PR Here we come!

Just so you know, Tyler is feeling much better now and luckily Jackson and I avoided him so much last week that we didn't get sick either! Now we're getting ready to go to Puerto Rico in the morning! Jackson hasn't been on a flight since he was 2 months old, back then he was an angel on the plane. We know it won't be as easy this time around, but we're hoping he does well tomorrow. He's a lot more active and wiggly so it should be interesting. If nothing else, its good practice for our much longer flights for Thanksgiving and Christmas!

Hopefully his favorite Gerber Puff cereal snacks will help us through the flight. He has become such a good eater these past couple weeks! He now eats a jar of baby food for breakfast, lunch, and dinner and loves having the puffs for snacks. A few days ago he started to try to feed himself the puffs and it wasn't working. I'd say 1 out of 20 made it in his mouth maybe? Most ended up smashed on the ground in his hand or down in the high chair. But dang he's gotten better, and fast! Today about 15 out of 20 make it in his mouth. He's a fast learner!

Maybe I'm going into such detail because as I type this I'm watching Jackson do this ...

Correction

Remember on Monday when I said that this weekend would have been better had Tyler not been sick with the flu? Well turns out it isn't the flu. He was starting to feel better on Monday, but then took a turn for the worse Monday night. He went to urgent care Tuesday morning while I took Jackson with me to vote...

As Jackson and I were waiting in the hour-long line, Tyler kept texting me progressively alarming updates from the doctor such as ...

Fever is 102

Doc says I have Bronchitis

Doin a chest X-ray

Pneumonia

I gotta Get a shot

Gonna get on antibiotic

So, forget the flu - he has pneumonia!! Finally I made it to the front of the line and voted (yay for republicans winning in Florida!) and then met up again at home with Tyler. He showed me this note ---



For the past couple days Tyler has been at home trying to get better ... especially so we can go to Puerto Rico on Tuesday!! I'm trying to keep Jackson and myself away from Tyler so we don't get sick, it's honestly a miracle I'm still ok!

So for my husband who I'd never seen sick with more than a cold since we've been married, here he is sicker than I've ever been. Poor Tyler ... hoping he gets better soon!!

Halloween Memories

We had a fun week celebrating Jackson's first Halloween ... enjoy the photo overload!

(PS It would have been even better had Tyler not had a terrible case of the flu all weekend , luckily he's starting to feel better today!)

So ... what else is new?

I guess this blog is called TyandRach.blogspot.com - not Jacksonupdate.blogspot.com, so what else is going on with us? Well 2010 has been an amazing year - we had Jackson, bought a house and have traveled all around Florida for Tyler's work. But between now and the end of the year, it's only getting to get busier. Tyler has a trip scheduled every week between now and our Christmas break - some small ones for work, but some fun ones with Jackson and me!

We've got three vacations coming up in the next two months -

1.
In 2 weeks we're going to Puerto Rico!! Tyler stays at so many hotels that he was able to earn free nights through Hilton that he can use anywhere in the world! He also had a few extra vacation days that expire at the end of the year, so we basically have to go! :-) But at first he showed me options in far off places in Europe, Central America, and the Pacific Islands. But me, being the realist with a seven month old, only wanted to go somewhere local. Maybe we can go somewhere exotic next year when we can leave Jackson with my mom. So I thought we should go somewhere we could drive to in Florida, maybe the Keys? But Tyler didn't want to stay local when he had the option to go foreign! So we decided on Puerto Rico.

I'm not going to lie, I'm still a little nervous to take Jackson there! But since (as Tyler says) it's basically America, and we'll be able to rent a car and stay at a nice hotel - it should be just fine for the little guy! I was skeptical at first, but now as I'm getting more used to the idea - I'm getting so excited! Finally a trip where Tyler doesn't have to be working - an actual vacation! Tyler and I were actually supposed to go to Puerto Rico for our honeymoon but our flight got canceled so we ended up canceling the hotel and staying in Arizona. So this is actually like the honeymoon we never had (plus a baby)...

2.
For Thanksgiving we're meeting my family in NYC!!! It's my mom's birthday the day after Thanksgiving so we're all staying in Manhattan for the weekend. We're going to see the Macy's Parade, go shopping, enjoy the sites, and even see a Broadway Show! Since my sister and her husband live in up-state NY, my parents and brother are flying to see them and then driving down to the city. Jackson, Tyler and me will fly into the city and meet them at our hotel (another Tyler hookup!) and party for the weekend. Then afterward, we're going to drive up to Boston for a couple days so Ty can show me the amazing city I've never been to and we will visit with the lovely Dan & Jamie Cook!

3.
Christmas is coming and we'll be in Arizona for the week before Christmas and in Utah the week after. So all our family and friends out west, we hope to see you then!

It will be a busy couple months but we're so excited. I can't believe this year has flown by, we've got Halloween this weekend and our little tiger is going to look so cute! So I'm sure another jacksonupdate.blogspot.com will be posted shortly :-)

seven months

On Sunday Jackson hit the seven month mark and is still as cute as can be! We've been so busy that this month just flew by and Jackson has been so great at tagging along through all of our travels and adventures.

The big change for the month was solid foods - he finally decided that he likes baby food! After hating rice cereal and refusing our initial tries of apple sauce last month, I was pretty sure I'd be nursing him until he was 2. But a few weeks ago he finally decided he would actually swallow instead of spit it out - and he loved the apple sauce! Then he tried sweet potatoes, those graduate cereal puffs, and even bananas mixed with rice cereal. It's been great to be able to feed him when we're eating dinner, and out to eat.

