Visiting the grandparents

Singing for Papa and Mama Ross

Soooo happy with Papa!

He still asks to "ride bicycle with Oren?" every time he sees one.

Swimming with Oren....and he still talks about this to. "go swimming with oren..."

"Uncle Oren, how did your muscles get so big??"

Playing with chickens at Uncle Larry and Aunt Linda's!

Chicken eggs.....now that I've seen this pic I realize why he gets so excited every time we pass the eggs at the grocery store. He yells, "Eggs, mama!  Eggs!"

Supper at Big Mama's- Eating with Sunny

At Mimi's now, helping her spray the yard and bringing in the newspaper

Riding the cow!

This child will never pass up an opportunity to "ride tractor"

At the zoo watching elephants with Daddy

Wouldn't stay still long enough for Mimi to get a family picture

Running in and out of the little playhouse at the botanical gardens.

Showing him how to work the toy snake that Mimi bought him

Showing off his VSU tattoo that Oren and Aubrey gave him, he is very proud of it.

Can you tell he is exhausted from running around like a wild man?

Showing Mimi his teepee.

I think Mimi likes it more than Jay  :)

These are the pictures from Jay's week in Georgia while Wes and I were in Florida. He is still talking about everything they did and will just shout out little sentences about something throughout the day. He also wakes up from his naps talking about them so I guess he dreams about the fun they had often. :)

We have had a busy couple of weeks and i don't have many pictures since getting back into town so I will have to keep my camera near this week. This is our first official week of no school which means I am focused on planning activities to keep Jay busy and happy throughout the week. Columbia has so many things for kids which will be what gets us through the summer. It is such a blessing to have so many things to do within 15 minutes, all of which are either free or super cheap. It is overcast today so I am going to take Jay to the children's museum. Tomorrow I will take him to the zoo. Friday night they show free movies in the park where you can take a picnic to and let the kids run around. There is an art studio that has things just for toddlers that Hannah and I are going to try soon. Movies are a dollar every Tues and Thurs mornings for kids. Between this county and the surrounding ones we have festivals just about every weekend. I could go on but you get the picture. I was telling Wes I wish we could just pick up columbia and take it with us to south Georgia. How perfect it would be for columbia to be where Adel is!

I will try to include some of Jay's new skills quickly before he gets up for the day:
- repeats all of my many phrases. When he's trying to think of something to do he will say, "how 'bout...." or "let's see....", usually will say "tank u" immediately followed by "your 'elcome" when I give him something (doesn't realize they are separate comments), he is very quick to say, "sorry!" when we run into each other or he trips over jake.  "get up mama" and "come on mama" are frequent phrases throughout the day regardless of what I am in the middle of. Then he will follow with a command, "walk mama, turn around, sit mama, lay down mama, etc". my least favorite: if I have a toy of his he runs over and yells, "mine mama! mine!" snatches it away and says, "share!"...not quite what I was going for when I started using that word with him.
- When he is doing anything fun he throws his hands up and yells, "YaaaaHoooo!"  He must have learned this in GA because he never did that before that week. We were in Kroger the other day and everytime I would start pushing the cart he yelled it....it was so cute.
- Loves to say the blessing before we eat. If we forget he starts saying, "hands! hands! until we remember. Then we hold hands and Wes and I say "God is great, God is good...." while Jay dances to the beat. Then when we are done he yells, "yay! amen!"
- Still draws and throws with his left hand more than the right. Kurt is thrilled about this and is betting on his nephew being a star baseball pitcher. Wes is worried bc he says it will make fishing and hunting difficult. I am hoping it means he will have some kind of musical or artistic talent that will make me rich one day.
- Loves playing baseball and golf, which is bittersweet to me since Dad would have had so much fun with this. We have been going to Josh's softball games and Jay loves to watch him hit. At home he carries around a bat and hits any ball he can find. When he comes across golf balls he finds anything that resembles a club and beats the ground like a crazy person until he finally makes contact with the ball.
- Loves the "piggy game" with his toes (this little piggy went to the market...), asks for me to sing "one little monkey jumping on the bed..." when he is jumping on the bed and then takes over at the part where the doctor talks. He shakes his fingers and says, "no monkeys jumping the bed!"
- When it's time to eat he "helps" me as much as he can....gets the box/bag of whatever he wants out of the pantry, gets the milk or juice out of the fridge, grabs a spoon, picks out a cup and bowl. It's very sweet until I turn around and see him about to drop the gallon of milk as he says, "heavy" or realize that he has taken the rice krispies bag out of the box and is about to dump the entire bag on my floor.
- With his increasing smartness I am seeing just a glimpse of embarrassing moments to come. When I (or jane or katie) pick him up he points to my chest and says, "mama's boobies! One booby, two booby". When someone is holding him, about half of the time he will confidently point to their nose and say, "boogers!". The other day I was changing Joshua's diaper and Jay walked over, pointed to Joshua and said, "whoa baby wa!  big peepee, baby wa has big peepee!"
- his favorite songs right now are: "row row row your boat", "hush little baby don't say a word...", "the wheels on the bus", "itsy bitsy spider". he asks "mama sing row boat?" or "mama sing mockingbird?"  when he wants to hear them. When it rains he almost always asks "mama sing raining, pouring?"
- Loves watching the mail man and trash men come to the house. He stands in the driveway and waves until they leave, then says "thank you mail man!" "bye bye trash truck" as they drive away.

Well he is awake now and I've been trying to get this finished in the middle of giving him breakfast and keeping him from killing the computer so I will end here. I'll work on getting some pics this week.