Jackson loves the ladies.

That is the electronic Truck Jackson got from his Papa B for his birthday. He had it 5 seconds before it was full of girls. He's going to break some hearts, that one is.
So other that it being the hottest day of the year, Jackson's birthday party was awesome. He had a great turn out, and everybody seemed to dig that it was in a park(the kids, anyway). The kids played and ate cup-cakes(which completely melted) and played with his new toys, and then were whisked off before they passed out. The whole thing was maybe 2½ hours. Having a kids party at 10:30 in the morning is awesome. Everybody is energetic, they eat everything you bring, and the crash out when it's done. No more afternoon parties for us anymore.


In other news, if anybody in the Tulsa area wants to house a foriegn exchange student, please contact my wife. She has been tasked with finding homes for 20 kids 15-18 from arounnd the world for between 4 and 12 weeks by August 14, when they may land in Tulsa and have no where to go. She cound really use your help.


Also, my other kid is a vampire.




Powers out.

Cute kids and Summer Movies

Man, my wife makes cute kids.
Thanks to the mighty Bucaroo for the pic.


it is now one of my favs of all time.


Laura took thins pic while here last month. We had a grand time.


My other kid, who had a birthday last week, gets his birthday party this week. It's going to be in a park at 10:30am because who doesn't like cake before noon. If you want to go, email me. We have had a mild summer* by Oklahoma standards this year. July is almost over, and we have yet to hit 100°, thanks to Al Gore. Need I remind you of the summer of '06 when we had 34 days over 100°? I thought not.


That being said, it is supposed to get to a hundred on Saturday, the day of the Party. Hopefully, we'll be out of there by noon or 1:00. Jackson is excited for the Party, and actually has no idea that his birthday was last week because we didn't tell him. I don't think his just turned 3 brain could have wrapped itself around the concept of birthday now, party later. My brain can barely deal. Let's just let him open a present now, I would say. You aren't getting it, Jenn would say. It's because I'm slow.


In other News:


Finally saw the Batman movie last night. It met my very high expectations and exceeded them. That's all I'm going to say, because I sure you can't shop for toilet paper without seeing a Welshman in a batsuit on the package**.


I am extremely excited for the Watchmen movie. I know Alan Moore didn't want it filmed, but let's face it, Moore is kind of a dick.


I'll tell you what I'm not excited about is The Spirit movie. It appears that Frank Miller has taken a beloved, wonderfully campy and groundbreaking strip from the '40s and is using it to further is juvenile, chauvinistic, über macho agenda. Don't get me wrong, I love a lot of what Frank has done. It just seems like as time went on, his male characters got less and less sympathetic, in direct proportion to his female characters wearing less and less clothing. But let's face it, Miller is kind of a dick. And can we please make a comic book movie without Sam Jackson in it for once?



Powers out.

*Way to jinx it, Powers!
**Wipe out crime!

Tomorrow my first born will turn 3!

Holy shit, time flies!

Jackson is turning into an incredibly smart little boy. I can tell because he has quickly become bored to death with just about everything, especially his parents. He needs constant stimulation, and luckily for us, he can't really stand the TV. Too slow. He'll watch for about 7-8 minutes before he's off and running. The only things that can hold his attention, other than constant movement, are sleep and building the tracks for his trains. Neither of which he does very often.

One thing he does love is soccer. He gets to run around for an hour kicking things. Right up his alley.

This year his personality has really come into the forefront. He is sweet and hyper and funny and has even begun to make up jokes. Jokes, people. He also likes to trick you, and he likes to hide and jump out to scare you. He picks out his own clothes, and like his dad, prefers t-shirts with comic book characters on them.
He has also developed broken record syndrome. He'll ask the same question over and over until you give a different answer and then he'll say "No, Daddy, its (first answer)!" and start all over again.

He also at that age where we spend equal amounts of time thinking either, "I can't believe how smart you are!" and "I can't believe what a little shit you're being!" Which I'm sure sounds harsh to anybody who doesn't have kids, but incredibly accurate to anybody who does. And keep in mind I said thinking, not saying.

All in all, he is an awesome kid, and I love him a lot. I chalk it all up the the wonderful parenting that my lovely bride offers, as I do not know dick. I have seen the importance of being around, unlike the constant stream of "father figures" that wandered in and out of my childhood. And I am trying real hard to not be the dad that comes home, scolds the kids for what ever they got in trouble for that day, cracks a beer and settles into the barca-lounger to watch sports, because you may as not be there at that point.

The second kid is awesome too, by the way. He seems so much easier than Jackson was. I know that a lot of it is that we have been through it before, but this kid has a completely different personality.

For one thing, Joseph sleeps. Jackson never slept more than 45 minutes at a time until he was over a year old. He still doesn't sleep well, and getting him in bed is still a constant battle.

Joseph is just happy and giggly and bright eyed and perfect. It looks as though he's going to have wavy red hair, too. Which is awesome as long as nobody calls him "ginger balls" later in life.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, JACKSON!

A Big-ass long weekend.

Three day weekend!
Friday I tried to take Jackson to see WALL-E. What I saw of it was phenomenal. Unfortunately, Jackson being almost three and all, couldn't deal with it. We cooked out at our place with the whole family and then tried to go see an air show/fireworks display at the Jenks airport that we read about in the paper I work for that didn't actually exist. Nobody seems to know where the reporter got his info, including the security guard that turned us away at the gate. So we went to a park for a while and waited for the Jenks show to start. It was pretty good, but the little ones(We had Grace and little Zane in tow) once again couldn't deal, so once again we left early. Those of you out there that don't have kids don't realize the full severity of this, but parents are constantly late for things and have to leave early. It's just part of the package.
Saturday, I took Jackson in the morning to see the actual event at the airport, which was a 50th anniversary thing with a bunch of vintage aircraft on display. Some of which you could go in and look around. Jackson had a gfeat time, given the extreme heat.
It was then on to little Zane's 1st birthday party. Zane is an awesome little kid who belongs to Jennifer's sister. He dove into his little cake like crazy. He also got a shit-ton of presents. Everybody had a really good time. During clean-up, I broke a dish. That in itself wouldn't be bad, but I put the broken bits of glass into a trash bag, and while taking out that trash bag, I somehow stabbed myself in the leg. I'm going to guess that the glass bit went about a half and inch to an inch into my calf. There was a bunch of blood that didn't feel like stopping for like an hour. yummy.
Jackson stayed the night at the grandparent's place. Mostly because he fell asleep on the couch about 7:00, and we just left him there to sleep it off.
Sunday we did chores, ate leftovers and hung out at the Mall.
Fun, relaxing and painful.

How was yours?

-

Some clarifications.

I guess I was mistaken on a few points in my last post.
The Hotel Scarlett is staying in is an Extended Stay hotel, so they do have a fridge and a sink and what not. That was my bad. It still doesn't explain very much.
Also, we thought the cousins were going to be here much later in the summer than they were.
Hence, we thought Grace might possibly be here, and it would have been awesome if she were, but we weren't counting on it by any means. Sorry, Grace.


None of this means anything, as the cousins are now gone. They decided that staying in the Ronald McDonald house with their mom would be more fun than hanging out with us.
So be it.


Scarlett is still back east with her mom, and will be until at least another week. So things are a lot calmer now. All sudden-like.


I think we are going to sit tight on the whole Scarlett thing. Only because we do think her mom isn't actively trying to neglect her child, she just doesn't really know how to be a parent. We're hoping she slowly figures it out. Maybe we can help her with that.

-JP