As a continuation of the Being Jacob post, there are two pretty big changes that happened in the past 7 months that are worthy of Jacob’s promotion to big boy status. First off is a big boy bed…

Jacob loved his crib.  He was perfectly happy in it.  He could crawl out if he truly wanted to, and started to a couple times, but I either distracted him or picked him up before he had a chance to do it.  He was perfectly content sleeping and sometimes playing in his crib.  However, as we all know, siblings have a way of changing things up.  We were ready to transition Dylan into the crib in his own room and really didn’t want to buy another crib.  So in July we got Jacob a toddler bed.  I wanted to get a full sized bed, but that would have required moving furniture, re-configuring his room and we had just moved in and his room was one of the first ones that we set up.  Along with all the other projects we had going on at the time, it was not something we wanted to take on at the moment.  So we decided to get a toddler bed that would just replace the crib in the same place in his room without having to change anything else for the time being. I took Jacob shopping so he could pick out his bedding (he chose tractors and dump trucks, big surprise there!)  Honestly, because of how much he loved his crib, I was a little concerned about how Jacob would handle Dylan sleeping in it, but it was no big deal and he handled it great! Of course the best way to test out a new bed is by jumping on it, right?

I’ve heard so many stories of kids who won’t stay in bed when they transition out of the crib, so we were anticipating that.  I thought for sure the first week I would be sending him back to bed, but it didn’t happen, he stayed in his bed, all night long, during naps too! And when he wakes up he doesn’t get out either, he waits until one of us comes into his room to get him. We were so surprised at how easy this transition was.  Just a couple weeks later we were talking with a friend who has kids around the same age as ours and they had just transitioned their daughter into a big bed a few months earlier.  They told us the same thing happened, she never got out of bed, until 2-3 weeks later it started.  So they warned us that it was coming.  3 months later, he was still staying in bed.  We kept talking to each other about how good he was sleeping in his big boy bed and we were so lucky that we didn’t have to deal with teaching him how to stay in his bed, etc, etc, etc…Right when we were comfortable and sure we had tackled this transition with no issues at all, BAM! It was like a light switch turned on and he realized that he didn’t have to stay in his bed if he didn’t want to.

At first it became a game, after we would put him down, he would come out of his room giggling, and we would be standing in the hallway waiting for him and send him back to bed. Then that stopped and he quickly learned the fine art of scaring the bejesus out of us!  He would wait until 1-2 hours after we put him to sleep, and we would be picking up around the house, watching TV, doing the dishes and he would quietly walk out and stand behind us, when we turned around we would jump out of our skin and try not to scream so loud, and with our hearts pounding we would send him back to bed.  Our home became the scene for a scary movie with the crazed psychological killer being our innocent (or not so innocent) 2 year old.  We were tip toeing around our haunted house, checking around every corner and mentally preparing ourselves every time we turned around that he could be there.

Then instead of getting up in the early evening, he started doing it in the middle of the night.  He would quietly walk down the hall and stand in our doorway, waiting.  You know that feeling you get when you can sense someone watching you, I’ve learned that you can have that feeling while dead asleep.  Again, it was like a horror movie, I would open my eyes and see this black silhouette of a tiny human standing in our doorway. Once he knew we were awake he would run and jump into bed with us.  This was also during the time when Dylan was not sleeping great, so I was getting up to go back and forth into his room, which would wake Jacob up if he was in our bed. And there were plenty of times when I was so tired from all the back and forth between our room and Dylan’s room that I would just bring Dylan to bed with us.  So often times we had all 4 of us in our bed, and we were all sleep deprived.  Then there was one night that kind of stopped the late night visits.  Jacob had come into our room, so I took him back to bed and when I got back to our room Dylan woke up, so I went into Dylan’s room and soothed him back to sleep.  When I was walking out of Dylan’s room Jacob was coming out of his room at the same time and started sneaking down the hallway towards our room.  Since he had his back to me, he didn’t know I was there.  I said in a loud, stern whisper “Jacob what are you doing out of bed!!” it scared him so much he flung himself against the wall and was clutching onto the doorjam for dear life.  Ha! I got my payback!!  Since then his night time sleep is much better, we get an occasional late night visit, but once we send him back to bed, he stays there until the morning.

