Meet Asher Joseph

Michelle and Jesse made a special visit back to Iowa to meet their new nephew Asher, along with a visit with the rest of the family of course. Now, only time will tell if Jaxson will be as happy to share Uncle Jesse when they are visiting...

Uncles

Two of Jaxson's favorite people are his uncles. When they are around Jaxson is all smiles and loves to play with them non stop. Needless to say, they are pretty good at letting their inner kid come out and have so much fun with Jaxson. 

When Jesse is in town from New York Jaxson will spend every minute with him if he could. This most recent trip he really did get to spend so much time with Jesse, which didn't make them leaving any easier. Jaxson spent the night with them at Elaine's twice while they visited and had a special all day outing with just Jesse and Michelle on Friday going to all of Uncle Jesse's favorite Des Moines stores. If Jaxson could have anything he wanted it would probably to be able to hang with his uncles everyday.

Jaxson's Day Out: Build-a-Bear

I wrote awhile back that I found a giftcard for build-a-bear from Jaxson's first birthday. It was such a great time to find the card because it served two purposes. First, it was a great outing for just Jaxson and I. We had so much fun and he said several times that "daddy and asher at home" with a big smile. He was a little shy at first but he laughed and had a great time. He mostly loved picking out clothes for his bear making laps around the store picking out different shirts and pants, but he kept coming back to this one jacket. The 'leather' harley jacket of course. I kept trying to divert his attention to no avail, his mind was made up. He was just trying to find different things Bear needed to wear under the jacket, not instead of the jacket. So... we came home with a harley jacket.


The second purpose it has surprisingly served is helped Jaxson become less scared of the potty. We were doing great when he became very scared of the potty so we backed off and gave him some space to do it in his own time. Well, Bear needed  big boy underwear and so last night when they were getting their pj's on (Bear in his boxers and white shirt) Bear had to go to the potty. Not long after Bear went, Jaxson wanted to sit on the potty himself. The potty session didn't amount to anything but this is a BIG hurdle that we have been trying to overcome and I think Bear might have done the trick. I guess the rather spendy little bear was worth it if it helps our big boy overcome his fear of the potty.

The finished product, Jaxson and his new best friend Bear.

Giving Bear a bath before picking out outfits

 Jaxson and Bear in their pj's and ready for bed

From One to Four..

Luckily Elaine enjoys being a grandma  because she is going from one grandson to three grandson's and one granddaughter by this summer. Can you imagine last Christmas it was only little Jaxson ripping open gift after gift and next Christmas it will be four little ones ripping open gifts and crawling and/or running all over the place! We are growing from one to four with the addition of Asher, and the TWO little ones that Michelle and Jesse will be welcoming in July. She is pregnant with twins, one boy and one girl. We all found out she was expecting awhile back but I wanted to wait to get a belly picture for the blog. What is a blog post without pictures right? And it didn't take long for her to show a belly, with her being petite and now with two babies in there. She is at 22 weeks, already over half way there to meeting them, and finding out what we will get to call them! (And selfishly it is so fun to be able to talk about names without the pressure of having to pick one.) Jaxson will be one lucky boy now having a brother and two cousins to get to know and play with. Now if we could just convince Jess and Michelle to move back to Iowa....

And Elaine better practice where she will fit two more on her lap because that will be one of their favorite places to be. Just ask Jaxson...

Baby Shower for Two

Michelle and Jesse came into town on Wednesday to meet Asher and see all the family. This will likely be the last trip as a family of two with their next trip being made once they have two more in tow. On Saturday we enjoyed lunch and games at Flarah's with a small group for Michelle baby shower. She opened up a few gifts and seeing all the tiny dresses and little boy jackets began to sink in that this was a baby shower for her babies. I remember having a "this is real" moment at Jaxson's baby shower.

(And I stole all of these pictures from Elaine)

My boys and I... I love them

22 weeks on the day of the shower!

 

Some of the best cheesecake I have eaten before!

  

Jaxson thought they were pretty good too.. 

Jaxsonisms

Jaxson: Mommy, I just farted in my mouth!!!
Me: What?!?!
Dave: Did you burp?
Jaxson: Yah!!!!