But other than that ... not many developmental changes with our little buddy. Still no crawling. Still no scooting. But I'm not going to lie, I'm fine with that! I'm still able to set him down on the carpet or on the middle of my bed and know that he's not going anywhere!

He still has no teeth, he still has beautiful blue eyes, he still has little wispy brown hair. He still gets called "the gerber baby" all the time, and we are loving him more and more each day!

I've been taking a picture of him every month in his crib, laying on his back to show how much he grows. This month he would not keep his legs straight!




He's been a little sick for the past couple days so I wasn't able to get many good pictures for his seven month photo shoot. So these pictures are about all I got - I'd like to call it the many faces of Jackson. Proof that he's not smiling all the time ... just most of the time :-)




(mid-cough)


(always reaching for the camera!)

But when his Daddy comes in and throws him in the air - we're guaranteed to get a smile out of the little guy!

Grandparents in Town!!

We had such a fun time with Tyler's parents here this week! They left this morning and Jackson has been looking around the house for his fun play buddies all day. While they were only here for 4 full days, we were able to fit a lot in to the schedule. The grandparents went on morning walks with Jackson, helped us decorate and put things together around the house, spent lots of time playing with Jackson, babysat him so Ty and I could go on a date, and we even visited 3 of the parks at Disney World!

We had been planning on buying a grill for the past couple weeks, but Tyler waited until his dad was in town to help him pick out the perfect one. It was great to have the "grill master" here to help us set it up, and christen it with some amazing steak and pork chops!

As you can tell, Ty was stoked to finally have a grill - and a super hardcore one at that!

**I've been told that someone doesn't approve of the above picture since he looks like a "manatee" but if it weren't for that manatee we wouldn't have wheels on our awesome grill!**

Sunday Dinner was amazing - Pork Chops, Mashed Potatoes, and a Poppyseed Salad! And since the weather was so nice we were able to sit out at our brand new patio table set :-) Here in Florida, it's just getting cool enough to sit outside for dinner haha.


Jackson absolutely adores his grandma and grandpa! I was a little worried he might be a little shy or apprehensive, but boy was I wrong! He loved spending time on their laps, in their arms and waking them up every morning to play on their bed.



Grandma introduced Jackson to his new favorite song :-)

We even had a little belated birthday cake for Tyler - my family's classic double chocolate bunt cake!


Yesterday we spent the entire day at Disney World! We started at Animal Kingdom and loved the safari!



\

Then we drove over to Epcot for the afternoon and sampled some of the foods at the annual food and wine festival. We had yummy sausage from Germany, Crepes from France, a sampler of Spain dishes, and a Danish dessert!



Jackson loved banging on these African drums!



Lastly we went over to Hollywood Studios and finished it off with our favorite ride - Toy Story Mania - and watched the American Idol Finale Show. It was a busy day but Jackson did great! He was happy basically all day and just fell asleep in his stroller for naps. What a great baby we have!

Last night Grandma and Grandpa spent their last hours with Jacksy back at our house. It was so much fun watching them fall in love with Jackson. He is such an amazingly happy baby and so much fun all the time. Just two more months until we see them again for Christmas!!


Love this video - you can see how much fun these 3 have together :-)

Ty's B-Day!

From one birthday to the next! Tyler's big day comes only 12 days after mine, so it's always a fun time in late September / early October in the Jennings household. This year it seemed even closer together with us traveling the week after my birthday. Tyler never lets me talk about what we're doing for his birthday until mine is over, so I always feel like I'm scrambling to get stuff ready at the end! We were only home 6 days before his birthday yesterday (4 of which I didn't have a car since my battery died twice) but luckily we were able to have a great day together yesterday!!

We started the morning with homemade waffles and then Tyler opened most of his presents.

Jackson gave him a basketball so he can get really good and teach him how to play in the coming years! (Even though he was a bit more interested in the card than the ball at this point...)


My cute boys with the gifts and cards. His biggest present is a set of irons (golf clubs) that has been ordered and will be arriving soon! And yes, I got him socks for his birthday. I guess that makes us an old married couple. He didn't think he needed new ones, but believe me, he did!


The main event of the day was spending the afternoon at the beach! We headed west to Tampa Bay and drove the 80 miles to Clearwater Beach. It's a little bit farther then the Atlantic Ocean side, but it's so worth it! The water is so warm and the sand is soft and white! Jackson slept the whole drive there and back and was a happy little guy playing in the sand and waves with daddy.





After coming home and cleaning up a bit, we went to The Cheesecake Factory to celebrate for dinner. We were a little hesitant to take Jackson since he was so crazy at my birthday dinner, but luckily he behaved himself much better this time. Basically perfect in fact! This is now the third year in a row we've gone to Cheesecake for Ty's birthday haha. We considered other places, but it's just so hard to go wrong with that place!

Here are some pics of the two boys playing around after we finished dinner...




And then the dessert menu arrived and Tyler handed Jackson to me - this was a big decision! Tyler took about 5 minutes deciding what cheesecake to get!


He decided on one we'd never tried, pineapple upside-down cheesecake - perfect for the pineapple lover, right? And it was great! Jackson was intrigued by the candle as seen here...



It was such a fun day with Tyler and Jackson! I'm so grateful for Tyler and I feel so blessed to have him as my husband! How lucky am I!! We sat just a few booths away from where we were last year and it is crazy to see how much has changed since his last birthday. But with all the changes, I'm more in love now than ever!

I'm so happy to be raising this beautiful little boy who looks just like his daddy!