18-month-old Jackson

I keep saying it, but only because it's true...Jackson is more and more fun to be around with each passing day. Eighteen-month-old Jackson is ridiculously fun and I'll tell you a few of the reasons why...One of my favorite "new things" of late is that Jackson has really gotten into giving and receiving hugs. He hugs his stuffed animals, he "hugs" Grandma in Florida by hugging my cell phone during a call, he hugs his friends, and best of all he hugs his daddy and mommy.

His language skills are pretty impressive, if you ask me. He busts out all kinds of words that we don't expect him to know and he'll repeat any new word you ask him to say. That being the case, conversations with him are getting to be pretty frequent and amusing (in person or over the phone).He likes to pray. We usually hold hands and pray as a family at the table before eating dinner. Well, Jackson now insists on "pray" time at least 3 times during each meal, sometimes a couple more prayers while he's sitting on the potty, and a few more as he's being tucked into bed at night.

Oh yes, I did mention the potty. That's right, he's on the self-directed potty training fast-track. He's been telling us for months when he needs to poo and not too long ago he added a pee-pee warning. If we weren't quick enough to respond to his declaration, he'd run to his room and return with a diaper in hand, which he would promptly throw at our feet. Dan's been pretty thrilled with these developments and insisted we pick up a little potty for the kid, which we did. We got Jackson a froggy potty and he's quickly become prince of the potty. Grandma Tyckoson even gave him a book called Prince of the Potty.We stop everything when Jackson says the magic word, "Potty!" Usually as we scurry toward the bathroom at lightning speed, Jackson is yelling "Book! Book! Book!" because while he's sitting on the potty, he absolutely must have a book in hand. Sometimes we read, sometimes he just looks at pictures. His favorite book to read on the potty is his Jesus Storybook Bible and he likes to flip through the pages pointing out birds, the moon, Noah, Jonah, Jesus and John the Baptist (who he insists on calling "Matt" for some reason). We can be found reading in the bathroom fairly often these days.Here's a snapshot of Jackson pointing out "Matt" (John the Baptist) in his Jesus Storybook Bible.
Jackson has been busy learning his colors and shapes (if you ever have the chance, ask him to say "triangle" - you will not regret it!), but he seems to like learning about letters the most. He's partial to J, A, O, and V, but his very favorite letter is W for some reason. He points it out everywhere we go -- on store signs, in books, and even on the digital compass of the car's rear-view mirror. I finally got out the wooden blocks I bought for him before he was born and they're definitely on his top 10 list of favorite toys to play with. He likes to open the blocks' canvas storage bag and yell "Mess!" as he dumps the entire contents of the bag onto the carpet. Then we randomly talk about different letters and shapes on the cubes until he's bored and ready to move onto something else. At that point, I open up the blocks bag and we turn clean up into a rowdy game of basketball with Jackson yelling "Booyah!" with each block that he tosses into the bag. We repeat this cycle at least 3 times a day.Jackson is also really interested in social media now, not unlike the rest of the population. Several times a day, we have to log in to Facebook because he wants to see pictures of his friends from Italy, local friends, or of Uncle Rob & Aunt Beth's dog, Cooper.

To Dan's delight, Jackson is a sports enthusiast who dunks balls into his Little Tikes basketball hoop throughout each day with an enthusiastic "Booyah!" for each score and a "Miss!" when the ball goes awry. On the weekends, he watches football with his daddy and yells "Touchdown!" at random intervals. He practices his golf swing, first yelling "Fore!" before swinging the club wildly in the air back and forth while making a "swish! swish!" wind noise. We are forever searching for plastic golf balls that have rolled under every piece of furniture. Often the search concludes with Jackson's ear pressed hard against the carpet as he looks under the couch or TV cabinet yelling a slightly muffled "Help you!" (instead of help me) for assistance in retrieving a hard-to-reach ball. Note to self: must buy more golf balls.We're so grateful to God for this gracious gift of a son to laugh with, play with, and learn with. A price can't be put on the joy that he's added to our home in this last year and a half.