Then…Jacob decided to stop taking his nap.  He clearly still needed it, but he would not stay in his room.  I tried everything from sticker reward charts, bribing him with MnM’s, a clock that would change colors indicating when he should be sleeping (or at least stay in his room for quiet time) and turn green when it was okay to get up, nothing worked. His excuse for not napping, “but the sun is up!” Duh mom, you don’t sleep when the sun is up!  I began talking with him about it trying to prepare him, saying I was going to feed Dylan and put him down for a nap because he was tired, then we needed to rest too.  And Jacob would reply with “Noooooo Jacob’s not taking a nap, Dylan is taking a nap. The sun is up!”  So I began telling him that we were not going to sleep for the night, it was just a rest to recharge our bodies for the rest of the day.  “But the sun is up!” is always his response, and he even goes to the window and opens the curtains to show me how bright it is outside as if I didn’t already know.  If I was able to get Dylan down for a nap around the same time then I would try staying in Jacob’s room with him until he fell asleep, that worked a couple times, but then he realized that I would sneak out after he fell asleep and started fighting it.  So then I told him he could nap in mommy and daddy’s bed and that worked a few times too.

A sleeping boy is just too precious, I can’t help but snap a quick picture before sneaking out.

Then he figured out that I was only letting him in our bed so he would nap, so he fought it again. No matter what I tried, he would not sleep!  I knew he still needed his nap because if I drove anywhere in the late afternoon he would fall asleep in the car.

So I did that a few times, taking long afternoon drives.

But it really wasn’t fair to Dylan since he would wake up from his nap then have to be strapped in the carseat while I drove around trying to get Jacob to sleep.  So I stopped doing that.  Then I decided to start going for long afternoon walks with the stroller, and he could at least rest and have some downtime.  He started falling asleep in the stroller, even at 4:30 in the afternoon (or would that be considered evening?)

Then we figured out that he would take a nap for Justin (or my mom) but not me.  The poor kid was tired, but would.not.stay.in.his.bed (at least for me)! That means during the week he doesn’t get a nap and on the weekends when Justin is home, he does.  So I gave up trying to get him to sleep and we just put him to bed really early during the week. I’ve learned with this parenting thing, you have to pick and choose your battles.

Next is we are officially down to one kid in diapers!  Almost a year ago when Jacob turned 2, I got a little kid potty and we just set it in his bathroom. He was curious about it and would occasionally sit on it and would use it at night before taking a bath.

He was interested, but I was not ready to tackle potty training yet.  Then with the upcoming move and arrival of a little brother, I didn’t want to do it before, partly because I still wasn’t ready to do it and I didn’t want to go through the training process then risk the chance that he may regress during all the changes that were coming and then have to do it all over again.  So we waited…and after the craziness settled down a bit (is there such a thing?) we picked a weekend and put it on the calendar.  We did some research on different methods and got advice from experienced parents, stocked up on underwear, MnM’s, potty prizes, juice boxes and hunkered down at home for the weekend.

The first day there were a couple accidents which is to be expected, but then the rest of the weekend there were none.  I can’t say that he was exactly excited about the process (which makes me wish I would have done it a long time ago when he was really interested).  When it was obvious he needed to go and we kept trying to take him to the bathroom he was showing his stubborn independent side and kept saying “My not want to!”  and after what seemed like spending hours in the bathroom he would finally go.  But about 5 days into it, he really got the hang of it and is so proud of himself now.

Because he is such a good communicator and has really good control (he held it for 4 hours on his first day back to preschool after the potty training weekend!) it really has not been that big of a deal. We make it a habit to go potty every time we leave the house and he usually doesn’t have to go again until later when we get home.  Even traveling in the car out of town has been easy.  He also is comfortable telling others when he needs to go. So far, it has been a big success!

There is one funny story though…On the first outing the Monday after the training weekend, Dylan had a check up with our pediatrician.  I brought our little “travel” potty with us.  After getting checked into the exam room we were waiting for the doctor and Jake started doing the “potty dance”, so I loaded Dylan back into the stroller and we all went across the hall to the bathroom.  But after a while Jake didn’t go, so we went back to the exam room.  Then Dylan was getting hungry, so I started nursing him and Jake started doing the potty dance more urgently.  Because I was still nursing Dylan I just got the potty out and set it in the middle of the exam room, I figured it wasn’t anything that would scare away our pediatrician.  Jake sat down and immediately started to pee, but in typical boy fashion he hadn’t quite mastered the skill of pointing his aim down, so it was shooting directly at me (and an eating Dylan).  I quickly put my hand up to block it and thankfully there was a sink in the room so I was able to get some wet paper towels to clean up. While I was washing our hands and cleaning up the mess off the exam room floor (while still nursing Dylan), I kept thinking that there must be some kind of health code that we were violating and I was praying that the doctor would not walk in right in the middle of it all (thankfully he didn’t!)  After the appointment was over and I got everyone loaded in the car, I literally sat there laughing at my life and wondering if it was too early to have a glass of wine! This parenting thing is quite a journey.

