch. Then we rushed home for conference. Thanks Liz and Boyd for a great morning!

On Easter morning we gave the boys their Easter baskets. Jackson lined up all of his basket's contents in a straight line as he got them out. Like father, like son. However, Jackson then proceeded to throw Easter grass all over Drake. This is where his behavior began to mirror me more. Then we got the boys ready for church in their cute little Easter outfits.

After church we went over to Grandma and Grandpa Cersey's house for dinner and more Easter festivities. All of the cousins, Aunts, and Uncles were there. Grandma Cersey's sisters were in town and Grandma and Grandpa Pearson also showed up as well. It was a full house. We ate, dyed Easter eggs, and had another Easter egg hunt. Grandma and Grandpa Pearson fell asleep amongst all of the hubbub.

Rained Out!

Well friends, the ThunderCats' first game has been canceled due to the never-ending rain. I know that all of you were anxiously awaiting this day so that you could come out to support us, but you will just have to hold out until next week. Sorry to ruin your evening, but don't you worry. You will get to see the fury of the ThunderCats in action soon.

What's Shakin'?

So much has happened these last few weeks! Where to begin? Well, Drake started crawling on March 11. I have a video of it, but it is too big to put on the blog, so unless Justin wants to work on that you won't be seeing it. For Drake's sake, I am really glad that he is mobile. He is much happier now that he can get around by himself, but for my sake it sucks! You would think that our house would already be baby proofed since we have the 2 year old, but that would be a false assumption. As a matter of fact, I think it is worse because we have the 2 year old because he leaves little toys and things lying around that are the perfect size for choking babies. And of course Drake is only interested in the things that he shouldn't be playing with like Justin's weights.

Speaking of weights, Justin and I started a work out program called P90X. Maybe you have heard of it. It is a crazy, intense, 90 day program that takes at least one hour a day, 6 days a week. We took "before" pictures, but I will only post them at the end of the program if the "after" pictures are super hot because of our drastic improvements. If I post them now we run the risk of embarrassing ourselves for no reason at all.

And, as if the P90X workout wasn't enough, Justin and I also joined a co-ed softball team. I know you are thinking, "Wow! You guys are so awesome! How can I be more like you?". Well, the answer is you can't so don't even try. No, actually I wouldn't be surprised if one or both of us drop dead from sheer exhaustion in the next few weeks. Anyway, our teammates are Nicole Wood (the team manager), Chris Fox (the team coach), Carey Fox, Brindi and Ryan Horsley, Jana and Ta Thanasack, Jesse Kipper, and his brother Douglas Kipper, and Rachel Keanum. Our first game is at 9:30pm on Thursday, April 2nd at Bethesda Park on field #10 for those of you who want to come and see us work our magic (magic = lose horribly). Go ThunderCats!

Let's see, what else has happened? Oh, Drake's 9 month stats. Drake is now nine months old and he had his check-up last week. At his appointment he was 30 inches long (92%), 21 lbs. 3.3 oz. (60%), and his head was 18.2 inches (75%). I don't really know what to make of those percentile rankings. When Jackson was 9 months old he was 29.9 inches long (88%), 21 lbs. 8 oz. (59%), and his head was 18.1 inches (64%). Their measurements seem awfully similar, but some of their rankings vary rather significantly, don't you think? Whatever, I am probably just an idiot.

Finally, my mom (Grandma Pearson) had surgery this week but she is recovering very quickly. The boys and I have been over there helping her out the past few days. She should be back to her normal self sometime next week.

What the Snow?!

So, we were having pleasant weather last week. Temperatures in upper 50's even in the high 60's on Thursday. Then, out of nowhere (nowhere technically being the northwest) we get a snow storm yesterday. It was almost comparable to a mild Utah snow storm, almost. The snow started coming down at noon and didn't stop until around 7:00 last night. We only had sacrament yesterday because of the weather. Yes, Georgians are pansies when it comes to snow, but in our defense we aren't prepared to clear the roads in this type of situation. So, here are some pictures that were taken not too long after the downpour started yesterday.

After Church we went over to Grandpa and Grandma Cersey's house where Jackson played in the snow on the back porch. Later in the evening Grandma pulled him around in a sled. Jackson loves the snow.

We didn't have any snow clothes for Drake, but we let him touch some snow and watch Jackson play in it. Drake got so excited that he threw-up.