Oh, how he will hate this blog when he is a teenager.... haha

Jaxson's Day Out: Yogi Bear

We are trying to make sure we do special things with Jaxson on a regular basis so he doesn't feel that his whole world disappeared with Asher's arrival. His first big outing was to Madagascar when Elaine played with Asher for a few hours.  On Friday Dave was looking online and told me he was going to take Jaxson to a movie. I thought it was a great idea. So Saturday was Dad and Jax day and they went to the movies. This was the first time Jaxson has been to the theater and Dave said he did great. They went to Yogi Bear at a theater that shows older movies. Besides the Nova theater is a little cheaper so if Jaxson decided to throw a fit leaving wouldn't be wasting that much money. He came home with a giant smile and said he saw Yogi Barry. (We just taught him our last name so instead of Yogi Bear, it was Yogi Barry) Last night Jaxson was playing movies, he sat a chair in his room and and got a little basket full of "popcorn" and said he was going to the movies. It was a dinosaur movie.. of course.

He was also quite excited about all the 'treats' they got too. He lit up when telling me about all the popcorn and gummy bears they ate. Dave said that he was going through the popcorn faster than him. And if you know Dave, that is a pretty hard feat to take on. The next outing will be Jaxson and Mommy's day out! What will we do....???

I told Dave to make sure to take a few pictures while out so I can have it for the blog. This is the only one I got! So like it or not, it gets put on the blog!! 

Ten Days

 It has been ten days since Asher has arrived and it seems he is growing too quickly. I haven't even had a chance to get any pictures of him and decided today was the day. Dave and Jaxson were out and I rounded up a few things that would work to make a nice background and we were off. He was only about 75% cooperative but I was able to get some I really loved.

St Patty's Day Ride

 It was 70 degrees yesterday so we decided to take the boys to the St. Patricks Day parade downtown. Dave took a long lunch and went with us. We were among the rest of Des Moines it seemed, with the nice weather AND the schools being on spring break it was crazy busy down there. It was also the first time we got out our new ride! I found this sit and stand stroller at the consigment shop that I am in love with (Once Upon a Child) for only $75. It is an older model but was hardly used and they sell new for 200+. It was a huge score! And it works great, it has the bar so our carseat just snaps right in and Jax can sit or stand on the back. And two cupholders is huge. I know it seems small but if I have a drink and Jaxson we don't ever have anywhere to put them both.

Dave and I took turns standing up with Jaxson jumping for candy and beads while Asher was parked on the sidewalk. Dave was much better at beads since he is so tall, I was a little better at scrapping with the kids on the ground for the pieces of candy. I only felt slightly bad about snatching them before the little kid next to me, but not bad enough to not go after them as fast as I could for Jaxson. Asher slept through all the festivities which was good since I didn't really feel like unbundling him and having a bunch of strangers oohing and aahing over the new baby. He was well hidden and safe.  It was a good first family of four outing. :)

The new ride!

Three Short Days

 Just three short days after delivering little Asher, and on my first day home, Dave and I ventured to the Civic Center to take Jaxson to the Madagascar Live show. Call me crazy but I wanted to take him so badly and Elaine didn't mind sitting with Asher for a few hours while we went. I took plenty of Tylenol before leaving the house and I think it helped at least a little bit.  It was tiring but I am so glad I went! It was a great show and Jaxson was so good while we were there. I wouldn't even hesitate for a second taking him to another show or even a movie if something came out that we thought he would like. It was nice to be able to do something with just Jaxson since we hadn't been with him since Tuesday night. He laughed, danced, and sat in awe of the show the whole time. When it was over we headed right home so I could feed Asher, who so politely slept the entire time I was gone and didn't give Grandma any grief at all.

We rented the Madagascar movie to watch before going to the show so Jax could get familiar with the characters. He only half watched it and didn't really seem too interested. We were hoping he would get excited seeing them 'in real life.' Luckily he was still very into the show and loved every second of it. Once we got home then he wanted to watch the movie. Over and over and over again. I was too tired and out of it that I hardly noticed the movie somehow found its way to repeat in the player and he watched it close to 4 times non-stop.

Lookalikes?