One observation I made after the potty training weekend, was about all the time we spent together. We always seem to be on the go. During the week, it’s off to preschool, running errands, the museum, the zoo, playdates, etc… then on the weekends it’s working on a project around the house, off to Lowes or Home Depot or going to a party or church.  That weekend, we did not go anywhere, we didn’t do any projects, no one came over we just sat and played games, did puzzles, talked and spent quality time together.  It was nice, and it was a reminder for us to slow down and take a day off every once in a while, forget about everything that needs to be done and just sit down on the floor and play.

Lately, all I’ve really done is share pictures of Jacob during the events of our lives, but haven’t really talked about him, things that he is doing, his likes, dislikes, etc…He has grown and changed so much in the past 7-8 months, I want to write as much as I can remember.  So I’m forewarning you, this post could get long…

To start with he has gone through two pretty big growth spurts in the last 7 months.  Also right in the middle of our move and Dylan’s arrival his 2 year molars came in (that really was a tough time for everyone!)  His favorite things right now are trains and tractors. He loves his Thomas the Train books and shows, and can tell you all the different types of tractors (bulldozer, excavator, crane, etc…)  Some friends of ours gave use the movie Wall-E (really a cute movie if you haven’t seen it), after watching that movie, Jacob calls any bobcat style tractor he sees Wall-E.  You often can find him in his room lining up all his cars/tractors/trucks/etc…to make a train.

And drums…he LOVES to play the ‘drums and cymbals’ is what he calls it.  And will drum on any surface that makes a cool noise like the wooden seat of our dining room chairs with the cymbals being the metal back rest or the bottom handle of our oven.  He uses his hands as the drumsticks, or if I want him to be a bit on the quieter side I give him straws to use as drumsticks.  Justin downloaded a drum app on his phone that Jacob loves to play.  He also loves watching you tube videos of his cousin drumming over and over and over while imitating his movements.  Makes me wonder if he will follow his cousins footsteps and we have a future rockstar on our hands?

He loves swimming. We spent a lot of time at the pool this summer.

There is an amazing app that we have on the iPad that teaches SO much and makes learning fun.  One of the things that Jacob loves to play in the app is about money and it is a game where a monkey is collecting coins and it teaches you how many pennies make a nickle or a dime and how many coins make a quarter and how many quarters make a dollar, etc… So he is always asking to play with our spare change and his piggy bank.  Somehow we never get our spare change back, it stays in the piggy bank, so I guess he is learning about saving money too, that would make his Opa very proud!

Jacob is quite the chatterbox.  His teachers at preschool keep saying how they can’t believe how well he is speaking.  Not just words, but the sentences he says and the amount of words he knows and his clarity makes him so easy to understand.  He is speaking above and beyond the rest of the kids in his class and the teachers love that they can really communicate with him.  What is really cool is sometimes if we can’t understand a word he is trying to say, if he knows the sign for it he will sign it so we can understand him.  The sign language has been such an amazing tool, he rarely signs now, I miss it, and it is so cute to see him sign a word here and there as he is talking.  I truly believe that it had a huge impact on his ability to pick up his verbal communication so easily and quickly.   It was like the floodgates opened and he just exploded with his communication.  He narrates everything for me while I am driving…If we are turning left or right, red light means stop, green light means go, he spells S-T-O-P and says stop at every stop sign,  he gives me a weather report and if it happens to be raining (a rare occasion in San Diego) he will count 1-2-3 GO! for the windshield wipers and they move back and forth.  He will point out every single T (or cross) on churches or hillsides as we drive by.  He gets so excited to see garbage trucks and school buses on the road.  He says “we need gas!” every time we pass a gas station.  He knows the way to certain places that we often go to and will tell me we are going to Target/Lowes/Home Depot/Costco/In N Out/Oma’s house/school (does that give you an idea of what our daily lives are like!)

He tells me when we are almost home and while driving down the street we play a game where I ask him is that our house?  Is that our house?  and he giggles and says Nooooo, until we get to our house and he says there’s our house we are home!  And when I back into the driveway he starts saying Beep, Beep, Beep like a big truck backing up.  But he doesn’t just narrate our car rides, he pretty much narrates our life for us.  He will come tell me that daddy is in the shower in the morning, or that he is wearing a tie to go to work (or a golf shirt to go golfing and yes he knows the difference!) And the questions….question after question after question, I know his little mind is working in overdrive absorbing all this information that our big vworld has to offer, but man I never realized that a little human could talk so much!