Today the sun is out and the snow is melting, but I got this picture of the house before it is all gone. It is suppose to be back into the upper 60's and even the 70's by Friday. Kind of crazy huh? We enjoyed our day in the snow, but we are ready for things to get back to normal.

The Circus and Crazy Weather

Last Saturday (Feb. 21) we took the kids to the Circus downtown at Philips Arena. We took Marta again since it was such a hit the week before. Jackson was entertained for all of about 10 minutes and then he started saying "It's time to go home." Drake sat with his Grandma Cersey and from what I hear he had a great time.

We were joined by Jessica, Andy, Megan and Alexis, Jana, Ta, and Anthony, Grandma Cersey, Brindi, Ryan, and Aiden, Thayne, Jones, and Lacey, Danielle, Andy, Brooklyn, and London.

The clown parts were pretty boring, and the animals were kind of a bust since the dogs failed to catch a lot of their frisbees, the tigers looked depressed and failed to do as they were instructed, and the elephants pooed all over themselves. But there were a few entertaining parts like the 7 motorcycles speeding around in the same cage. A few of the little guys slept through most of the show, but I think for the most part we all had a good time.

A week ago Jackson, Drake and I were reading on the couch when Grandma Cersey called to tell us a big storm was on its way and that we should turn on the news. When I turned on the TV it was evident that we were about to get hammered not only by thunder, lightning, and hail, but possibly by a tornado. There were Tornado warnings for our area all over the news and the radar indicated that the eye of one of the storms was headed right for us. Now, we get these kind of storms here in Georgia several times a year and normally I just go about my business and ignore the storm outside, but this time I'll admit I was a little nervous. Justin hadn't gotten home from work yet. He was on his way home, which was worrisome, but he was actually driving behind the storm so he was fine. So, I prepared for the onslaught by running upstairs and getting the mattress off of Jackson's bed. I set up camp for the boys in a little niche in the center of our house on the main floor with the mattress propped up to shield us from any potential flying debris (we would have been in the downstairs bathtub but on the news they said to avoid the west side of your house since that was the direction the tornadoes were likely to come from). The hail started to beat down on our house and it was so loud that I could have sworn that all of our windows were braking. The thunder, lighting, and hail crashed down on us for a good 10 minutes or so. Jackson was upset, but we said a prayer and that calmed him down. It turned out that there were no tornadoes in our immediate area (there were tornadoes in other counties that did a lot of damage) and the hail only broke some of our outdoor lights, which is surprising considering the size of the ice (Justin is holding a few pieces of it in the picture below).
The next day my mother asked Jackson about the storm and he told her about the loud banging and said that he had been scared. She responded by saying "but you were OK because your mommy was there to protect you" and he said, "No Grandma we said a prayer and Jesus protected me." Is that not the sweetest thing ever? I wouldn't be surprised if the faith of my baby boy saved the whole city from death and destruction.

Valentine's Day On the Town!

On Valentine's day last Saturday we decided to hit the town. I had promised Jackson that he was going to get to ride a train that day thinking that we would go to Stone Mountain to do this, but it turned out that the train at Stone Mountain was closed. So, we had to think fast. We decided to ride Marta instead, Atlanta's own beloved transit system. I think that Jackson considered it an acceptable substitute, after all taking Marta isn't just a train ride, it is also a one of a kind experience. My parents and my cousin, Darron and his Wife, LuAnne joined us on our excursion.

When we got downtown we were all hungry so we went into the CNN center for lunch. As soon as we entered we were crowded amongst thousands of prepubescent, scantily clad, make-up doused cheerleaders. Apparently there was some national cheer leading competition going on at the nearby Georgia Dome. The men were quite content in this new setting, but I was appalled by it for several reasons. First, it saddened me to see so many young girls trying to mature so quickly beyond their young years. Second, I was distraught by the fact that some of these girls considered themselves fit enough to wear such skimpy uniforms as they scarfed down buckets of fries, inhaled grease soaked pizza, and gulped down gallon sized cups of Coke (not diet). And third, I was mad because I didn't make the cheerleading squad in middle school and my residual shame comes hurtling out in the form of anger and disgust whenever I come in contact with young peppy cheerleaders. You stole my dream! But I digress. Since the females of our group were the ones carrying the cameras we conveniently forgot to get pictures of this distressing scene.
After lunch we walked in the bitter cold through Centennial Olympic Park to the World of Coca Cola. We had a good time there even though it was a little crowded (some of the cheerleaders followed us there). The boys enjoyed riding in their stroller through the exhibits (side note about the stroller: This ugly piece of hud was generously given to us by Carey Fox. Carey I really do appreciate you giving this to us even though it is the funkiest looking stroller I have ever seen. It has come in handy on many occasions. Honestly, thank you!) We got our picture taken with the Coca-Cola polar bear and tasted a lot of Coke's soda flavors from around the world. Drake fell asleep, and Jackson spilled coke all over himself and Drake. What could be better?!