I was looking through some pictures of when Jaxson was born to see if the boys look similar. When Asher was born I thought he looked nothing like Jax but now that I went back and looked at some pictures I am thinking they look more alike than I thought. Can you tell who is who?? It probably wouldn't be that hard but just for fun, here is two pictures one of Jaxson and one of Asher both right after being born. I tried to find similar pictures. :) (And if your not sure don't scroll down to Asher's birth story and try to cheat!!) ;)

Bedtime Stories

Jaxson is probably like most kids and gets a couple stories before going to sleep. Last night he was so against going to bed and was crying up a storm. It probably had something to do with his best friend Aubrey coming over and him not wanting her to leave. It was a double bad news, Aubrey left AND he had to go to bed. But through his tears he said that he wanted Asher to lay down with him to hear the bedtime story. We read a book but Jaxson didn't take his eyes off of Asher, holding his hand, stroking his hair, and kissing him on the nose.

Weighing In

Asher had his first doctor appointment today and was given a big thumbs up. He promptly peed right on the doctor, just as his brother had on his first visit. It seems that its like a pre-payback for all the pokes and prods he will have over the next few years.

At birth Asher was 8.8lbs and 20.75 inches long. Leaving the hospital he left right at 8.0lbs. He didn't lose too much, they only begin to worry if they lose more than 10%. Today, six days after his birthday he weighed in at 8.9lbs and is 21inches long. This means he has gained his birth weight plus already, which they allow up to 2 weeks for that to happen. I am not shocked since he loves to eat!

He let me sleep four hours straight last night only waking up at 4am, and 820am. What a sweetie right? :) It seems that my body is already learning that 4 hours is a lot of sleep!
 

Lucky Numbers

Both of my boys seem to have a number that keeps appearing in their birth, which we decided was their lucky numbers. Jaxson's lucky number is 26. He was born on 6.26 at 1:26pm. On top of those coincidences we had hospital room 2026 and Dave was 26 was the time. It seemed that the number 26 kept cropping up over and over again. I hadn't really expected there to be such a number with Asher day but a number kept coming up, and it wasn't his birthday. It is the number 8. He was born at 4:58 pm and weighed in at 8.8lbs. We hadn't really thought anything of all the 8's until we headed to our recovery room, number 3008. I also started going into labor on 3.8 but little Asher just couldn't seem to make his entrance into the world until 3.9, even though he tried his best. It seems silly and maybe most people wouldn't even think anything of it but some reason Dave and I just noticed it and the number 8 just stuck. So when we start TBall time we will have a little number 26, and a little number 8!

Brothers

It is so amazing to watch Jaxson and Asher together. This was something I have to admit I was nervous about. Not that I thought it would go bad, just that I didn't know what to expect and I wanted so badly for it to go well. We made sure after Asher was born Jaxson was the first to meet him with just the four of us in the room. We wanted him to feel special but also to have a moment without the other people fussing over the baby. If he was going to open up it would most definately be with just Dave and I there. He walked in and was a little unsure. Mostly due to me being in the hospital bed still with IV in my arm and other machines. He looked at Asher momentarily and from then on just ignored him pretty much. I made sure nobody pushed him to look, touch, or talk to the baby. I didn't want him to feel pressure and he could do it in his own time. He played with his dinasaur puzzle that Asher got him as a big brother present and he was content just doing that while everyone held and talked to Asher.

Elaine brought him to the hospital on Thursday and he stayed all day. He ran to give me a hug right away, which I was so happy since Wednesday he was too nervous to hug me due to the IV. Then he was so interested in talking and looking at Asher. He smiled and wanted to hold him and kiss him. He was adorable. The first time he sat on the bed with me and held Asher in his lap he sat there and told us all about everything they were going to do together. It made me melt inside. He went on about them playing dinasaurs and many other games. Much of it nobody could understand but you could tell Jaxson was excited and happy for Asher to be his brother. My favorite part was when he said "mommy, daddy, jaxson, and asher go to mommy's house now." He calls home "mommy's house" for some reason. I was so releived he wanted Asher to be home with us.

 This was Jaxson telling us all about all the things Asher and him were going to do together.

Now every morning he runs to see Asher, kiss him on the nose, and ask to hold him. If Asher cries he quickly goes to him anxious to help him feel better. He even came to me today and told me Asher wanted some of mommy's milk. It was adorable. I know the novelty of having such a little person here will begin to wear off but to watch the brotherly love between them grow is more perfect than I could ever imagined.