Everyone has funny stories of things that kids say, and I am starting to gather a few myself.  One time while we were at Lowes, I was ordering blinds and halfway through the process Jacob was getting bored and kept saying to us “No more talking!” the sales guy thought it was pretty hysterical.  Also every time we go to Lowes or Home Depot he loves looking for the forklift machines that move the pallets of merchandise around the stores and calls them the “Beep Beep” because of the beeping noise they make.  One time it had been a while since we were at Home Depot and when he saw it instead of getting all excited like he usually does he simply looked at me and said “Oh.my.Gosh…It’s a Beep Beep” like he was imitating a valley girl from the movie Clueless.  It wasn’t what he said it was the way he said it that just left me speechless.  After we moved, we had to remind Jacob every once in a while not to bang his toys or drive his cars on the walls, so one afternoon while Justin was hammering some nails to hang pictures in his room, Jacob started saying “stop banging on MY walls!”  Jacob is my little helper when we go shopping for groceries.  Although the only thing he really reminds me to get these days is beer and wine and chocolate cookies (Oreos).  Once while shopping at Trader Joe’s I grabbed a six pack of Hansen’s and when putting it in the cart Jacob asked me if I was getting beer, the man walking by turned and smiled at us, all I could do was laugh!  There are certain staple items that we get every time we go to Costco, but without fail the only items that Jacob reminds me about until they end up in the cart are beer and wine.  Why are those the things he talks about so loudly in public?? And I promise you we don’t let him drink it!

Along with the talking, also comes the singing.  Jacob loves to sing and will listen to me singing to Dylan when soothing him down for a nap and then ask me to sing the song over and over and over again for him so he can memorize it.  We’ve been singing Jesus loves me after our prayers at bedtime since he was a baby so he has that song down pat.  His other favorites are Hush little baby, don’t say a word, the theme song to the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, America the Beautiful, ABC song, Jingle Bells, Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.  Often times he will set us up with his Ukulele and his drums and we will dance and make music to go along with the song we are singing.  I told you, future rockstar…

My healthy eater who I couldn’t get enough food into fast enough has become very picky.  One time when my mom was at our house, I made him some roasted carrots, he started eating them and we were so happy he was eating a different kind of vegetable so we were encouraging him and really making it sound like he won the lottery every time he took a bite. My mom said to him “Ohh those are good right, they are nice and sweet”  and he simply looked at my mom and said “no Grandma they’re not sweet, they’re carrots.”  Duh!  We got a good laugh out of that one.  He won’t eat meat (except on some very few occasions I’ve been able to coax him to eat or at a preschool party when all the other kids are), he will eat any kind of fruit, eggs, applesauce, etc… but not the standard kid meals like hot dogs, chicken nuggets, pizza, spaghetti, mac n cheese, so whenever we go somewhere I’m always having to pack something that he will eat.  But like his momma, he does like his sweets!

I thought we were going to get lucky since Jacob seemed to skip over the terrible twos, he had his moments here and there but nothing really worth labeling the terrible twos.  I’ve had so many friends who have told me that the terrific threes are worse than the terrible twos and three months out from Jacob’s third birthday I think I can say that we are entering into the terrific threes. He is testing me to see how far he can push.  He is Mr. I can do it! MY turn! Don’t help me! And will completely loose his mind if you try to do something for him without letting him do it. A few of my “favorites” are…If he asks for milk and I walk into the kitchen to get it for him, he will come running from the other end of the house screaming MY turn, MY turn! And if you have actually already started pouring the milk for him, prepare.for.a.meltdown.  I specifically remember a friend telling me that the most annoying thing about their son during the terrific threes was the whining, and I think about that every day because Jacob has perfected the art of a whine. While driving in the car, from the backseat, he will say on repeat with a whine “Mommy I NEED you, Mommy come here! Mommy hold my hand”  with his arms stretched out reaching for me, begging me to reach back and hold his hand.  If I’m on a slow street or stopped at a signal I’ll reach back give him a squeeze and tell him I love him, but I need my hands to drive the car, and once we get home I’ll hug him and snuggle for as long as he wants.  When we get home I’ll sit down and try to convince him to sit in my lap and he wont.  If I manage to grab him as he runs by he will wiggle and squirm until he breaks free from my grasp. I think part of it is that he has caught on that whenever Dylan cries one of us goes to him, so Jacob thinks that if he adds a whine to whatever he is asking for he will get it.  That has been my struggle these days, I can tolerate a tantrum here and there or his wild and crazy little boy ways but he really tests my patience with his whines.  Here’s to praying I survive this next year with my sanity intact!

All in all, Jacob still continues to be an amazing little boy.  I am so proud of him and so thankful for this incredible human in our life.  He has such a fun personality and when he is not driving me crazy, he is making me laugh with the silly things he comes up with, like using a bucket for a helmet instead of the cool actual helmet that he has.

Or imitating me when I keep saying all I want to do is sit on the couch, put my feet up and enjoy a cup of coffee in the morning.

And there is so much more, but this post is getting pretty long I am going to end it here and will be back with more. Until then I leave you with this…testing out his rockstar hairstyles 🙂