Looking back on October...

October flew by this year. 

Faster than a speeding bullet.

This month Jax started saying please "peas" and thank you "tank youuuuuuu" on a regular basis.

We had tried to teach him both for a while, and while please came easily, thank you didn't happen until nearly the end of the month, notably on my birthday.  Thanks for the sweet present, Jax!

On the flipside, the little guy has gone from eating anything and everything to very specific things.  He loves cottage cheese and yogurt, but refuses to eat meat. He likes corn but hates pretty much every other vegetable and will only sometimes eat a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.  I'm starting to make recipes to sneak in the veggies and meats so he's not sure what he's eating.  The few times I've done it, he gobbles up a few bites and then realizes that maybe mommy is fibbing to me that this used to be yummy "muffin" is filled with veggies.  

I think he's on to me. 

He also has learned to smile on command, which he has done for a while on and off, but now, instead of just smiling, he gets a cheesy grin on his face and closes his eyes. No idea where this came from.

 

My best friend came to visit for the weekend and we had a great night of a firepit and grill out, but that night, Abby got sick. Super sick. As in, we made a trip to the Emergency Room, where she was hooked up to an IV and at the hospital from 10pm to nearly four the next morning.  She ended up having a gastrointestinal infection, but it was a scary thing to watch.  She had a crazy fever, was shaking like a leaf and couldn't stop throwing up.  She missed a few days of school the next week, but luckily was back to herself by Halloween for trick or treating. 

She has been taking tumbling classes and is getting pretty good at headstands, bridges, cartwheels and dancing in general.  The great room is her glorified dance studio, which is great to watch because all we have to do is turn on some music and she starts dancing (think interpretive dance) and soon after, Jackson starts copying her, which is hilarious.  Jackson has also learned the coveted dance move of raising the roof, which makes me laugh every time.  This morning, in his high chair, he looked at me and said "mama, raise roof" and then proceeded to do his signature move.  Priceless.

We have had fun playing in the thousands of leaves that fall in our back yard

 (thanks to Matt for the countless hours spent blowing, raking and burning).

Here are a couple snaps from leaf time-

We have tried to get some mommy/Jax photos like we did last year at the same time (and the year before with the maternity shots) but this little crazy man wanted no part of it. 

 We did manage to score some cute photos on my birthday, which is the best present possible. 

Here's my fave:

I don't even remember if it was September or October, but Jax decided that my iphone should take a dip in the toilet.  Oops.  I got a new phone a couple of days later, and the icloud helped to get it back up and running in an instant.  The downside is that I take photos/ videos every day on my phone and the new (refurbished) phone won't connect to any computer. Or update to the icloud. So we are currently in the process of trying to figure out a way to get the stuff off of the crappy replacement phone. Stay tuned...