The adults had fun too. I ended up staying close to my favorite soda dispenser, Tab. My dad even bought me a hat so that I could emblazon my drink preference. LuAnne bought a hat too. We almost lost Darron once. He said that he was going to the bathroom, but we all know that he was trying to find a secret place to "wheeze the juice". We were all happy to see him again when some coke employees managed to find him and escort him back to the tourist area of the museum.

After leaving the World of Coca-Cola we made our way back through the park. Some of us, namely LuAnne and myself, were a little inebriated after drinking all of that coke and we began to act a little crazy as you can see in the pictures below. I was jumping off everything I could and LuAnne was fascinated with walking in slow motion. Eventually our sugar high wore off and we joined the rest of the family back in reality. We all had a really fun time. I would not have preferred to spend my Valentine's day any other way.

Love you all!

Potty Party!

Last Saturday evening we had a Potty Party for Jackson. Now, you may be saying to yourself "what is a Potty Party?". Well, that is a very good question. It is a question that we did not have a good answer for on Saturday and I can probably only feebly answer today, but I will give it a shot.

Years ago in anticipation of the potty training days Justin bought a book called "Potty Train Your Child in Just One Day". We all know how anal Justin is (pun intended) so it didn't seem unusual to me that he wanted to get a head start on learning the ins and outs (pun intended) of potty training. Well, as it turns out, neither of us ended up reading the book, but I skimmed through it once and thought that I got the gist of it. What I learned from my skimming was that we needed to have a Potty Party. Never mind the details of what a Potty Party consists of, I thought we could just wing it. We set the day for Saturday and invited the Grandparents. Saturday rolled around and we opened the book just to see what preparations we needed to make. Well, it turns out there is a lot more to it than can take place in one day, so I created my own version of the Potty party, which in the end has actually turned out to be quite successful.

I decorated the kitchen and the bathroom. We sort of had a Spiderman theme. When the grandparents arrived we opened gifts. Grandma Cersey brought a gift and then I had a special gift prepared. In our gift to Jackson was what I like to call the Potty Puppy (picture below), some big boy underwear, a calendar, and some stickers. After opening presents he decorated what we call the Potty Box (pictures also below). Then we had cookie cake. After eating I told Jackson that his Potty Puppy needed to go potty so we went to the decorated bathroom, which he was excited about. We set the Potty Puppy on the potty and waited, but the puppy wasn't able to go because he didn't know how, so we asked Jackson to show the puppy how to use the potty. To our amazement Jackson actually did poop on the potty! Then of course he expected the puppy to know how to do it, so we placed the puppy back on the potty and I sneakily dropped some Raisinets in the toilet. He totally bought it. He may never look at Raisinets the same way again, but I think it is worth it. Anyway, then we placed a sticker on his potty calendar to display his success, and he got to pick a treat out of the potty box. We have larger and more fun toys in the bottom of the box for poopoo treats (trains, whistles, bouncy balls, candy, etc.) and smaller treats in the top portion of the box for peepee treats (candy and stickers).

So far the whole con is still working. Jackson asks to go to the potty all the time and we always take the Potty Puppy (the puppy doesn't have to go potty unless Jackson needs some coercing), and he always gets rewarded afterward. Of course, he has still peed in his diaper quite a bit, but he has placed all his #2s in the toilet since Saturday. I am so surprised and happy that this has worked. I guess I should keep my fingers crossed so that it continues working.

Obviously, Jackson doesn't know the correct way to wear his big boy underwear yet, but we'll get there. Drake on the other hand is sadly too young to potty train. You can see the result of his most recent bowel movement below. At least his shirt was appropriate for the occasion.